What am I missing?

When your new I would find a company as close to the house as possible that has a full service terminal, which means they do orientations, work on and assign trucks etc... Then you narrow your choices down by the ones with the best starting pay and fastest pay increases in a 1-2 year period. The shortest training time would also help since most pay crap while training.
No OTR company is going to treat a newbie good. They will test your integrity, and see how much you are willing to do above the law. And see how much bull you are able to handle from OP's. Get your classmates in a row and tell them 2 out of 3 won't make it a year. Also make sure your carrier has well maintained equipment because they give points for everything now days and enough points will get you fired or hard to employ.

 

wow 2 out of 3.....i think we had 10 that went through my school sponsored by cfi last i heard maybe 2 of us are still driving none at cfi and they were a great company to start with back then

 

Myself, I graduate in 2 weeks from school. I have since narrowed my choices of where I plan to go down to 3 companies that will hire "student" drivers. I'd suggest taking what you read here with a grain of salt. In any industry and any company you're going to find people that just don't fit in, and because of that are unhappy. What I chose to do was do some research here, use the FMCSA website to check out the companies, and then go down to the local Pilot and Petro and talk to drivers I saw from the companies I was considering.

Think of it like this...

If you go to a restaurant and have a bad meal, you're going to tell everyone you know that your meal sucked, right? But if you have a great meal there, you're probably only going to tell people when you hear they're going there, and what you had as a suggestion to help them also have a good meal.

It's all about doing your research. Use what you see here only as a place to get names of companies. Then use those names to look up those companies on the FMCSA website ( http://ai.fmcsa.dot.gov/sms/Data/Search.aspx ). Use that site to check for "red flags". Check to see how close a company is to the threshold before the DOT steps in and bangs the company for violations HARD. Once you find a company that doesn't look too bad, go to your local truck stop, pick a day, and just talk to drivers. You'll find MANY that are willing to answer the same questions that they too had before they started driving. I hope this helps you and your class with your employer search and good luck with your classes.

 

MOST of the disgruntled post you see here are from people that were forced into this industry and look at it as a dead end job... those of us that frequent here and give the good info and learn are the ones that love what we do... of course we all have gripes and so on but that is the human nature..

as said above 2 out of 3 won't make it... and you have to earn your way in trucking no one is going to give it to you..

do you pretrips don't pencil whip it... you will get caught and it is on you now with the point system not just the company..

so if you came to the industry by choice welcome and i hope you get what you came for... if you came for a paycheck and really never liked trucking ill see you at mcdonalds or subway or someplace like that

 

Spot on Maxi. Trucking is the same as in life. If you can find something you love to do, you'll never work a day in your life. Granted there are chances to make some good money in this industry but it requires effort. Some just want to be a steering wheel holder then get upset when they learn that there's more to the job than that.

I myself look at trucking as a way to finally start my life. I've wanted to drive the big trucks ever since I spent a summer with my uncle about 25 years ago. Now I get the privilege to work along side professionals like yourself and other's I've spoken with on this forum. I'm very much looking forward to getting out there and doing my part to help show the rest of the country that we are hard working men and women trying to eek out a living for our families by doing things that many people would be terrified to even try.

 

i just thought of this... it really shows you how many steering wheel holders we have, i live in the Pacific North West, and well chaining is a part of life weather it is to get you to safe place to park or run over the mountain i don't care which you do..

but people that refuse to come up here 6 months out of the year cause you may have to throw some iron... i guess i don't mind cause around the holidays i have no problem getting loads that keep me near home..


FCW9 i wish you the best in your adventure here hope to see you out on the road some day

 

Some of the posters also have a less than stellar job history, which is another reason they end up at a bottom feeder.
Like the others said, for the most part, a driving job is what you make of it. You're going to have long bad days, lousy loads, idiot dispatchers, PITA customers at EVERY company out there. It's how you handle the challenges that determine whether you succeed, or become a statistic, as a "former" driver. Or a poster who continually gripes about how company "A" keeps screwing him.