The truth about heartland.

Sorry to hear about all the difficulty seekingwork101....

If there is a silver lining here it is.. in my opinion .. working for Walmart is overrated. . I would not like it there .. too regimental. .

As for taking crap from office personnel .. well usually it is the other way around .. I am a big boy and have been thru enough in my 57 years to enable me not to take crap from anybody..

Heck.. if they were going to fire me anyway I might as well adjust some attitudes...

Averritt express was like that and I had to exit in style and they have never prevented me from getting hired anywhere..

All they say on my dac is that I would be eligible for rehire but would be against company policy...lol

After I explain what happened I always get quite a chuckle from my new employer followed by a request not to do that again...

I have only been fired 1 time. I took that employer to the labor board and won my case and a good size judgment which I never collected..

You can defend yourself...

Good luck.. it gets better .

As far as my staying or leaving heartland during our transition only time will tell.

Not planning on driving that much longer anyway.

 

Added paragraphs for readability. seekingwork101 said (msg #58):

O.K. It seems to me not too many readers on this forum believe me, when I say that Heartland Express will prevent you from getting hired by other well respected companies. They will write in your DAC record untrue phrases,
which by the way, can take months to clear up with Hire Right. That is the company that keeps your working record history.

They (Hire Right) will NOT change anything in your record without the express permission from those who put it in your record. The best that you can do is submit a complaint to them, stating the facts as you see them. Your adversary, in this case Heartland Express, inc. of Iowa, will respond to them, taking their sweet time to do so.

In response to your question.......Or rather statement to the effect that Heartland has nothing to gain by ruining your good driving record, All I have to say is, that they do it because they can, because they are vicious, nasty,
unethical in their behavior, and just because they can.

You may say......And what did you do do to piss them off to such degree? A top ten account load could not be delivered on time due to an engine problem. At the time they thought my husband just didn't want to make the delivery, which was not true. This resulted in bringing down a percentage of their "On Time Delivery" for the month---Affecting the review for the fleet manager, and the boss, at the time: (Jay Courtney and Cliff).

They concocted a plan with the safety Dept., since they could not find any other violations, stating that my husband's records were "historically unsafe" How a trucking co. can make such statements when the driving record of said employee is absolutely perfect, is beyond my level of understanding.

To this day I see them as a bunch of spiteful, lying, unethical thieves---who will stop at nothing to apply revenge on those who have been detrimental to their bottom line. (Even if the detriment in question was not the fault of the driver, nor was this incident manufactured for selfish motives----Or any other reason, than the fact that the engine stopped working when it did.

There is more to the story, but this is the short version. So....Would I ever recommend anyone to work for this company? My resounding answer will always be: NO!!! Unless, of course, you wish to find yourselves in the same predicament we are in, today. Many blessings to all, and to all a very happy Thanksgiving!!!!

 

Added paragraphs for readability. seekingwork101 msg #60:

Thanks, Tow614 for your kind sentiments and opinions.

I'm sorry I have to differ with you regarding employment with a new company, as long as your record is clean. Yes.....There are companies that will employ you, no problem. However, those are NOT the type of companies where someone with a twenty year experience will necessarily want to work.

The most sought after companies such as Walmart will NOT hire a driver, based purely on a log-book violation. Which by the way, Heartland describes in the DAC as a "falsification". My husband, always thinking that for official purposes such transgression would be classified as a "violation", proceeded to describe it as a "violation". Subsequent to the face to face interview; where all questions and road test went well, my husband was advised that he would be hired, pending receipt of Heartland's report.

Once they received the report, approximately two weeks after the interview, he received a phone call from Walmart Headquarters. The news was that my husband could NO longer be considered for employment with Walmart due to the report from Heartland Express. There was only one word for which my husband was NOT Hired: "Falsification of records"

How anyone can describe in an official record a transgression involving fractions of a mile as a "falsification" is beyond my level of understanding. On top of that, Heartland had the gull to also state that my husband's driving record was unsafe. What????????? Excuse me????? How can anyone describe a perfectly clean record, with not as much as a traffic violation, nor any accidents or incidents, or even a speeding ticket.......As an unsafe record?

