Swifts new Idle policy

Some chowderhead sitting in an air-conditioned office - an office that the revenue I generate pays for - tells me that the idle time in my truck is too high? This, boys and girls, is why there is such a huge turnover of drivers in this industry!

I wonder if any of these corporate boneheads have ever heard of heat exhaustion and/or heat stroke? If you left a child or pet in the back of an automobile in the summer, you'd be arrested.

Anyone know the symptoms of heat exhaustion? How about dizziness, irritability, confusion, headache, nausea, and fatigue! Do you really want someone behind the wheel of a 40-ton behemoth who is suffering one or more of these symptoms?

What it's going to take to stop this BS is a horrific fatal accident, where the driver proves that he was tired and didn't get enough rest because his company pressured him/her not to idle the truck.

 

I find it somewhat funny that BA thinks he has the whole game locked up, and is defending the company rather than the revenue generating drivers. You notice no mention from him of the office workers running 70 F all day everyday. Also, he fails to account for times when their mismanagement of company resources (IE Drivers) leaves them sitting for 12-34 hours in places such as Laredo, L.A., Baton Rouge, etc... I am sorry, but if I am sitting in a tv room all day long I cannot (1) watch my truck in high crime areas or (2) watch my QC for incoming messages about loads. Your theory is sound for somebody who doesn't actually live in the truck, but for those of us who try to keep moving we need to be in the truck anytime we're waiting otherwise we may get passed over if somebody is IDLING by the computer while we're in the T.S.

 

Uh....that is why you have preplan notice sent to your cell phone via text. Granted sometimes i've gotten PPs over the QC first, then the text comes, but 90% of the time i get a text i got a PP. Now if you are too poor to have unlimited text or a cell phone, or both, that isnt my problem. And if that gives me an advantage over a driver sitting in a TS or a terminal, so be it. i could care less where my miles comes from.

 

seabass, go ahead and try sleeping inside of a driver's lounge at any truck stop. lets see how long it takes for them to kick you out.

 

I don't believe that anywhere in my posts I recommended sleeping in a driver lounge. If you go back and read carefully you'll see that I was talking about what to do during the day.

Obviously you can't sleep in a driver's lounge at a truck stop.

 

there's not a single chance in hell that i would ever spend my day inside one of those lounges. you're still new at swift, so i'll give you a pass on that. wait about 2 years and lets see if you're still singing the same tune. i bet you won't.

 

I don't sit during the day, got work to do, lol.

 

I have to disagree i would bet that the people running the company dont go home and cut off there a/c or heat when they go to bed or just sitting around watching tv. So why should they ask any drivers to? what kind of person are you thinking that just because someone is trying to stay cool they think its a vacation? Grow up .

 

I guess I just have a more optimistic view than most when it comes to life on the road. It's a job. There are far more difficult and taxing means of earning a living out there.

People should buck up and remember what the truckers of decades passed went through to do their job. We've got it pretty #### good.