Any Info about Heartland Express??

Only 2 days max, you can't bank up any more.

Even then you still don't get your full 2 days.

I tried to get 1 day off for each week out, since they kept wanting to keep me out for just 1 more week, and they won't allow you to bank up more than 2 days off.

I been with other companies that allowed to bank up 7 days off max, so I'd work 49 days strait, and ask for final delivery before home time to be in Las Vegas =)

 

I believe the hometime issue is something that heartland is going to have to change immediately or they will have a lot of empty smurf trucks on their hands.

I do believe there is a lot that heartland is going to have to change when it comes to how they treat drivers from gordon.

If they try a my way or the highway approach it will not work. If they treat gti drivers better than heartland drivers it could have a negative impact.

This could be a blessing for current heartland drivers. The people who have the most to lose here is heartland ownership.

Many gordon drivers are prepared to walk and are considering their options if things go bad. While we hope for the best we are prepared for the worst.

But I am still optimistic. ..there may be some inside heartland who believe their way of doing business has always worked and can't see the need for change. The problem is that trucking is now in the 21st century and if you are unable to change with the times you will find yourself left behind.

There will be somebody out there who is going to get it right and that is who the best drivers will want to work for. I believe the company with the best drivers will take the lead.

 

I have only been here three months but was told "there is no set policy". I took 3 days off and they didn't say anything - but it was when I was randomly passing through my home terminal. I just told them over the PeopleNet and then took off.

I also had a pre-planned and prepaid vacation that I told them about when I applied. That's 8 days and they told me fine, I would just have to clean out the truck so it is available. I forget what the other limit is, but something like 14 days and then they want you to start all over through orientation I guess. I overheard a driver at a terminal also say he regularly went home for periods right up to that limit.

 

Wow, 3 days and they didn't complain? Sounds like they are starting to loosen up and listen to their drivers, which is a good sign.

There was once I had to take off more than 14 days. Of course had to turn in the truck but didn't need to go through orientation again when I came back. Must be new rule.

Just the same, it makes sense (or so I been told) that if a company is making profit, that there is no reason to change their way of doing things. Been a while since I was with them but if I remember they had something like $300+ million in the bank, and weren't shy to brag about being a successful company.

 

I sure do hope they listen to the drivers and not try the My way or the Highway approach. I will say I do have a few options to go to if this does not work out. I will not stay out for 4 weeks for 2 days off and I will not run regional for weeks at a time running 1-200 mil runs. If Im working for 70 hours a week I expect to TAKE home well over 1k a week..... I will give it a try but there are some things I will not compromise on. There are always jobs for a driver with a good record to go to.

 

If you are out for a few weeks you can get 3 days. Not 4 though. 3 is the limit unless there is something that you really need to do, or can leave truck at terminal.

On the freight. Where you live matters allot as to what contracts you are running and the average miles per load. Since all the freight is dispatched regionally you just have to learn the lanes, learn the freight, and know what you are looking at for each area.
Dispatchers are all different also. Get to know yours as well as you can.
Some will take what they are given by the planners all the time. They will not bother to even look and see if it helps the driver or hurts them.

I was given a load plan on Thursday for a load picking up Monday morning at 0130. Well, I was just getting home this morning at 10am. So that would have had me sleeping half of Sunday so I could grab that load.
then I looked at the delivery, and it delivered 470 miles away, on Tuesday morning at 0430. So the load had over 26 hours on it.
Was not going to happen. I am not going to mess up my weekend for a load with bad times. So I called in and told dispatch that I did not want that load.
He took it off and Friday morning he found me a load to pick up Monday morning after 10am, running up to Atlanta and dropping on the yard. So with that load I will have the same miles, better times and be free of the load Monday afternoon. Then someone else can grab it and run it out to Arkansas.
I also have to say, I have only been with this dispatcher since I moved to FL in august. So far he has been fair and when I point out issues he takes care of the problems and plans me out well.
I do not worry at all about getting shorted miles for refusing loads. But I do always have a good reason.

 

Thanks chromedome....

I know that in the past heartland has done things on a regional basis but now they are truly a 48 state carrier.

Logistics are about to change drastically and there is going to be a need to do some things differently.

For example.. at gti we have a U.S. Fleet and we run primarily loads from the midwest to the northwest and west coast.

It has been difficult for them to plan this board unless drivers stay out for 4 weeks. Usually when we get to the west we run northwest freight until they have freight coming back to the midwest. I like running up there because a short run is 700+ miles. Not this 100 to 200 mile crap.

We always get 1 day off for every 7 out with up to 5 days off.

These are some things like I said I believe will probably continue in order to move this freight.

Gti regional guys have pretty much done things like heartland does now as far as time off goes so there won't be any problems there.

It is going to be interseting to see how heartland integrates both companies together. There will be some new opportunities develop that no one considered at first but like they say.. necessity is the mother of invention. .

