Have to start somewhere

I am almost in the same spot bruned out yes I my am a lab manager/tech an work for people who are unrealatic about life and add to my job week always changing the reuls and may be downsized if work dose not pick up so monday i am giveing my two weeks. then i go to school on the 7/7

I am looking at Arrow, TMC, and KLLM, if you have work with one Plaese give me some help. I unlike most dont need to be home weekend and like the idea of long haul and Flat bed.

As for auto vs. manul Amen you steer an auto you Drive a Manul.

 

Of those 3 I would go with TMC.

 

why
the trucks i here there great.
will I make it if i will not run illegl?
have you worked for TMC

 

I have never worked there , but I have heard a lot better things from them then the other 2.

 

GOT A ? gOT MY LICENSE, NO JOP. AM 60 YO. HAVE A LOT OFUNEMPLOYED TIME IN THESE 10 REQUIRED YEARS. WAS TOLD MY WORK HISTORY WAS HURTING ME. TODAY SOMEBODY SAID JUST FILL IT IN WITH 'self employed"! WHAT DO YOU THINK? I'M GETTING READY TO GIVE UP ON TRUCKING DO TO SURVIVABILITY FACTORS.

 

I live in Phoenix, male, 56, divorced, no kids. I was thinking of going with Swift until I found this forum and read all the nice words about them. I have a class B with passenger and school bus and, since bus charters are way down due to fuel prices, thought I would learn to drive a long vehicle that actually bends in the middle (maybe not quite the middle but, you know what I mean). I love driving 45' buses but, I need to make a living. School buses are OK but, I need more than 30-35 hours a week to live decently.
Can anyone familiar with the Phoenix area steer me in the right direction concerning getting a class A with all the goodies and also who to work for starting out? I'm not rich and will probably have to save some $$ before starting any type of school so I can pay bills while learning.
Any help will be very much appreciated. Real name is Ray by the way.

 

The thing I really don't get is why Maverick let Daytona go when they did. I'm not going to go back and check the dates but if I remember correctly it was months after his last issue that he was let go. It was even longer since he had done anything which caused any damage to equipment. I can understand getting rid of someone if you consider them to be a high risk but why wait so long?

I also don't get the safety points quota thing. It would make sense to me to assign points and to use the amount of points as a gauge but what about other factors. People are human and #### happens. I would think you would look at each case and the circumastances to base a decision, not just a number. To think that what is apparently one of the better companies would let a very experienced driver with many years of no issues go after say a couple of 1mph over speeding tickets in OH and a blond moment in logging is ridiculous. But from what I'm reading that is exactly what would happen.

I'm so glad I don't work for a big company

 

That buddy of mine from my home town that mav let go because he racked up too many points in a year went to pulling a reefer. He did not last a month. Said they where always on him and hassled him a lot. If he stopped to take a leak they wanted to know why. Said he worked a lot harder and made less than what he did with maverick and no one ever hassled him at maverick and he was there a little over a year. Mav was his 1st trucking company.

This is what I have tried to tell you newbies. You have to know the difference between a bad company and a good one to compare them. Yet some of you claim that I have nothing bad to say about maverick. That is because the good out weighs the bad. All companies will have their downfalls, but I know the difference because I started doing this back in the 80's and have driven for 5 different companies not counting the army.

I have had issues with mav and as I have said before it is with a CSR. The ones who book our runs. This week I got jerked around and should have got home thursday instead of friday, but I am not going to quit over it. This is trucking and to many things are unpredictable. They have treated me very well as I have posted before where other companies would have said too bad don't like it? Leave.

Mav is hard to get thru the hiring process, they hire about 2 % of those that they interview. Several things will get you tossed out the door. Most of that is respect. They catch you bad mouthing a employee and your gone. They won't tolerate a FM trashing a driver nor will they allow a driver to do the same. Make a suggestive comment about one of the women and see what happens to you. They even say on their website they are looking for a certain breed and many can't be mavericks.

It is hard for a new driver to break into this industry. Many including me have made a lot of mistakes and moved on to other companies and took our lessons with us. Pick a bad company and the odds are already stacked against you, the wrong starter company is just the icing on the cake. Check out all companies from all angles. Then you decide what is best for you, just don't blame others that try to help you along the way....

There are good companies out there, you just have to pick the right one.

 

good post, for a flapjack flyer!

and every bit of it true.