If anything, my husband was fired for being overly cautious.

He, along with all drivers on the George Washington Bridge in NYC., had to come to complete halt. Nobody moved for a few minutes, and subsequently everybody started to move very slowly. While NO traffic was moving at all, he pressed the wrong button to save a few minutes, walking around the truck to find out what was wrong. Accident perhaps? Well.....Those few minutes cost him his job.....

The moral of the story is that if you try to help the Operations Dept., (which my husband did) you are on your own. They push loads down the throats of drivers. All they care about, is the board. Will it show that we are at 99% on time delivery? If not....There will be hell to pay if a top ten account load is NOT on time.

Just so that you keep this in mind....Operations will concoct a legitimate story to fire the driver. Yes.....That is how it works. You scratch my back, I'll scratch yours. Anytime that Operations wants to apply revenge on a driver for committing such an infraction, if they can't find a legitimate reason to fire the driver-----They will seek the assistance of Safety---who, of course, will do their bidding.

In my humble opinion, I'd keep a diary of every phone call. Better yet, tape your conversations with them. As for coming home on time and demanding that they keep their end of the deal once approved, don't tell them in advance what you intend to do. Just go home, keep a record of the incident, and make sure you have another job waiting.

You should know that if you are to one day be called into the "office", they will call you to fire you. Demand a record of the reason for which you are being fired. Demand in writing the reason for same. They will NOT write down in front of you, why you are being fired. You have the right to obtain that while in the office. Don't accept their" Is all right: You will get it in the mail, etc. Try to record the entire interview, and tell them that you are doing so for posterity.


This above mentioned advice is not just for you. Is for all Heartland Drivers. Had my husband done just one of the above, he would not have been fired as easily. Only because if the taping of the interview ever goes to court, they will treat the driver with respect. The guy representing "Safety" was belligerent towards my husband. Screaming, confrontational, yelling at my husband and being disorderly. Would he have exhibited such behavior knowing that the exit "Interview" was being taped? Of course....NOT.. These people need to come across a driver who is prepared, who is not intimidated, and with whom they cannot play games. Enough said.

 

I haven't read all the replies yet, but in response to the last one, from Victor_V, is pretty accurate.

Will try to keep my long story personal experience short as possible.

They will lie on the DAC report.

Back in the days with paper logs, you had to balance delivering on time without getting love letter in the mail from log department.

Of course no 1 issue leads to driver getting fired. But final issue with myself was them requesting over 800 miles to be delivered within 20 hours (no time for 10 hour break?).

I'm always on time, and have no chargeable accidents or tickets. I always run my hours to the max and don't turn down anything or complain. But when there is no legal hours to run something on-time, I tell dispatch immediately about it. I'm very big on communication (which is why I have a GREAT relationship with my wife now for last 8 years).

The day might come with dispatch says Safety needs to talk to you. It could either be to fire you that day, or try to write you up on something and make you sign a paper admitting what you been doing wrong and how your going to fix it. If your not fired that day, you will be soon, because they are making a paper trail to get rid of you since they obviously don't like you for once reason or another.

If they bring you in to find things to write you up on, one of the things they like to look at is your log book on the computer. Not sure how much info they have about your logs on the computer, but they know when you were moving or not. They'll try to say that they saw you sit for 36 hours over the weekend, and thats not being productive. Yeah well, when they give you 600 miles on Friday, and you finish those miles by Saturday night with Monday appointment, the truck isn't gonna move for that much time. And when you ask dispatch to drop the load somewhere and pick up another one for more miles, they just say sit on it for Monday appointment. Sure, their accusation sounds serious, until you realize the whole picture. After going back 2 months worth of logs and unable to prove anything wrong doing, they gave up and tried to make a generalized statement to sign which can give other false impressions.

