Getting a job with no experience and with outside CDL training

Guess what I heard stories of Black helicopters at scale houses but that's all that was a story. The insurance companies run this industry and if they tell the company to get rid of you or not hire you. That's what they will do. Most companies have on their web site. The hiring requirement, and most list no preventable accident or 1 preventable accident in the last 3 years, and if you got fired/quit because of it. That's another red flag. Yes you can put in apps for trucking jobs, but I would be putting in apps for non trucking jobs as well. The companies that will hire will run you into the ground. They have the worse safe stat score and they are on the verge of being shut down. If they know you can't go anywhere because of your record. They will treat you like crap, and just hope you don't get dinged in the scale house for faulty equipment or falsifying logs. Also the living in Florida thing throws another monkey wrench into it.

 

• We are hiring company drivers with a minimum of 1 year OTR experience
• Must be 23 years old
• No Hazmat needed
• No DUI
• No Possessions
• No more than 3 moving violations in the last 3 years
• No more than 2 preventable accidents in the last 3 years

 

Hmm, yea, Dinomite is right as usual (again : ) with the glaring, unadulterated absolute I completely overlooked. This is a prime example of experience (Dinomite) trumping newbie (me) exuberance. He's dead on with the comment about preventable accidents. Insurance companies call the shots here. Yea, Florida has its challenges and those of us here in the industry as drivers have to work even harder and smarter than most (compared to drivers in other states, save for Alaska and Hawaii) just to land a decent driver job. Take his advice, try for an industry job, wait a few years for the accidents to give you some breathing room on your record, come back, take a refresher course and hit it (no, I take that back, poor choice of words) again (but you know what I mean). Thanks, Dinomite for setting the facts straight.

 

Please excuse me for not fully understanding, but why does the state of Florida seem to be more difficult for professional truck drivers versus the remaining 47 mainland states? Would this include the entire state of Florida, or just certain areas in Florida?

This seems unusual only because there are, give or take, approximately 30 million people who live in Florida, well populated to say the least, from the panhandle to Jacksonville, all the way down south to Miami.

Proportionately speaking, wouldn't there be just as much freight coming in and out of Florida, especially along interstates I-10 and I-95?

 

Florida's population is about 19 or 20 million people. I don't drive yet, but in reading a lot of stuff on here about which states are the best, it seems Florida's not the best place to operate from, at least in part, because it has a small manufacturing base - meaning, to over simplify it, you can get stuff into the state, but you can't get enough out except for ag products, so there's a lot of deadheading or poorly paying outbound loads. Also, Florida's in a corner, which means there's not as much thru-traffic, such as in IL, OH, IN, KY, TN, etc., which provide more opportunities.

Ok, now it's up to those with actual experience to fill in the blanks of my analysis, or contradict me altogether.

 

Mje pretty much got it right. No manufacturing base, mostly goods coming into the state but not out. We used to have citrus but now we can't even produce enough for our own citizens since most of the old groves were bought, built over and now contain subdivisions and condos. We get most of our citrus now from the land of fruits and nuts .. Cali. Drivers can get on here but it's touch to get home time. If you live above the I-4 corridor you have a better chance of a selection of jobs and if you live near Jacksonville where many of the hubs and truck terminals are you won't have a problem. BUT, where there's a will there's a way. I know several drivers living here and working otr but use an address in north Florida and even other states. I belong to a hunt camp in northern Florida and considered using that address but was fortunate to find a local company that takes me to all 48 but then again I had to give up the home time and commit to staying out about six weeks at a time. The further south in you love in Florida the tougher it is to secure a good, decent otr job, at least for newbies. After you have experience more doors open. Another discussion I recently had with another driver in another thread in this forum made me think about what he was saying in regard to the Panama Canal work being done which should inevitably lead to additional work for drivers here in the state once the ports begin getting much busier. Some say Florida is poised for an economic boon in regard to the ports booming with business when this takes place but we'll just have to wait and see.