K & B Transportation fraudulent company, can mess up driver's CDL, wage theft

K & B Transportation uses forced dispatch to force drivers to fake and violate DOT logs/hours of service (10-, 14-, 70-hour clocks). If a driver rejects to work past available log hours or to work while being off-duty, they threaten the driver with getting less miles, loss of weekly pay guarantee, fines. The $1250 weekly guarantee they advertise to attract new drivers is later used as a tool to force drivers to perform legal or illegal work.

K & B advertises to their clients 99% on-time delivery and quick delivery time. When those times to make pick ups and deliveries are outside of driver's available hours of service, they will force the driver to fake or violate the log. By doing so, they are able to move loads quicker, get more contracts having competitive edge over the companies whose drivers follow the DOT clock limitations.

In average, they forced me to fake or violate logs every second day. In my first 10 days with the company, 3 times I was ordered to work during my 10-hour breaks while being told to stay off-duty. I had relay drivers banging on my door to wake me up to live relay loads during my 10-hour breaks, unpaid and against DOT clock rules.

They forced me frequently to work past 14-hour clock. They would get me to the consignee close to the end of my available hours and instruct me once I run out of hours, after the consignee finishes live unloading, to move the tractor slower than 5 mph around the yard so the elog does not detect the movement and keeps me logged off-duty, then to use off-duty personal conveyance to get out of consignee's yard. Some of my work days were 18 or 19 hours long from the start to the moment when I finished, some days I had no more than hour and a half to four hours of sleep because of their forced dispatch and being forced to work while being logged off-duty.

The first time I told the dispatcher I do not want to fake the logs, he spent an hour on the phone convincing me it is for my own good to 'maximize' time and earn more money. Pre-assignment example: start the day at 22:00, pick up the load at 23:00, delivery appointment time at 14:20 hundreds of miles away. Notice that the pick up and delivery times are 14+ hours apart which violates 14-hour rule having no 10-hour break in between.

After I told the dispatcher I will not fake/violate the hours with my most recent assignment, he told me I would loose the weekly pay guarantee because I reject the load. I called the Safety Manager who did not seem to be interested in hearing about forced log irregularities.

This company cheats on the number of miles, pays drivers less miles than the actual mileage following their routes. The first route they gave me was 723 miles, Google maps shows more-less the same distance, later I was paid for only 676 miles, almost 50 miles less. Dispatcher said the distance is calculated zip code to zip code. My last load had some 5% (18) paid miles less than the actual distance. By paying drivers less miles than what the actual distance from the pick up to the delivery location is, drivers are being paid less cents-per-mile.

They are not upfront with things such as that they charge new drivers $35 for the drug screen. My first full-week paycheck had over $100 in deductions for work-related things (such as trailer wash, shipyard security escort), dispatcher told me the accounting dept. can take time to process all the receipts.

Example: I was told to go pick up a load and write a $75 company check for security escort in the shipyard. 8 days after I sent the receipt in to K & B (I Transflo-ed it together with other paperwork) $75 has been deducted from my paycheck. Paystub showed the accounting dept. processed one trailer wash receipt from the same load but skipped the receipt for security escort. After I left the truck in K & B yard, I went to the accounting dept. and told the lady over there here is the receipt I have already sent in days ago for $75 deducted from my pay, she didn't want to take a look and told me to wait. I still did not get reimbursed for it 10+ days after I Transflo-ed it.

The company has an extremely high turnover rate of new drivers. When I told a company employee about being forced to fake the logs and that I do not want to do it, he told me the things are like that and the chances are more than half of the drivers from my Orientation class will probably be gone before the end of first month.

I resigned after 2 weeks. On my last day, in the K & B yard I came across a driver from my Orientation class who said he has been overworked, not given 34-hour reset with constant lack of sleep. He said he is leaving the company and mentioned the issues resembling what I have been put through being forced to break the hour rules.

This is a real example of a K & B dispatcher's way of communication after I said I do not accept a pre-assigned load which would violate my hours: You have two options, option a) you go pick up and deliver the load like I told you, or option b) you do not deliver the load because you rejected it and you will split the fine with us the client is going to charge us (he was threatening me I would pay a $100 fine if I don't accept the pre-assignment).

This is a real example of a K & B forced dispatch I have been put through which does not give a driver more than 1 hour of continuous sleep during the span of 30 hours:
03:00 start of the work day
04:00 delivery appointment time, live unload in the consignee yard
06:00 live unload finished, I parked the truck at a nearby Pilot fuel station waiting for the next assignment, a small fuel station with no available parking spots at the time, I parked by the curb in the parking yard like a couple of other trucks did
08:00 received information from the dispatcher he would get me a load soon
14:30 dispatcher sent me a pre-assignment and told me on the phone to stay off-duty for an hour more, it would reset my hours like I was on a 10 hour break so I can start my new 14-hour clock right away, pick up the load at 17:00 in a different city and deliver the load (hundreds of miles away) tomorrow morning at 06:00.
06:00 delivery appointment time at a client where typical wait time to get live unloaded is 1.5 to 3 hours, my work day would end probably around 09:00.

This company will be loved by people who put money first over safety regulations, drivers who would sleep for 3-4 hours during fake 10-hour breaks and fake or violate logs to get more miles and money. If you do what they say, you will be good to them and earn good money for yourself and for them, if you do not comply with their requests which often violate DOT rules, they will bully you, put you down verbally, lie about you and penalize you.

To those who say that only lazy people complain about K & B when the company is so wonderful to offer plenty of work: keep living your dream, not only that this company allows drivers to fake and violate logs, they force drivers to do it. Not all drivers want to break the rules and destroy their health because of money. When a K & B dispatcher forces a driver to have a 16-hour long work day, gives a driver only 2 hours of sleep during fake 10-hour breaks, then forces a driver to follow it up with 17-hour work day, it is a hazard to public safety to put a driver in the condition like that (chronic sleep debt) on the road to drive a semi-truck.

 

Yes, after the first few days on the job being forced to fake/violate the log, I started taking photos of pre-assignments, dispatcher's messages, log graphs, in case of whatever. I imagined it would not help much if a DOT officer stopped me and I would be at a risk of paying fines or loosing my CDL. After I refused to fake the log any longer, dispatcher told me over the phone I am of no use for the company like that, at that point I started recording the phone conversations.

Crazy twist of events for a truck driver.

 

Correct.

I just started working for K & B, the first time I was given a load where the pick up and delivery times were more than 14 hours apart with no 10 hour break in between, I thought it was a mistake, no other trucking company before asked me to do something like that. The first time I was told to do a live relay during my 10-hour break, I thought it was a one-time favor they ask me to do.

After the first week I reached out to a company employee and told him about what I have been forced to do thinking maybe it's my dispatcher not the company. A few days later, I reached out to K & B Safety Manager and told him what is going on. They all listened and didn't say much. Seemed like everyone knows what is going on. It was either take it as it is or leave it, I resigned after only 2 weeks on the job.

One of the worst things that can happen is the company can retaliate. I have been on the road for all 7 days of my work week and it qualifies me for the weekly pay guarantee but I was told because I rejected the load (I refused to fake the log/hours any longer) I would not receive the weekly pay guarantee, I was given less miles, my last week paycheck plummeted. Weekly pay guarantee became important after seeing that they pay less miles than what the actual distance from the pick up location to the delivery location is.