Ashley Furniture-what a joke

Hometime a privilege? That's just a bunch of bull ####. At the bottom feeders maybe. We do get home every week. The policy is explained very clearly during interviewing to orientation, or it was to me anyway. It's not like anyone got here and got a huge surprise what the hometime is like.

It's not the typical common carrier job and they don't do things like a lot of carriers do them and it's not for everybody that's for sure. There are tradeoffs in life no matter what you do. I don't live far from the yard and don't have a long commute. I can trade a few hours hometime for above average pay, good benefits and nice equipment, and nobody looking over my shoulder telling me what route to run, where and how much to fuel and just leaving me alone for the most part.

They frustrate the hell out of me sometimes but that happens everywhere. I like to run hard and they run me that way. I hate the northeast like everybody else but I've found the longer I'm here, the longer the interval between when I get sent up there. I primarily run southeast to Midwest and that's fine with me. The experience here does seem to be very location specific. Some are good, some not so much so.

All of that said, if I could find the same benefit and pay package with better hometime, I'd leave tomorrow.

Things could be worse. They certainly were where I was at before I came here.

 

Guy. As far as I can see, only 1. Keep thinking it's all roses at ADS, theirs a reason they're hiring so hard lately. And I highly doubt theirs 600 drivers. Their hung at about 500 the whole time I was there but told everyone we had 700. The equipment is great, and more than well maintained, the money is great. Home time (dependant on area) really blows. I had enough. Now I'm home daily, off weekends, and every other Friday off. And I didn't take much of a pay cut.

Have fun boys...

 

So... the way trucking has always been is "hometime is a privilege?" Why don't we go back to spring ride cabovers, 3 log books, shippers holding us up at the dock for 30 hours and slipping us some little white pills and "toothpicks" as an incentive to still get the load there on time. How about we go back to "be there on time or you're fired" or " deliver it on time no matter what or we'll make you quit or make you want to quit." If wages won't go up in trucking other things, namely the quality of life, had better improve, that is the simple law of supply and demand.

You do understand that a slower truck means you are working harder and longer for your OTR miles, right? In 10 hours of driving, at 40 cpm (not sure what Ashley pays, just an example) averaging 60 mph instead of 65 cuts your pay $20 per day just on miles. The guys working there 10 to 15 years ago were making more money than you are now. When I was in a 64.5 mph truck starting out, Ashley trucks used to fly down the road like rockets. Now they are so slow they can't even get out of their own way.

Ashley is now advertising all the time on Craigslist as well as Facebook. Still leads me to believe their driver retention numbers are no where near where they used to be.

 

All you have to do is look at their Factory laborers and yard jockys to see what they really think of their employees.

 

I'm sure we will manage.

 

It's absolutely not all roses here.

But that being said. The money is good on the LTL side, I work out of a yard that for the most part doesn't cover other yards so I'm home either daily or 4 out of 5 days during the week. Have had to work 2 Saturdays but was compensated more than fairly for it....and were only a couple hours anyway.

I have my share of complaints which I don't Air publicly. But as stated above the trade offs are positive.

 

I applied for the Redlands, CA area..... got a phone interview and then got an email later saying all positions were already filled. Yet they still got their job posting up and still looking for drivers! I guess they weren't interested in me after all. No hard feelings though!

 

A friend of mine just went through orientation and is flying back to SoCal to work out of the Redlands yard.
I am waiting to hear from him on how it goes.

 

Lol sounds like someone has worked for peanuts their whole trucking career, I can't relate... keep being a sucker, and I couldn't stop chuckling at your Quailty Lease Purchase advice, the trucking industry loves guys like you.

 

I currently have 3 trucks,2 of which are paid off with titles in hand.....so yeah I'm working for peanuts.