Off to a great start with Prime!

Good luck, man. Stay away from the lease. Contrary to popular belief, you can make pretty decent money here on the company side running strictly solo.

 

What Does Prime Test For On The Skills Portion? Alley Dock, Straight Line Back, etc.

 

Just noticed your sig line, 123456.

Couldn't agree more

 

Music ive you seen you get beat up more than a few times on this forum for your choice in companies and it seems like your not totally sure what your going to make here. Keep in mind, im sure that youve figured out by now that we get a rashion of crap mostly becuase were in everybody's way at our speed, they get held up by prime truck during the day and want to tell primes prospects that theyre making a huge career mistake that evening on the forum. You sure can make $800-900 net not gross here. New guys are starting at 42cpm. When you get assigned an f.m. they will expect you to cruise at 56-58 this makes 1.5cpm fuel bonus very realistic putting you at 43.5cpm. Look to make somewhere between $1000-$1500/year in extars ie. drop pay, detention, layover, etc not including fuel bonus. So if you make $50000, $1000 or so will come from the extra pays i mentioned thus you will need to make $49000 off your miles including fuel bonus. So....$49000 divided by 43.5cpm=112600mi/per year...divided by 52 weeks = 2166mi/per week. This is pretty attainable. Keep in mind thats in paid miles not odometer miles seems im averaging 94% of all odometer miles being paid which puts you at 2300 actual odometer miles 2304miles x 94% = 2166 paid miles. Still very realistic. Out of that $50000 after per deim tax credit you will have to itemize your taxes but with no other deductions(mortgage interest on a home, child tax credit, etc) other than per deim expect to pay about $8000 in taxes if your claiming single on taxes. This is based off my experience your state may tax more or less than mine though. So out of that $50000 - $8000 in taxes = $42000 net divided by 52 weeks = $807 net/week. Note these numbers are attainable and alittle conservative. Also, do look to be in the northeast when you go solo even if you dont do the northeast regional. You wont get stuck there while your teaming with a trainer the runs are too short for a team truck.My first six months here i spent out there and by that i mean hometime to hometime the only time i wasnt in the northeast was when headed home or headed back out, and i have never been a northeast regional nor have i ever been paid any extra pay for northeast runs. Man that first six months was rough but it passed i dont go out there much now. This doesnt happen to all new drivers but it seems to happen to many of us when we start here at prime. Keep in mind if this happens to you, i found the best way to get out of it is make note of it to your f.m. be friendly and play the politics game here "hey ive been in the northeast for two weeks ever since i left home, but im not a northeast regional, whats going on?". Theyre likely response will be were very short on trucks up there thats were we need you. Respond with "sure illl help you out" keep in mind your the new guy, prime doesnt have seniority but you just walked in off the street you may have to do the stuff nobody wants to do at first, but that goes with any job or career field. When you find yourself up there for two weeks straight the 2nd time have the same exact conversation with your f.m. again finish "ill help you out" and the third time do the same again "ill help you out". Now by the forth time or so youve now made note to your f.m. that youve "helped" them out now you can say look ive helped you now its time for me to get out of the northeast with alot more leverage than if you either had never had discussed this with the f.m. before, or if you had and you tried to let them have it so to speak. Like i said doesnt happen to everybody but it does happen to it will pass. So many want to come into this industry off the street and want to have the best pay, all the perks, roll around in a palace with wheels, and dont want to have give up anything for it. Prime's been a great company to work for once i got my first six month out of the way.

 

Holly crap sorry for the long post i cant believe i wrote all that