Why I hate reefer

Unless you need to fuel and are parked behind him in the fuel island lol

 

I jinxed myself on this one really good :-/ In the middle of getting offloaded at a shipper after sitting here for almost 7 hours in order to get loaded. Got here for scheduled pick time, "no, no, no driver I don't know what they told you....." and you know what... it could be worse... it could be a LOT worse.. but it's not.... So we'll mark this one up as bad experience #1,647 (been driving a long time) and move on.

 

They tried that up here in Canada but dot didn't like 3 guys driving on 1 license ..

 

Van can be great in short spurts. In fact in can pay phenomenally well but it just isn't sustaining. Too many dry spells. All those trucks running over themselves to do Amazon does draw them away from other freight. But there's still just too #### many of them.

Look at this junk trailer in the attachment below that I regrettably booked as a rescue a few weeks ago. Broke my own rule about NEVER booking a power only load where the trailer is the rescue of one of my fellow competitor o/o's. And when I got to it the trailer was in fact in the piss poor shape I figure 99% of these "loads" to be in and exactly why I had that very rule in the first place.

Piece of #### had no brakes. Look at those Chicago style mud flaps. Yep, this carrier was part of that mafia. The tractor was parked beside the trailer and a check of the 6 month old MC revealed numerous violations including but not limited to faulty brakes. Their insurance had been suspended the day before.

THAT is your competition out here and it is not limited to vans but it is more prevalent there. And guaranteed another one just like that one rose to take its place, probably a dozen more. When you are scratching your head in frustration wondering who this endless supply of people who are booking runs for $600 on 400 miles or some such craziness remember this picture.

 

Excellent writing!
Good job and thanks!

 

There are days when it's hell on earth and days when it's truly rewarding. Even waiting all day for a load of lettuce to cool off in AZ beats being stranded with a flatbed or a Van in Phoenix for days.

A guy I went to driving school with wanted to do tankers because he thought "they can never overload you". Sure thing.

Sometimes bumping docks is a blessing, versus trying to retarp a flat in Sioux Falls in a 40 mile an hour wind with blowing snow.

In this industry, pick your poison.

For all the BS involved with reefer, we are a country that loves to eat and that shows no signs of slowing down. Yes it sucks at times but it is Job security nonetheless. As a company driver, As long as you are with a company that pays detention after a few hours and $100 or more of layover per day, you'll come out decent.

When the economy starts to take a dump, van and flats especially hauling building materials will slow down, that is usually the first sign.

 

Reefer has its positives and negatives.....positives being there's plenty of long to super-long loads(at least where I work) which give me 1-3+ days that I only have to pretrip, drive, make the occasional 1/2 hour dot break or fuel stop, maybe a couple of "bladder relief" stops thrown in. I can haul freeze protect loads and not have to idle the truck like in my old dry-van days. And with the economy being on the cliff like it's been the last 10 years, there's at least a constant demand for produce, meat and dairy stuff.

The negative... the stupid insane dock times at shippers and receivers....this is a problem I've seen get worse and worse over the years. Really unless something is wrong on the production end of a shipper there's no excuse for the 8-10 hour dock times. This is something I blame on the industry for not standing up to shippers and receivers who think our trailers are free storage/ac units and us drivers enjoy sitting at a dock without even so much as a port-a-potty sometimes.... grocery warehouses, that ones self explanatory.
And some of these brokers who think we never run into traffic/weather delays, always run 70mph, always have a full 70 or 14 hours available, and still think we do nothing but sleep while parked at the dock, and always assume we get loaded or unloaded the instant we bump the docks.

 

Same here. Easiest #### job I've ever had. Sitting now for five hours waiting to get loaded... And getting paid for all of it. Maybe not very good if you're paid by mileage though.

 

I was at a customer the other day almost 12 hours. Signs all over saying do not walk your pet on the property. I don't have a pet on board but I did for 4 years previously.