Any info on the new J S Helwig and Sons?

^^ That's the truth. They will give you a pre-plan the day before your delivery and all is good. Then magically, when you reach the delivery point and have sent in your arrival and unloading, the pre-plan is yanked off of you and replaced with a crap load pre-plan ... that they hope can get dispatched before your dispatcher notices and it's too late to undo it.

I'm about done there. Can't deal with all the politics and side-stepping that goes on there between planners and dispatchers and where you can no longer trust a pre-plan will hold. I understand things change in the trucking world and last minute changes have to be made on occasion but I also know sometimes things change simply because somebody else decided they didn't want a particular load and griped about it and I suspect that happens more often then the other.

It's still not a bad place to work compared to other options, but when you truck just to stay busy and can honestly take a job or leave a job (not work), you don't need any additional hassles to deal with as a matter of routine.

 

Where ya gonna go, you seem to be one of the happiest drivers at this company. Seems it's small enough to talk to the boss. Doesn't he have an open door policy?

Anyway I'm seriously thinking of going to work there as a company driver and have been talking to Debbie...your posts have have made me feel I'm making the right decision. Maybe you'll work out your problems and you and I will meet in the next few weeks.

 

That's the thing. If I needed the money and had to work, I'd stay at Helwig (or perhaps go back to flatbed and weekly home time that I kind of miss) ... but I don't need the money, or the cons that the typical trucking job offers in exchange for it's pros.

 

OK here you go...

If you like re-powers...then is the place for you
If you like running off your re-cap with very few hours and not being able to do a 34hr re-start because operation will not let you stop and take a 34hr restart...then this is the place for you
If you like a day off for every 7 days out, and you must stay out for 3 weeks, then you put in for home-time and are told you cant get home in 3 weeks because that week is " full " so you have to stay out another week or two...then this is the place for you
If you like your loads to pay 50+ miles short ...then this is the place for you
If you like to take your 10hr breaks at the shipper/receiver....then this is the place for you
If you like to take a 10hr break while you unload then not get a re-load for ANOTHER 12/24hrs....then this is the place for you
If you like a operations dept. that cannot subtract from 70, 14, 11...then this is the place for you
( yes they use Q-Com and still can't subtract )
If you like to be told un-truths...then this is the place for you
If you like your driver manager to be all pissy when you ask a question, but nice when he wants you to do a re-power....then this is the place for you
If you want an operartions dept. that " feels " like you are walking into a used car sales office full of BS...then this is the place for you
If you want a phone call from someone who says he is the owner of the company but you know its not the owner of the company....then this is the place for you
If you like to get the bad loads, the short loads, the loads that don't pay good, the run around loads , when you put your 2 week notice in....then this is the place for you

Score card for company:: 1 to 10 .. 1 is bad 10 is great...

folks in pay dept. - 10
folks safety dept - 10
folks in e-logs...and all other office folks---10
folks in shop----10
OK...now the folks in OPS dept ( LOL ! this is where you make your money LOL ! )...dispatch...driver managers...planners... 1
Have a great day and like they say " BE THE PRO "

 

I will agree with a lot of what you say but some of this is just the way the industry (most of the carriers) is going. Adding to fleet size, and making up the loads needed with shorter hauls that mess with you about the time you get on a roll.

I find the best thing to do is beg for the longer hauls, run your wheels off, run out of hours in 6 days then essentially have no choice but to let you get a restart, then you have the kind of hours needed to get the longer hauls, and hopefully repeat the cycle.

Yes, they have grown too fast in terms of fleet size but have been too slow to grow the operations side and they are having growing pains. Repowers are just the way things are going to be with most anywhere you go that has elogs and tries to maximize productivity for as many as possible and not have any service failures that are killers for a mid-size company over time. Most times with repowers it seems they do pretty good job ... considering what they have to contend with.

Yes, the hometime reservation thing they have is sometimes a problem for me and I'm pretty flexible and don't ask for much, so I know it's a huge problem for a lot of other drivers. They need to have 2 fleets, 1 that has 1-2 days at home every 10-15 days and runs a lot of the TX, AR, southeast and midwest. And the other fleet stays out on pre-set cycles that go from 20, 28, 22, 26 days, repeat, giving 2-4 days at home in between, and these guys only run TX/KS to Northeast and back (like they used to run as a fleet)

I'm wanting to go back to flatbed and regional and get back into enjoying my weekends, OR go somewhere where I can run west occasionally and stay out like I do now, and I'm kind of looking for an excuse but would like to not do any changes before October. For the most part I like it here ... so long as the good weeks (3k+) outnumber the bad.

Best of luck on your new transition wherever that leads you.

 

New Transition?? Who said anything about a new transition??

 

Be advised Helwig drivers. As you know they have become more adamant lately about following the route/fuel solution ... now meat patch loads to Jersey are being routed via 80 across PA then back to 78 near Allentown. This is 50+ add'l miles and it doesn't appear Helwig is going to modify driver pay at this point to reflect anything near practical route miles to follow solution. I'm raising a stink about it but not sure what the outcome will be in the end. But I don't like having to fight and claw to get what is owed me to simply follow directions. Glad this is my last tour. If this changes I will post back here.

 

Can Anyone Tell Me Whether jsHelwig Have In Cab Scanning , Navigation ,& Inverters in There Trucks?

 

in cab scanning with your scanner, no in cab navigation invertor is in truck,

 

LOVE WHEN guys try ######## on a company when all along it them that is the problem, been here 5 months and if I had not planned my hometime when I did I would have been begging for the HONEYMOON to be over I have been getting between 12500-14000 miles a month on E-logs