REAL numbers in leasing a truck: Read before you consider leasing a truck!

As a company driver,who is home every weekend,never close to 70 hours a week,avg 2,500 miles..I grossed about 96,000 with all bennies 100% paid for..4 weeks paid vacation, 8 paid holidays,2 paid personal days....Lets take a little more out of your 86 to take time off,go to the doctor,or dentist..and your 86 cpm gets a little shorter in the comparison...

 

actually it doesn't. My .86cpm is my average to this point including time off. That number is always moving back and forth depending on hometime. .86cpm includes the 0 checks. You may get weekends off, but I take a week to 10 days every 3 to 4 weeks.

my weekly average as far as miles is less than 2,000.

Bennies are great, but I have them through the military so I don't need those through my work.

All in all you have a great job. And you should with 18 years exp. I make above average money and I have just 2 years.

 

yea I'm not gonna lie,I am very fortunate to have this gig..Alot of big companies will starve a driver out to make him lease..if you can make it happen good for you,but most L/P are stacked against the driver..ask yourself this,if there was soooooo much money to be made from being an O/O or L/O why would a company share that wealth with drivers ??

 

Let me guess...UPS feeders? There aren't many company driving jobs that pay $96,000/yr + bennies for a 5 day work week, but that's one of them.

 

Thats hard to answer.

I believe the business plan of some companies are train them, make them lease an overpriced truck for little money, give them little to no discount on fuel so we keep that too and when they quit send them to collections for the schooling they owe and re lease the truck. It's a shame but I believe that.

Then there are the better companies. The ones that realize driver retention is important. I feel they lease for many reasons. Avoid taxes and hire lease drivers as IC. Now that the affordable health care act is here, they can avoid covering the contractors. Of course fuel costs are nothing, and they are still getting paid very well. And, they do care about having good experienced drivers so they can maintain lower CSA scores, attract new customers and settle comfortably into higher rates.

Good drivers come at a premium. There's no way around that. You can either pay them .50cpm + as a company driver or, cut your operating costs, taxes, health care contribution and overall liability and give them fair lease deals.

 

It's a simple answer as to why companies like o/o drivers. They save a ton of money. They don't pay for fuel, maintenance, truck replacement, driver pay, recruitment, or any of another list of costs. They don't pay for health insurance, taxes, unemployment, disability, workman's comp. Shall I go on? They make some money on the trucks they lease, but they make a lot more by getting a driver to go from being an employee to and independent contractor. Landstar and Schneider have gone even further by eliminating dispatchers as well.

What most people don't realize is that whatever you pay an employee you have to add 25% to 30% more to cover the employer taxes. As far as health insurance in most cases an employee only pays about 20-25% of the total monthly premium. So if you pay $200 a month your employer is paying at least $800-$1000.

Here is a thought for all the company drivers who think people like myself are foolish. Many if not most companies were started by someone like me. A guy with a single truck, a little business sense and a dream. He worked hard, made a lot of sacrifice and now many years later his reward is to let you make money for him while he finally gets to put his feet up and relax. If he treats you well it's because he remembers what it was like on the road and wants you to have it better than he did. The trade off is that you will stick around and take care of yourself, his equipment and his customers because you have a pretty good gig and want to keep it.