New User. 30/ Female/ Moncton, NB.

Don't forget H and R!

 

Gotta wonder where some of these replies are coming from?

I was a newly licensed female driver in NB 5 years ago and as such, I feel like I have a valid point of view on trying to find work here.

First, I'm not aware of a single company on the East Coast that will assist with or pay for school. Since they can't take your class 1 away if you break a work contract and leave, they (rightly, in my opinion) won't pay for the course. Your license is your responsibility. You may find a company with a hiring bonus, because they can recoup that if you break their contract. Make sense?

As far as the recommendations listed here, most of these carriers don't run east of Montreal, or they don't hire new drivers, or both.



I have never seen a Bison, Manitoulin or Sanjel truck on the East Coast. Challenger occasionally advertises looking for teams, but there is no terminal out here and as such, they expect you to be gone much longer than most jobs. I'm not sure they take new drivers for those positions, either.

Schneider doesn't run freight out east, I am in and out of their terminal in Montreal quite often!


Midland/Sunbury/RST will take a new driver on an internship and then tell you to apply back in 5 years. The schools in NS and NB shamelessly continue to provide free, no-obligation labour to these companies owned by the mega-millionaire Irving family.

Armour says they hire new drivers, but their recruiter Chassity Dunphy at Driver's Overload has lied to me personally and a few other female drivers to avoid hiring us. As far as I know, their company drivers are all men. They may have some female brokers onboard with their O/O division, Pole Star. I presume if you don't have the cash for a course, you're probably not in a position to buy a truck.

Day and Ross hardly ever hires company drivers around Halifax or their Hartland terminal, since they are a predominately O/O fleet (on this coast, at least.)

Keep in mind that Woodstock, NB is called "the trucking capital of Canada" because there are more drivers and companies per capita than any other city in the country. You're very fortunate to live only 3 hours from there.

Here are some companies that might return your calls (for work, not financing):

Connor's Transfer in Pictou, NS and with a new terminal in Woodstock, NB. The recruiter there was the fellow who hired me (at a different company) so he isn't opposed to the notion of women driving, like some companies. They mostly F/L reefers up and down the eastern seaboard to and from Sobeys. Their trucks also do the store deliveries for Sobeys in Atlantic Canada. I hear they are like any other company from a few friends who work there, good weeks and not-so-good weeks, pressure to "maximize" your log sheets, etc. They advertise great pay (anything over $.40/mile here is a rare thing, indeed.)

Ayr Motor in Woodstock, NB. I've never heard anything good about them but they do take some newbies.
Apparently the owner, Joe, is a REAL piece of work. He is known among drivers for smashing the glass in his window with his phone receiver and being an all around, first class arsehole. They slip seat all their company drivers, so be prepared to live out of a duffle bag and take your TV under your wing every time you arrive back at the terminal. There's a guy waiting with his suitcase and TV in the yard when you arrive, and you are assigned a hostel room to take your hours off while they line up another truck for you. I was told they'll pressure you to stay gone for 6-8 weeks, and that their NB drivers only get loads to the Winnipeg terminal, and that their western drivers end up stuck in New Brunswick constantly. A broker there wanted to hire me for one of his trucks, and when I asked him if they run legal he assured me did, and in the same sentence he told me was driving from Woodstock to North Carolina (1400 miles) in a single shot. No thanks.

McConnell Transport in Jacksonville, NB (5 mins from Woodstock) definitely hires students out of school and trains them with an experienced driver. Being female, however, is certainly not helpful as they will only place you with a female trainer. As of last year, they had at least 1 qualified female trainer, but there may be a waiting list of female candidates if there is still only her. They routinely lie about drivers who used to work there to their new employers and then will call you offering a job, after messing up your chance for another job. Classy. Myself and 2 friends were in that position, but McConnell's reputation speaks for itself and no one believes what they say about their past drivers. They run Florida all winter and use that to lure us pasty, white Canucks to come work there, but I was there a year before I ever got to go while they have drivers who are there a few weeks and do nothing but Florida. Favouritism is RAMPANT, I could only squeeze an average of 1800 miles a week over the 1.5 years I worked there, and I stayed out much longer than the 10 days most guys did. The rationale was that men have families and bills, whereas women are just making extra money and thus don't need to earn as much. The problem, of course, was that no one pays my bills but me and $350 a week won't cut it.

GTL in Dartmouth hires students, as well as drivers who have rolled trucks, failed drug tests and have 6 pages of violations on their abstract. They routinely hire drivers who are fired from the company I work for and don't call for a reference. They have brokers there who may hire you as we'll.

