Company constantly asking for favors, but won't get me home.

No, it's not normal, and I'd be plenty upset too. You know, of all the companies I drove for, it seemed someone else always got a better deal. Ever hear the saying "nice guys finish last?", well, if it was me, it would be the last time I did them a favor. Granted, generally, we don't know what goes on, on the other end of the phone. I'm not sure that alone would make me quit, but I'd sure let them know it isn't cool. Many times companies protocol makes no sense to a driver, but not much you can do about that. Never been any different.

 

A.) Always keep a record of who, what, when and where your asked to do a favor - facts matter when it comes to airing a complaint.
B.) Anytime your asked to rescue, recover or reposition a load, keep track of the miles you lose, the move number of the original load, and the the move number of the new load. Of course management already has this information, but when the driver has it and can recite it chapter and verse, they seem to take you more seriously

 

I suspect the problem is your travel agent.

 

You’ve showed them how you will allow them to treat you. I’ve had it bite me at places I’ve been leased on at.

When I pulled food grade the money was great and I’d never say no. I’d run all night to make sure the product got there before they ran out. If something needed covered on the weekend I’d do it. First year I was there I ran just under 160k miles. When I wanted to slow down a little it caused problems because he was used to me running the way I had been. The guys that were off weekends never got any flack but it was a problem when I didn’t want to cover weekend stuff because I had shown him I was fine with it from the start.

I ended up taking my truck elsewhere because it’s difficult to retrain people how to treat you.

 

The trucking company generally is not going to change what they are doing. If you have brought the issue up more than once, they don't explain well what is happening to you, but not others, your only decision is do you have a better job to go to? Keeping score just feeds anger, it's not changing the company. If the company wanted to change they would explain "the policy is A, B, and C" and sometimes those policies help you and sometimes they hurt you, but it should even out over time. If they won't explain, or their explanation is "that's trucking" you can decide to have the episodes repeated until you get a different job, or stop keeping score so you don't make yourself angry enough when the next episode happens that you unleash 20 episode's worth of anger and lose your job.

My dad taught me when you are scheduling appointments during your home time, you always schedule them just before you expect to go back to the truck and not the day you expect to get home because you are likely to get home later than you expect or want. Both of us generally worked either a regular schedule with regular days off or were home every weekend, which is different than OTR and being gone 2+ months at a time.

Driver complaints are not going to change the habits of a trucking company. This is why it is very important to know the reality at a company BEFORE you choose to work at one.

 

That's trucking. You're good natured and they're using/abusing it. Don't complain either or it'll get worse. Maybe Walmart's hiring near you? Set schedule and always home at the same time every week. Nobody would even dream to ask for some unreasonable one sided favor that interfered with your hometime. It literally never happens.

 

You could try saying since they got you home 2 days late you need 2 extra days off. They don’t want the trucks sitting not making money. It might give them incentive to get you more if they know you’re going to ask for more home time.

if they don’t care then asking is basically a waste of time because the might just be happy to replace you with another driver.

if the company doesn’t care then maybe look at other companies and see if any claim better home time. My company has OTR and regional driver that work 5 days then get 2 off at home. It just depends on what’s more important.

it could be as simple as trying a different dispatcher who tries more to get drivers home.

 

It may be normal , but I do not think it is right or fair.
There is a saying in poker. If your sitting at a table and you don't recognize the fish , you are the fish.
I don't know how you can remedy this, because you are a good human and you have set a precedence, and the people you are working for are taking advantage. From reading all you good people, I think the employer that will take advantage of you is in the majority. To me it is not normal, but I am not like most.

 

That's what happens to us good drivers that have no problem , helping clean up everybody else's #### ... then companies wonder why all the good drivers leave for greener pastures.