please dont lump me in with "independant contractors" such as Injun (just giving you SHATner)...i'm not really 'independant', so u cant call yourself that. Least that is what the big class-action suit is all over. with that out of the way....you say you turn down loads that basicly arent enough miles to make you any money? Granted i can see turning down a load because of HOS. But just fair warning, you turn down a 150 mi load with it being "live" at both ends, and you KNOW it will blow your whole day......you're telling the planner and your DM "I WANT TO SIT". You might as well take out the qualcomm, and after you send in a Mac 9, type in just that..."I WANT TO SIT". Turn down enough loads, and you'll be on here in a month saying "man i cant make the ends meet...i'm only getting 1200 mi a week"
I've had the planners send me loads and my DM called and told me he hoped I wasn't considering it. Let's see ... 375 over 3 days, 160 of it empty miles. It's more profitable to sit. Company I don't care. L/O, I'm not paying out of my own pocket to carry Swift's freight. 150, same day, live at each end ... I may take that. It's only 3 hrs off my 70, 6.5 off my 14, enough time to start another trip that day, an opportunity to make detention pay and for the "trouble" of taking the trip - the planners know that it sucks - I can probably negotiate at least a $40 kicker and sweet heart trip to follow.
Keep thinkin' that. You wont automaticly get detention pay unless you sit at a shipper/final 2 hrs past your appt time. dont forget that.....its your APPOINTMENT TIME where the benchmark is measured from. Lets say you get to ..Pepsico. appt time is for noon, you get there at 11, and you arent unloaded till 230p. if you think you're going to get 90 min. of detention, think again. you MIGHT see 15 min. worth, if you're lucky. but i dont understand the last half of your post. 150 miles? picks up and drops same day? and live load and unload? that is how i'm reading it. 3 hrs off your 70? and 6.5 off your 14? think you had better check that. Lets try 3 hrs driving, half hour for pre/post trip inspection....3.5 alone right there. The way i do it....add another 30 min for 'work' at the shipper and final. thats 4 hrs. lets just tack on 2 hrs on each end for it being 'live'. now you might get local pay, but doubt it. so you just worked a full day....8 hrs of your time spent...half of which was spent sitting, being NON-productive. and for what? i'm going to guess .28 cpm? that is about $42. after taxes....is $30. so for 8 hrs of your time, you made a little over $5/hr. thats minimum wage.......like 15 years ago. you a co. driver or lease/op? if you're a L/O...your DM is screwing ya. if you're a company driver.....your DM is still screwing ya. 400 mi for 3 days? you're joking me......dont matter what color your truck is....its a joke. Its time to either find another company, or stick it out, and let your DM know 125 mi a day isnt cutting it. otherwise, i'd be finding myself another DMs board to get on. as a co. driver, my miles were running about 2000/wk....maybe 2200. Since going lease....i'm hitting close to 2800. and the kicker is, i get to run 65-68. that might not sound like much, but in 10 hrs, i can run 650 miles. it'll take a co. driver 11 hrs do run the same amount. so for every 6 days, i got 6 hrs in the bank to work off of...that normally will mean another load. hence the difference between 2000 and 2800. I just spoke with the company who provides accounting services for lease drivers. They worked my numbers based off the contract, and to break even on the truck, i've gotta run 1600 mi a week. anything over that is net. so if i run 2800 on average, thats 1200 in my pocket. thats not covering my taxes, or maintence account. But i keep myself on a budget. what i dont use goes into an account for the truck. and the $$ for maintence i already look at like its already spent. that way i dont dip my hand into the peanut butter. my situation is different. i have no bills.....except for my cell phone/internet bill. I have no credit card debt...no house payment, no car payment, no kids that i know of. those folks who have all those things.....no way they could make enough (for me) to stay out on the road and make it worth my time. bust my tail, and i only see $100 spendable cash? forget it......
I hope I bump into you sometime ... It would be a blast having a convo with you. You brought up the 150 live load and that I would be screwed if I didn't take it. I said I may and how I could make it work. I do know how detention pay works ... again I said opportunity, not that I would get it. As far as 3 hrs to run 150 mile. Like you said 68 mph truck, it isn't going to take 3 hours to run 150 miles. My Dm is doing fine .. the 400 mile load over 3 days came in from the planning area I was in ... I rejected it as other "O/O no revenue". Then called my DM and let him know ... By the way I use the same accounting company - based off my first P/L my break even is 1280 miles.
Your assuming that all drivers do the pre/post trip like they are supposed to. Apparently "Real drivers" Dont need to
dunno how to take this, but i'll just say this. I log 15 min for a pre-trip, and 15 min for a post trip. Now i know you CAN just 'flag' your post trip, and not log on line 4...but i do it that way because if you show 30 min pretrip (like you're supposed to), you just ate up 15 min. out of your 14 hr clock. Now granted, that dont mean jack, cause if i'm 15 mi away from where i wanted to stop, i'd roll there anyway. That being said, i still show 30 min. of inspection, i just split it up because i can take that last 15 min. right at the 14 hr mark, and it dont count against me. (yes it still counts against your 70, i know)...but this way, over the course of a week, i'm saving almost 2 hrs of time i can now spend driving....
Was more talking about how alot of drivers do not do it at all. Was at the Loves on 76(I think?) and saw us in the student driver truck going over log books and was like "Eh, they are easy, I'm about to start mine for the day." and with that, got in, and took off, no pretrip or nothin o.o
that goes for everybody in this industry, dragon. Just look at how many hoods you see going up in the morning? out of 100, you'll maybe see 5? Well you gotta get under the hood to do a proper pre-trip...so if the hood dont go up, you arent doing one. But i'll admit, there have been days where i just 'took off'. But i will always look it over good when i get stopped. Not making an excuse, cause there isnt one....i'm just saying i'm guilty of that from time to time. But i will always get out and make sure my air-lines arent cut, no body put a quarter in the gland hands (wish they would cause i'm poor) nobody has pulled my 5th wheel or tandem bar and that all my tires are inflated. here is one.....how many of you actually look for a valve stem cap? when picking up a trailer? You know that is a DOT requirement? (least i've been told) i always carry glad hand rubbers and those quick fill valve stem caps in the cab door on my truck.
i went over my info with the accounting co. the other day after swapping trailers. They've been trying to get ahold of me for days. and based upon the info i gave them, my break even will be around 1600. which is pretty close to where i was estimating everything before i signed up. what kind of truck do u got again?
I have a Prostar Eagle ... Your break point depends on what you allow them to load into you P/L. I keep my business, strictly business - they wanted to load all my household expenses into my P/L.