SDS in Dartmouth hires new drivers and has a handful of female drivers. They are worth calling, as they are expanding in Moncton, although their main office is in Dartmouth. They have local work, regional Line Haul and runs between Ontario, Montreal and Atlantic Canada. They don't go to the USA, so you can do longer days and fewer resets. I hear people say bad things about the company, but when pressed for information they are usually just repeating what they heard, or we're fired. One guy filled my ear about what a BS company they are, etc etc. When I started there, I mentioned his name to my boss (just stating that we had worked together for a while) he roared laughing and explained that the guy was hired as a shunter, but he refused to crank the dolly legs up or down. ($13/hr wasn't enough for that, I guess?) and ripped the landing gear off of 2 loaded trailers by dragging them around the yard on the ground. Did a number on the pavement, too and got his butt fired.

A coworker went to Brookville Carriers out of school, working for a broker. She had a tire blowout in the USA and the broker replaced it and then held her entire paycheque. The company representative said it wasn't their problem, since the owner was a broker it was his call. Apparently there were 3 owners of the truck who all collected a paycheque from it and the driver only gets paid if there's enough AFTER their cut. I personally know the recruiter there and he comes from a family of car salesmen and doesn't enjoy much popularity among people who know him. Oh, but he's a good Christian, if that matters to you.

Just a little insight from where I'm sitting.

Good luck, feel free to ask me anything or of anyone has any input, I'm more than willing to listen!

 

Don't forget about keltic transportation right there in moncton they take a few new drivers outta school a year, thats where I work and couldn't be happier there is no shortage of miles if you wanna run them and sitting is rare.

id pick them over ayr, or maconnel anyday. I'd stay away from midland/sunbury they have focred dispatch you turn Down A load its too the bottom of the list you go that and they're fine with you breaking their rules while it suits them but you break them they didn't ask you too they won't think twice about firing ya its the Irving way.

 

Saturday Sinner and Sunday saint.


Very good post 2 Girls

 

You're right about Keltic, they hire new drivers out of Moncton. I applied there as well but they told me I needed to complete an internship to be hired, and I took the shorter 6 week course. I have a friend who worked there back in 1999 for a few years and absolutely loved it, he only left because he was diagnosed with cancer.

RIP Danny.

 

Pack up and move out west

 

Say what you want about Midland, Day and Ross, Sunbury ..... etc etc ....... the Irving's and the McCain's have put a lot of food into a lot of mouths over the past 100 years.

Princess, last I heard Armour Group had a good program set up for apprenticeship.

http://www.armour.ca/en/

Where are you planning on going to school ?

 

The only thing I said about any of them is that they take interns and let them work for free for 4 weeks and then refuse to hire them because they have no OTR experience. Whether the Irvings provide jobs in the province or not has nothing to do with their abusing unpaid internships with no intention of leading into paid work. In my opinion, this practice should be stopped and any company caught doing so should be barred from participating in any future internship placements. Schools and companies are accepting government monies to train WORKERS, not volunteers. They put food in mouths and gas in tanks, yes. They are also obscenely wealthy from feeding the mouths and tanks so I don't really feel that it's off limits to point out how unethical they are in some of their hiring practices.

Day and Ross lost the McCain's contract and has recently given notice to their 3rd party contractors that they will be waiting much longer to be paid for their work because of massive restructuring. For that reason, we will no longer bid on their loads and I'm sure we're not alone. So new-hire prospects might not be that great at this time. I also pointed out that they are mostly O/Os around the Maritimes.

I also addressed my experience with and named the recruiter for Armour, who also used to be the recruiter for Sunbury 6 years ago. I wish any new, female drivers the very best of luck with her. I've been told bold faced lies on two separate occasions and for that reason wouldn't even consider applying there now that I can work anywhere I want. They are virtually ALWAYS trying to find drivers even though they pay decently and you can work 4 on 4 off. That speaks volumes, in my world.

 

Those are good posts. I was a broker with the Irvings MANY years ago. The experience was good. But a lot can happen in 20 years since I left. There was no such thing back then of apprenticeships in trucking or foreign worker placement plans. I'm sorry to here some of your experiences have been less then stellar. I knew a young lady company driver from Midland. She was from the Quebec City area. 20 yrs ago she was working in mans world driving for the Irvings. That fiery little 80 lb red head could back B Trains into places that would shame many a large mouthed man doing the same job.

I've been all over the world and seen a lot of tragic stuff. I don't care who you are, what color you are, what gender you are (or were !), what God you like, etc etc .... if you are a good person, and have a good work ethic, and are community minded, then yer OK in my books.

Opps - sorry for the rant - what was the topic again ?

No really - sorry - I heard from a buddy last night (29 May '14) that Walter MacDougall out of Lancaster, ON is looking for some hot shot drivers M/F Eastern US and CDN work

'Luck

 

https://www.eassons.com/careers/internship-eassons