A newbie at CFI

Ok, I just got done with a 4-month stint at CFI. I was fresh out of CDL school, and did a lot of research here and on other sites & eventually hired on at CFI. Here's the impression i walked away with.

Pros:
* Well-maintained equipment
* Knowledgable and friendly trainers (well mine was anyway)
* 2-week additional training program at Crowder College was very educational.
* Allows pets
* Flexible passenger policy
* Pays per-mile during training
* Pays weekly
* 13-speed transmissions
* Doesnt care (or notice) when your logs dont quite add up


Cons:
* Horrible country music on hold (you will spend a lot of time on hold)
* Merged with con-way who only really seems interested in putting their name on everything (but this may be a good thing)
* Very little home-time
* Doesnt pay for idle-air
* Will frequently require you to run at the very edge of legal

Heres the deal, CFI dispatches at 47 mph unlike most companies who dispatch at 42. They have a bit of a reputation in the industry as the company to go to if you need that freight moved quickly... really quickly. 47 mph wouldnt be all that bad, but the routing is based on MS streets & trips which seldom spits out a truck-legal route, so by the time you add 50 - 100 miles for the route you'll really run, plus the 100 - 200 mile deadhead that the computer doesnt figure into the equation, youre often required to average 55-60 mph in order to make the ETA. Fail to make the ETA and youll be written up for a service failure.

So youre left with 2 options, push the edge, or get written up for service failures. Many CFI drivers look at this as a benefit, they make more money that way, but i refuse to game the system, and so CFI isnt for me.

 

I think i did give them a shot. I drove for them for 4 months afterall.

Its a shame really, because otherwise its a great company to work for. I just dont feel comfortable having to fix my logs & drive beyond the regs. Not at this point in my career.

It wouldnt be so bad if only half the runs were like that, or even 3/4ths. But in my 2-3 months driving solo, i dont think i ever had a single load that didnt require me to get creative in one way or another.

This isnt the way all trucking companies run is it? Because if you didnt have to drive 15-16 hours a day, it could be a pretty fun job.

 

Thats the way it was when i was with my trainer... Evidently i just got stuck with the wrong FM, because every time i called as a solo driver with these insane dispatches I was told the ETA was etched in stone & could not be changed.

The only time they ever moved an ETA for me as a solo driver was the time i was scheduled to arrive at the destination 6 hrs prior to the pickup time.

I did 2 beer loads. One out of St Louis & one out of Ohio (I think it was OH, mightve been PA).. Neither of them were drop and hook both left at least 2 hours late, and one was overweight enough to require a reload which delayed me enough to make it a(nother) 16-hr day. (actually more like a 30-hr day, since i hadnt slept since before the previous load) Needless to say I HATED beer loads almost as much as con-way loads.

Talking to my FM about these problems yeilded the response "if you cant drive like that, youre probably in the wrong business" the head of safety basically just put his fingers in his ears & called me a liar. I guess hes not used to drivers demanding to drive safe & legal. Indeed most of the other company drivers i talked to said that the lax safety was the biggest perk of working there, they make more money when they can break the rules. Apparently its the place to be if you want to be supertrucker, take little white pills & drive 25 hours a day, theyll let you do it.

I have no desire to be a supertrucker, so i just stopped bending the rules, drove legal, logged it the way i drove it, and of course the loads started being late. I started getting written up for service failures & decided i'd better quit before CFI messed up my DAC.

Now i drive for a little mom & pop co which basically lets me operate like an O/O, its like being on vacation compared to CFI.... I get to eat at least twice a day, dispatches are averaged at 45 mph max, I've got a nice roomy volvo, AND i make more money! But one things for sure, i always give CFI trucks a WIDE berth on the road.