So now on my DAC report from Heartland says "Communication and Performance Failure". Other companies that read that DAC report refuse to hire until been employed again for 1 year. The companies may either just not reply or answer your phone calls once they find out, or if your lucky they'll be honest and tell you what Heartland put on your DAC report. This is cause I refused to run a double log book. When they fire you for that reason, they will tell you that they "have drivers willing to do what it takes" wink wink double logs.

There are other issues with the company as well, such as flipping your sleep schedule every other day in order to cover their high value loads like Sears and FedEx. Home time for System suppose to be every other weekend, but they come up with excuses why you have to stay out for an extra week (over and over). For example, how can you be in NJ with no loads going west? What are all the loads going south, wtf? And you have to go home with a load, which dictates when you come back to work again. So if the load has only 12 hours to spare before delivery appointment, then thats how much time you get at home, out of a 36-48 hours that you were suppose to get at home. Doctors and Dentist appointments are nearly impossible to keep since you can't rely on them to get you home when asked.

They really do treat their drivers like crap.

Some how they think 60% turn over is a good rate. Compared to those mega carriers it probably is good. Only reason anyone sticks around and put up with the bs is for the higher cents per mile than other companies.

Don't let Heartland get mad at you, cause they will find a way to burn you in the DAC report and spin the story in a way that prevents you from getting hired elsewhere. Not that they are the only company that does that, but yeah you been warned.

 

Your exactly right.

No matter how good of a driver you are, with perfect driving record, and professional attitude, there can be things beyond your control that makes late delivery on one of their top ten accounts. Things like engine trouble, flat tire, etc. Its about their On-Time delivery percentage, and to save their own skin, they will burn the driver. Even if they can not find any other violations anywhere else, they'll still find an excuse to fire you, and burn you in the DAC report. Probably in review for Fleet Manager and Boss, they can put in the report that the issue was resolved by terminating the driver, to make themselves look good.

Anyways, in order to make themselves look good when their top ten account on-time percentage dropped, they decided to terminate a very good driver that always delivers time without accidents or tickets. My attitude is always 'professional'. I never complain, raise my voice, or curse anyone out. I don't call dispatch with stupid questions or stupid complaints. I always ran my hours to the max when possible (if they gave the miles). They'd rather lose a good driver than lose their bonus. Dispatch and Safety are nasty and unethical!

Heartland has some prized high value accounts like FedEx and Sears. You must deliver them on time without any excuse. Its inevitable that some day there will be mechanical or other issue out of your control. No matter how much they like you now, they will still stab you in the back later to save themselves. They can't be trusted. They will burn you.

Off Topic: I never did like the attitude of Safety while personally visiting Iowa. Been so long, I can't remember specifics, except bragging about their military experience, not afraid of the drivers, etc. Yelling at newly recruited drivers like we done something wrong already, and drivers are bad. Whatever, I just smile and kept my mouth shut.

 

HappyHardCore, you're actually responding to seekingwork101, msg #58 and 60. I added paragraphs for readability since I thought there was a lot of good info that readers would otherwise miss.

Thx for adding your corroboration of HTLD retaliating on DAC/HireRight.

 

Happyhardcore..... like to know the story behind that handle ... lol

Thank you for your input.. we at Gordon are facing a difficult decision.

Do we stay and see what happens or do we go before we have a chance to get burned...

I realize all companies have former employees who have bad things to say about them... the thing that is still troubling me very much is the absence of drivers defending heartland or even saying anything good..

Yes I read 1 or 2 posts that were positive but grading on a curve I must drop them off leaving a lot of negative.

While I am continuing forward for the moment it is not at full speed. I recognize danger ahead and I am proceding cautiously.

Thanks again.

 

Thank you! Exactly my experience!

 

I notice that you are new here...would you care to elaborate further on what experience you speak of and what you are currently doing..

 

http://www.thetruckersreport.com/tr...o-about-heartland-express-13.html#post3681877

Page 13, I have described my experience thus far.