They must ban "cpm" and "piecerate" pay

Well 2019 left some to be desired. With my equipment and authority I grossed less than I made in the past working for someone else as a employee. But only logging like 136 days, so there is that too. I'll keep my authority till my banker tells me it's time to make a switch.

 

Ever wonder how many packages are in a UPS 53ft wagon.
What is the average price to send one of those packages.
Ever wonder what the total price of all the shipping chargers in that wagon.
I have.
And you expect me to pull it for $1.50 a mile. Just sayin.

 

Did you calculate the cost of loading, cross docking, intial pickup, final delivery, warehouses, stores, kiosks/drop boxes?

 

I am over the road, and I dont want hourly pay. I actually like the model at it's current set up. Its motivation for me to run hard. It isn't like OTR companies are going to pay hourly for each hour in the truck. They'll just pay for the hours logged I would bet

 

I used to have a construction contractor business, we did residential interior trim work: closet shelving, door hardware, towel bars, toilet paper holders, mirrors, shower doors, medicine cabinets, etc. I paid a fair hourly wage, provided a company box truck, I even bought tool belts for my installers.

They were killing me, milking the clock, taking forever to get work done. I was out one day checking up on the crew and found my truck parked in front of a laundromat, crew chief who I was paying top dollar sitting there doing his laundry (several loads of it). I have no idea where his crew was, he’d dropped them off somewhere for a leisurely lunch.

Just like truck drivers, these guys punched the clock, loaded their truck in the morning and left, and were out there in the world with work to do and only their personal work ethic to get it done. I fired the crew chief and promoted one of the other guys, but nothing really changed, they still took forever, had lots of excuses (the painters weren’t finished, the carpet guys were in the way, etc). I was working hard selling our services, measuring houses, getting materials, prepping jobs, keeping the books current, but every once in a while I’d go out with the crew, strap on a tool belt, and dig in, and it was mind-blowing how much more work we could finish in a day. And trust me, I was not a particularly fast installer.

Finally, in desperation, I changed from paying hourly to paying piecework. I figured out how long it should take to do the work and how much I would have paid by the hour, and I converted it. Heck, I even sweetened the pot a little, my rates were higher than the equivalent hourly pay.

Two of the installers quit on the spot, only one guy stayed. But he was already the one guy who showed up to work for real (he hated working with that crew). And very quickly he started making a whole lot more money than before, because he noticed that more production = $. He recruited a couple friends of his who were also motivated workers, and the difference was amazing. We were actually profitable (until the housing market crashed).

I’m not saying that cpm is the best way to get paid, necessarily. I’m on a dedicated lane now, and my miles fluctuate greatly, and I’m grateful to be getting paid a day rate. Some days I only drive a couple hundred miles. Heck, yesterday I drove less than that. And some days (like tomorrow), I’ll be going close to 600 miles. But when I was OTR, even at .38/mile (new to trucking after many years of bus driving, so I made rookie money) I made okay money.

Also, anyone who says “we don’t get paid for loading/fueling/pretrip/post trip, etc” is frankly a mouth-breathing window licker. Your mileage rate has that work factored into it.

Finally, ELDs don’t limit us, HOS does, unless you’re looking to break the law, and frankly I can’t afford the (insert your favorite profanity) that getting caught violating HOS would land me in, particularly in the case of an accident.

 

i am flabbergasted! the OP stated my POV better than i possibly could have. By the mile pay is antiquated and broken. it forces drivers to make the decision every day to run legal or break the law. I am glad i am out of trucking. I get paid for ALL the work I do now.

It blows my mind that any driver out there would have an opposing argument against hourly pay!!! Talk about ignorant!

 

Maybe our industry would have a better image and the roads would be safer if drivers obeyed the rules. I fault this pay per mile system as the main reason EVERYONE cuts corners or breaks whatever inconvenient rule that gets in the way of expediency.

 

I am sorry if I am out of line. But after 20 years of driving everything from 2 wheelers to 18 wheelers, i have formed some rather strong opinions based on my experience. Although I have moved on from truck driving, drivers and the industry at large still have a special place in my heart. Best of luck to all of you!

 

Or maybe it's the rules themselves that are the problem?

Starting with new driver licensure before moving to the HOS our industry is rife with rules that encourage bad practices.

Being paid hourly will only make me not worry about burning my 70. It will not fix the other issues like speeding or fatigued driving.

UPS, Fed Ex, RL, Old Dominion all pay hourly. They have as many accidents as anybody else. I've seen them fly thru truck stops/yards, not do pretrips, etc. Ever seen a set of wiggle wagons trying to drive thru a blizzard when all yhe sensible drivers parked it a few hours ago? How about that video froma few years ago where the chain law was up and 3 fed exs were part of a chain reaction crash - none of them had chains on? They gey paid by the hour so why wouldn't they stop and chain up? Because they wanted to get back to the barn before the end of their 14.

It is not pay structure at issue. It is pay amount. If median and average driver pay matched what drivers earned in 1990 you would see a much different industry as we would attrack higher quality people and keep them longer.