 

Our system drivers are OTR. Primarily East of the Rockies. There dispatcher will be in Iowa, or in the past year or so they have started to do some system drivers with dispatch in a few other terminals. But still they are primarily out of Iowa, no matter where they live.
What I mean about all freight being dispatched regionally is that the customer service and planners for all loads will be in the region that the load is coming out of. So in order for the system dispatcher to get the load for the OTR system driver, they have to get it from the terminal in the region the load is in.
They do this to cut down on staff requirements. Which is one thing they will be doing over the next year at GTI. You just have allot more support staff than Heartland will want to keep. They like lean and mean.

I doubt they will change much on the home time thing either. They may for now and for some fleets. But it is an equipment utilization thing. They want to get the maximum use of all equipment. So having a truck sitting at someones house for more than 3 days is frowned on. It use to be 4 days, this has changed in the past few years.
There may be some changes for the better for the drivers with this acquisition. I hope that there will be. Things can always get better. But I do not have too high of hopes that allot will change on our side.
Heartland managed to make allot of money every quarter for the whole recession. And stay out of debt while doing it. The CEO of Heartland has the lowest salary of any large carrier, by millions. His pay is based on stock. The company makes money and he makes money. His salary is set at (if I remember correctly) 350k per year. It may be lower I cannot remember the exact number. This is due to him also being the primary owner of the company. And is how his father set up the job.

I am not posting these things to get anyone upset, or to try and convince anyone to go to heartland or get them not to. They have not been bad to me at all. While mileage varies some. I have been able to make money, and get home every weekend like I prefer to be. Yes, If I wanted to stay out I could make ALLOT more money at heartland than I am now. Just due to learning the lanes, dispatch and system.
Many drivers do not put in the time to learn the company and learn how to make money with the company. They want it all on a plate. Which can happen, if you are very good at communicating. But this is not common without putting in the time.

 

Thanks again..chromedome...

This is similar to how we do things at gti. Each region has a load planner that looks at the trucks in his region and dispatches them accordingly.

Gti wants their trucks to be profitable as well. I was told by my old dm that a truck needs to run 10k miles in a month to be profitable. I could stay out for 3 weeks with 3 days off but it seems like with our freight lanes that 4 weeks are the majic number to run consistently good miles. When I stay out 4 weeks I run nearly 13k in that time. Then I take my 4 days time off and 1 day vacation.

So if you were to figure a 33 day period and an average of 12.5k miles that would be 378 miles a day..including the time off.

I dont know what kind of miles heartland system drivers average but from the ones I have spoken to they dont seem to be getting the miles we do.

But..in the end we are just lowly drivers and nothing more than a tool for the company to utilize in order to gain profits.

The key is for us as drivers to find what works for each of us and be happy or at least content with our situation.

I don't see any need for me or anyone else to get angry with a company for choosing to operate their business how they see fit. Nor should a company get upset with an employee who decides that he prefers to work somewhere else.

I do understand what you are saying about heartland continuing with their current procedures to maximize profits from their trucks. I dont know if they have a lot of empty trucks without drivers but I know that here it can be difficult to seat new drivers at times. This is an industry problem though and not specific to any one company.

I plan on attempting to succeed here as heartland begins changing things. Should I find these changes not to be beneficial to me then I must move on regrettably. It has been a good 5 years and nothing lasts forever.

I have found in life that the best changes that I have ever made were the ones I made when I was not given a choice for some reason.

I do appreciate your input very much. We here at gti are not getting any useful info from anyone with the company.
All we get is the usual propaganda since everyone on the inside is worried about their job.

If I worked in the offices of gti in any capacity I would be very worried. It's easier for a driver to get another job than it is for a dm or load planners and so on..

Going to be an interesting 2014 I do believe.. I hope all goes well for you this year..

 

I wish I had that dispatcher. I have been told several times that I cannot refuse a load if I have the hours. A good example was an 800 mile trip that finaled out in Rochester NY the day after New Years. It wasn't the greatest, but at least gave me decent miles over the holiday and $40 unload pay.

Half way there I get a message to relay the load at a truck stop. The new load delivered at 0300 in downtown DC, 21 hours *after* my original load. The relay driver woke me up at 0400 on New Year's Day. After dropping and hooking, I tried to sleep for the rest of my break. Then I headed down to Baltimore where I immediately had to take another 10 hr break so I would have full hours after my 0300 delivery.

That was the load that took the consignee almost 11 hours to unload. Obviously, the other driver had probably been to that customer before and knew it was a horrible load. When we swapped trailers, I asked him why it was happening and he said "I have no idea", lol.

I have never understood when people say that since I have no access to the planners available loads. When I first worked for Crete in the 90's, they still had "load select" where they would send you up to 3 load choices. You could also pick up a matrix sheet at any terminal. It showed how many loads for the previous month came out of one state and went to every other. In that way, you could somewhat plan your moves. But at Heartland I'm always just told "that's all we have". In fact, they got angry when I questioned that relay to DC.