Central Ref. or Stevens

Whatever kind you want!


Disclaimer: You must make the cookies yourself...

 

Go with Crete/Shaffer...will pay a lot more. I did my research on all 3 of those u mentioned and I get more per mile and better benefits with Shaffer.

 

Don't know what the others start at, but here's Maverick's pay rates:

Students start at .35 per mile.
Raise to .38 at 3 months.
Raise to .41 at 6 months.
Raise to .42 at 1 year.

Orientation pay is $500. Training pay is $550 per week.

Bonus program pays up to an extra .06 per mile based on performance.

 

I ran OTR for 15 months. Never pulled reefer. I had my fill of grocery warehouses just pulling dry freight! Waiting for lumpers to break down the orders for 4 hours or more. Arrogant jerk grocery warehouse dock managers. I can imagine dealing with meat packing plants would be loads of fun too from what I have heard from Tyson drivers.


Stevens will try and shove a lease up your butt. 59mph trucks.

OTR companies are notorious for screwing you out of detention times.

Central? Owned by Swift.

What's the fascination with reefer?

OTR is for some people. It wore off in 6 months for me. I like being home. Maverick flatbed gets there people home almost every weekend. And they turn some good money.

 

Don't mean to hijack the thread, but Captain, I have a question about the Maverick TCD. Their site says only a small percentage of their freight is drop and hook. Does that mean that there is 1) a lot of driver load/unload, 2) lots of intermediate stops on each load? They have crossed my mind also, but I am not wanting to do flatbed and have to deal with tarping and untarping! Just curious.

 

More than likely they just haven't established enough of a customer base to have many drop and hook accounts at this time. Almost all meat loads are "driver unload" anyways but lumper fees are the name of the game.

 

Definitely a question to ask the recruiter/ and on this board about prospective companies. I just hate to sit and wait for the lumpers to break down the freight and restack it into store orders. It isn't my job to sit there. If I'm not getting paid, and paid well? My butt needs to get rolling. Can't make money sitting still.

Unless things have changed Crete/Schaffer require experience or a school that gives a PTDA certification for rookies.

 

We do have some multi-stop loads here and there, but it's not particularly common. Most of the facilities we deliver to are actually driver unload facilities, but Maverick doesn't want it's drivers unloading freight - too many injuries that way. They always pay the lumper fees wherever we go. I've never had to unload anything off of this truck myself in the time I've been here.

There is a lot of sitting involved. That's why we start out at a higher rate per mile and we have detention pay also. Common customers of ours include Tyson, Americold, American Yeast, Walmart, McLane Foods, and ConAgra Foods.