Crete Carrier Corporation - Lincoln, Ne.

3 years with crete now...ditto, except miles have been slow lately...i do like how they leave you alone to do your job.

 

I have not been on this site for sometime, mostly because I quit driving, but I still see the posts in my mailbox, and lately people are saying how great Crete is, let me tell you why I quit driving. I would request home time once a month...and I literally mean every 4 weeks, the reason is I am in the National Guard and NEEDED to be home for it. One partiular run..I don't know who I pissed off or how, but I sent in my hometime request from Chicago, Qual Com Request, and phone call, I need home time, Guard weekend in about 2 weeks, I got a run to Atlanta, another message to remind them about home time and why, got a load to Montgomery, then a couple of short runs to other places and then finally one to Paris, Texas, now I am sure alot of you have been to Paris and know there is not much there as far as truck stops with showers, or even real parking lots, dropped my trailer and picked up an empty, made my empty call and told them again over qualcom, "I need hometime, Guard weekend coming up" got a load offer to North Carolina, I said I need to make it to Utah, they came back a load to Atlanta, I said I need to make it to Utah, this went on for 4 days, Paris for 4 freakin days. They kept saying no loads to Salt Lake at all or even going west, finally I got a load out of Fort Worth To Boulder, Colorado, by this time I had called my Unit to explain I would not be there and if I could split train, fortuneatly they was able to give me another couple of days to go in when I was home. So at Boulder I send my empty and get a response, load offer to Pittsburgh, I said I have to make it home for Guard, they finally got me a load out of Loveland, Colorado. to Tooele, Utah, I drop that load and they send an offer pick up in Salt Lake to Albaquerque, my hours are running very short by now, I have 2 and half hours left on my daily. I said I am running short, and it was a live load, they said you are the only Crete driver in Salt Lake, Take the run or else lose the precious points, I called my terminal manager and she said I was the only one that could take it, pick it up and take it to the yard, I asked are you going to pay the fine if I go over or will you stand up for me if I go over, she flat out said it was my responsibility not to go over, and to do what it takes to pick up the load, in rush hour, get it to the terminal without going over, I picked up the load, the manager had gone home when I arrived at the terminal, however there were about 6 drivers in the lounge waiting for loads out of Salt Lake, some had been sitting all day waiting, why they could not pick it up I will never know, I went in after my guard and dropped off my keys and have never looked back until I started seeing these posts as to how great Crete is.

 

From what I hear, 95% of the drivers are happy there. I have to believe they arent that bad- I mean When you talk to drivers that are not complaining about their company that has to say something- to me anyway. Talk with some C.R. England drivers, I'm sure you wont find the figures to be the same, but like everyone on here, I'm just putting in my 2 cents-

IWX

Drive safe-

 

I have been with Crete for seven years now. They get me home most of the time, as requested, but on occassion, if there is no freight going that direction, my hometime is delayed. I would not expect them, or any company to lose money at over 60cpm to move a truck to get me home unless they can find a load that will get me close.
Over 80% of the time they get me home when requested. Granted it's only every 4 weeks but I get 1 day of hometime for every 6 days out, some companies only give 1 for 7.
As to them running you tight on hours. Crete will fire a dispatcher for knowingly putting you on a load you can't legally deliver. Consequently they keep track of your hours and will ask you to bump up against the limits from time to time. I have occassionally had loads where my 70 hrs would get me to the consignee and then the mandatory company policy of logging 15 min to check in and 15 min to check out puts me over the 70 hr rule. I am not in violation until I drive again, or pick up more hours. If the consignee will not allow me to stay on their property, which is rare, I may need to find a place within 7 miles so it will take less than 7.5 min to drive to allowing me to round that drive time back to 0 to avoid going into violation ( it's bending the rules not breaking them). If your terminal manager and dispatch say that you had enough time to legally pick up the load they will unfortunately disregard the effects of rush hour and require you to take the load, if your 14 hr rule will allow you could sit tight for an hour then get the load when your few hrs available will allow. I don't think this is any different than any other companies operations if they need to push you. The flip side of this scenario is that some drivers will use the shortage of hours as an excuse because they don't want to do the load, so dispatch is left with no choice but to walk the tight line between forcing you to take a legal load and pushing you up tight against the limits, without pushing you over.
I'm sorry your experience with Crete was not pleasant, and hope you have found something that meets your needs. A good terminal manager helps out a lot, but there is only so much they can do. Many drivers have been with Crete for 15 years and more, it has one of the lowest turnover rates in the industry, 45% or less, last I knew. The company is changing, unfortunately from when Dwayne Ackley was running it, it is becoming more of a cookie cutter corporate company that treats each person the same and doesn't have room to take into account any differences for individual idiosyncracies, but that is, in my opinion, is a result of the litigous society it must operate in. It is also changing with the current market conditions, as needed, increasing wait time between loads, and shorter runs, but so is everyone else. All in all it's still one of the best companies, I can find, to work for.

