CRETE - A Year in Review

May not be the only thing going before it is all said and done. Cannot really speculate right now. Time will tell.

 

Just curious but did you discover it by seeing the guage drop, hear it while walking around, or something else?

 

You could hear air moving through the brake valve in the dash(red knob). When it took longer than a few seconds to stop hissing after I released just the trailer brakes, then got out and listened. My 1st thought before I got out was the glad hand seal was leaking, but once I found that it wasn't leaking, I just walked to the back, and then you could hear it. If I went by a DOT cop, he would have shut me down. Then just had to crawl around and figure out if it was an air valve or brake chamber.

 

What now that they lost hershey they are going to drop the shaffer name? i knew they wanted to at one time but it was the only way hershey would keep them was the shaffer name. he also said he hasnt pulled from budweiser in over a year. They lose that too? no great loss if they did i wasn't so keen on them but it was better then pulling from Nestle there in Ga.

 

I think we still pull Bud-dummer from time to time. I haven't seen one in about 4 months, but we still get some now and then. They still have the Shaffer name, they just combined Crete and Shaffer's names on the door sign, since we were both under the same DOT number, they can do that legally. They just issued the ugly aced 75 anniv logo'd blue Prostars a few months ago, and I saw an info-article about it in one of the trucking mags right after, so I think the Shaffer name is going to be around. A year or so ago, one of the Crete's VP's was promoted to President, or CFO or some high ranking title at Shaffer.

 

Sitten in hotel room in OK City. A/C again! I just got it out of the shop in Wilmer with new compressor, expansion valve and all o'rings replaced. It worked really well yesterday when I picked up and today when I left the yard. But about an hour into a 4.5 hours day it started blowing hot air again???? Man it's hot. Dash thermo said up to 102* at times. Bummer because I will probably lose this sweet load (900+ miles with 5 stops!)

 

I think that is the 2nd truck this week that came out of Wilmer with a/c failure after having it worked on there. I hope my new brake chamber doesn't fall off before I get rid of it.

 

I should have taken Ms. T up on the loaner offer. Maybe I could have swung one the new trucks sitting out back.

 

i got the preplan load offer today and had to turn it down. It had me driving after my 14 hours. The dispatcher calls me and I tell her about my 14 hours and that I'll run illegal but I charge extra for that, she didn't even know where I started today, She told me that was all they had today and there were other drivers she could give it too, I told her fine and I'll take the day off.
I scope out hotels and am leaving the Loves and I get a message from the ops manager about how I could be out of hours after a reset. I do the facepalm thing, I tell him I have tons of hours on my 70 but a reset doesn't help my 14 hours and that I'd gladly pick up a load as long as I'm done by 19:00. No reply.... An hour or so later I ask him where all the load offers are and the area dispatcher tells me I was put out of service because I had no hours. I ended up with the tightest load ever, I really have to watch my liquid intake in the morning kind of load.
I called dispatch to try to "talk" to the so called woman who put me out of service, but the coward answered on the quallcom.
I think she explains the Cretmart driver sitting in the walmart lot, along the fence, where I picked up my empty, I pretended to run straight into his truck while looking down, he didn't even see me, then while I pretripped my empty I was waving my hands at him. All he did was fall asleep like a kid in church, you know his head falling forward.
My Kenny must have had the day off.
BRRRR!!!! it's cold in here.

 

I sent my app in to Landstar last week via their website. I'd always heard it took months and months to get approved there, so I did it before I had my truck refi signed and in place. I was approved for the loan, mind, just hadn't signed all the paperwork and actually switched everything over yet.

Monday I got a flurry of emails from Landstar. With attachments like "Landstar Inway Lease Agreement & Equipment Receipt.pdf" and "Workers Comp App.pdf" and "Tag Request Form.pdf" and "Unladen CMV Insurance App.pdf" and "Physical Damage - Optional.pdf" and "Documents List.pdf" and "Approved Urinalysis Collection Sites - GA.pdf" and "Approved DOT Inspection Sites - GA.pdf"

Among the documents requested are a copy of my truck title, a letter from my lender saying the truck payment is current, my long form DOT physical, my Form 2290 with an IRS "Paid" stamp in my name (this one's in my permit book at the moment), and so forth.

It would appear that by the end of July, I won't be pulling Crete trailers anymore.

It was great for the first year, maybe year and a half. Then it became a constant battle with dispatchers to get productive miles. And continuous headaches with Crete's customers - like the one in Breinigsville, PA that won't release an empty trailer until 10+ hours after they have you drop your loaded one. Or the same customer's location in West Jefferson, OH. Or the grocery warehouses.

I tried to stay positive, but it's hard when Crete has been systematically doing away with every single attribute that drew me here and kept me here during some fairly rough stretches. Like Load Select. And decent productive loads. Mind you, I consider a 500-mile run over 24 hours fairly productive. Or, if I'm empty at 5pm, a 300-mile load that picks up this evening and delivers by noon tomorrow. That sort of thing. What I couldn't put up with was 274 miles with 28 hours between pickup and delivery, with a bunch of "DO NOT DELIVER EARLY" notes in the load info. That's become the norm. They can keep them. I also noticed Crete is hanging onto older trucks longer, and then asking a LOT more money for them when they do sell them. There went the decent deal on a truck. In any case, I'm done.