Am I in the right

Yep ...in my h@m days I did Conway ltl most of which couldn't be run legally and was dam near like hauling cattle in hot weather ...do not stop !.
I got tired of Conway bs and went on Elogs voluntarily and never got offered another Conway load again .

 

You are human beings, not robots. Like many have said, you should get showers at least every other day c'mon, how about eating right, getting any exercise? Stop and smell the roses or coffee some time. Or you will burn out soon and maybe quit on that idiot dispatcher, company. Trucking life catches up to you before long, high blood pressure, overweight, etc.

 

Just stop and do what you gotta do, if your a good driver they will deal. Sometimes you have to push it to stay ahead and make your life easier but sometimes you have to slow down or take a break for your own well being. Your not any good to them anyway when when you eventually quit on bad terms or get into an accident.

 

I give that tight fisted grubbing money hungry dispatcher a day off outback.... maybe some rest will unwind him and teach that even God rested on the 7th day. Money is not everything... *** hammers the table...

 

I'll bite. Wife is a morning person. She is also the diplomatic one dealing with bills and managers. Im the one who does the racks in the trailers and certain other things so she don't have to and I don't need to disturb or make bad relations with customers. Im out of the way unloading. Im a night owl. It fits perfect. In our time 10 hours in the morning is her time. I get to sleep off the previous nights which sometimes gets pretty long. Fix her a meal on the move. We were self contained with 6 weeks food and fluids plus a toilet for humans etc etc etc etc. All we needed is fuel. Every 30 hours or less 300 plus gallons please it's been 1500 miles.

Once a week we parked that truck in east Armarillo at the nice TA there at that time and get away from the truck. We have a proper full course breakfast, dinner together with no talking about trucking between us. The staff were very good to us during those times. That's one example. And yes the laundry is being done around the corner.

Dispatch was good to us. But we were a sort of a fire dept a quick reaction team coast to coast. Call comes in to capture a late load off a single. Single spent a day and night in the bar and casino ruining the customer's appointment time. We get the call. Take their load.

That kind of cut into our gross income a little bit. But we were #### good at it.

The logs for us both totaled 140 hours to drive each week, that's two trips coast to coast, that's about all we can do and still have our day off. 11 hours these days for driving don't really make much of a difference, it's what" two extra hours for team to drive per 24 and 14 total extra for the week? you just max out your logbooks faster and find both of yourselfs in reset. Which did not exist in our time.

What we called reset was literally a few hours dinner, laundry a movie and a proper night's rest in a hotel a nice concrete super 8 or something that's quiet. Usually that causes a boot in our spirits for another week in that truck.

We keep things clean and in order because we had to. It was a good year for us and we have nothing bad to say about it really. Except the occasional fang or claw that comes out when things got really stressed as happened a few times. You smooth that over by fixing the root cause. Sometimes it's a dispatcher who thinks he has a super truck and is hamfisting us all over the map. We bite back via our DM. And they find another dispatcher.

When the VP has to come out of his ivory tower to give us the look over it's not a good thing. Not always. But you can make it work.

 

Time to speakup, hold down your foot and start refusing

One of you are going to get into an accident without rest


Your in no condition to drive without breaks or overworking...if your dispatcher knows better than you they're testing how far they can push u around

 

Stop making excuses for the company.

You have to manage your time better.

The dispatcher is part of the problem. You're the other part.

Learn how to say no.

There is no excuse to run this hard unless you really want to and your dispatching group knows they can cover loads that are screwed up by abusing you.

Unless you do true jit or expedite loads - real ones not fake ones - then picking up a load that is late isn't your problem.

I would seriously consider leaving the company if they can't see what they are doing to you and you can't learn how to say no.

 

It's a common issue with new drivers. They want to make a good impression, thinking the dispatcher is their friend. Truth be known, only in rare cases is the dispatcher your friend. Remember, they have a job to do, clear their board ( or screen) of freight. If you don't say no, you become their " go to" person to get rid of the freight. Dispatcher's rarely intimidated me. However,,,I have done "favors" for dispatchers, but made it crystal clear, they "owe me one" and if they didn't do me a favor, that's the last time I did anything extra.

 

"can't afford to take time off"?
are you a lease/purchase?
if no, then of course you can.
if,yes, well.............