 

I just want to say, Yes my experience was a bad one, but Crete is all in all an ok company. I am just saying when things were bad and I HAD to be home, they did not even find a load going west let alone to Utah. Also I forgot to mention on the way to Colorado, I talked to two other drivers at a fuel stop and they told me they picked up in Paris heading for Ogden, Utah.
The thing that really got me was not the fact that they needed a load picked up and it HAD to be done, they pushed me to do it...Now I know they keep track of hours but they are not 100 percent, my log book was, when I said I only had a few hours left and it was rush hour, they said I had 6 hours left...that was NOT true by any means...also they pushed me to do it when there was more than one driver waiting in the terminal for a load out of Salt Lake. As far as firing a dispatcher for wanting a driver to run illegal, then that dispatcher must not work there any more because he was trying to push the limits. Now I will say this, while I was working OTR I never turned down a load if I had the time to do it.
Now as far as the reason to be home, the Guard, NO MATTER WHAT, A Company cannot I say again CAN NOT keep a soldier from attending his monthly drill and I let Dispatch know in plenty of time, 14 days. (I did my part) I needed to get back for drill, I never went home for anything other than drill. They had more than enough warning to get me going that way. Instead, they opted to try and send me East....

Another thing Crete did for me, was, I had a brother living in Portland who was dying from cancer, I asked for a load to Portland so I could see him. I only asked for one day, I explained to dispatch and to my terminal manager the situation, both agreed it was important to get me there. I got a load to Seattle, and again requested, to go to Portland from there, or even find something going south, I got an offer going East, I again said is there anything going through Portland and again told them of my situation, they said they could not find anything, I asked for a restart so I could see my brother, if I stayed in Seattle my other brother could come and get me and then bring me back, they said I had plenty of time, no restart and to just take the load and move on.

Anyhoo, to make a long story longer, I left Crete and driving, I am now in the IT field where I have a very understanding supervisor, I make it to Drill every month, he makes sure to ask when drill is so he can schedule it in. AND he made sure to get me to Portland to see my brother before he passed, (he paid my fare) so it all worked in the long run.

Driving is not for everyone and I truly salute those of you who do it an do it well. You guys help keep this Great Nation rolling, keep up the great work.

 

wow is he lucky not to loose his job and not to have to pay for everything. never play chicken with a train, to many things could go wrong !!!

 

All I have to say is one word - Janelle (I think that's how you spell her name)

Anyone who has had to deal with the managemt of the SLC terminal, knows what I'm talking about...anyone who hasn't...count you're lucky stars. She is just mad because her sister was killed when Dorothy's house crushed her in the Wizard of OZ...(yes she's a witch too)

(Disclaimer:This was a sarcastic comment - not an actual event...Please don't think I would ever make fun of a real person being crushed by a house - Witch, or not)

Crete would have been in real trouble had you been called in for active duty and they failed to get you back before deployment... Trucking is a tough job when you're in the Guard...especially now that freight is tight and company's hate to deadhead anyone very far.

But in any case - A hearty Thanks for your service from a fellow patriotic American.

 

LMAO thanks for the early morning humor...

 

We need good IT people keeping things running, too. Glad you found something that works well for you. And yes we have a few terminal managers that need a good adittude adjustment.

 

My husband just left Shaffer because of low miles, but he had no problems other than not getting enough miles to make a decent pay check.