wti lease purchase

Just got off the phone with their recruiter. WTI wants you to be a company driver first then switch over to lease. I was fine with that. Turns out they want one consecutive year of otr experience between 2014-2015. So because I've been ltl for the past two year I'm not even qualified to work there. That sucks. They were the ones I was most interested in.

 

Dude.... consider yourself fortunate. Honestly.

 

Yeah I never looked back. I own a truck leased on to Mercer now. Just pissed me off that they wouldn't count local as experience. I ran into several companies that said the same thing. It all boiled down to insurance bull****. Now I just laugh as I blow past WTI trucks!

 

That's right.

 

yeah I've been looking at going out on my own but I've been a "local" driver for 10+ years so I don't have the OTR experience that some companies want. I don't understand what they think I don't know that the mega otr driver know....

 

They know how to travel in more than one region or state.

Sorry, couldn't resist.

 

As an employer, I can honestly say that it doesn't count. I'm looking for people who can deal with significantly different weather, road, traffic conditions, and HOS issues an OTR driver will face.
After being burned, I will never even consider anyone with less than 2 years recent verifiable experience. Talk is cheap, lost revenue and customers are not.

 

wait, 2 years experience or OTR experience?

I had issues going back OR after being "local" for about 3 years. They said I had no recent otr experience but it boiled down to me being home every night. Now, experience-wise, yes I slept in my own bed for those years but a lot of that time I was driving a sleeper "otr" truck, pulling a set of doubles from GA to NC and back overnight, every night. Other experience that was never even considered was running P&D when I pulled doubles, 28, 38, 45, 48 and 53 ft trailers doing delivers and pick ups in intercity and rural locations, backing to about 40 docks per day with no incidents. Also has years of prior otr experience, just not in the last 3 years. Company after company told me I had no otr experience till I found out it was all dictated by the insurance companies.

So I ask you... Would you hire me?

After all this, I called the last OTR company I worked for (800 truck operation that runs everywhere east of I-35) and all they said was "When can you start?"

 

Most likely. The real problem is someone who drives a straight truck or even someone who doesn't leave a city, ever.
I hired one of them who promised me up one side and down the other that his LTL experience equated to "experience". After two weeks of missing every single appointment, he decided that OTR wasn't for him.
He did manage to cost me about $6k and 2 good customers. Plainly put, his experience wasn't worth crap to me.

 

so because I drive "locally" I don't have appointment times? It's just frustrating that after a decade of driving I'm still farther down the list than a guy that's been driving at swift for a year or 2