COVENANT -- From a wife's perspective

Latest update.

Redcoat is in Chatt. chillin' with Rocks at the pool.

Actually, they called him back to Chatt. on Monday because they sold his truck and they needed to give him another one. Notice I did not say a "new" one.

He now has a 2008 ex-trainer truck with 291,000 miles on it. It wasn't in too bad a shape as far as cleanliness goes and Redcoat was able to get it cleaned up in a fair amount of time. It had to go into the shop for the brakes which took a day or two and Friday night Redcoat got a dispatch to Albany, GA for a load to Louisiana.

But....

By the time he got 80 miles out, he determined that something for sure was wrong with the jake and it was tied in to the cruise control somehow. So he phoned breakdown and told them what it was doing and they told him to turn around and come back to Chatt. So much for trying to make any money this week.

So he and Rocks hung out by the pool all afternoon. I think Redcoat got sunburned on his leg. Serves him right. (just kidding!!) I'm glad Redcoat got a chance to take it easy for a change and have some company. Although RC would never want to go back to teaming, he allowed that it do get lonesome sometimes when you are having to reset by yourself. So since he's having to sit, it's good that he has a friend to pass the time with. He also met another Englishman who is a trainer for Covenant so that was pretty cool. Plus he is getting the chance to trick out his truck (micro/fridge) to make life a bit easier.

Stay tuned.

 

Latest update.

Redcoat is now in Texas headed to Louisiana and has pretty much settled into his Georgia Pacific dedicated groove. I think this thread has pretty much run it's course as on August 26th Redcoat will have been with Covenant for a year.

He says it has been the worst year of his life.

Today I filled out an application for him with Maverick. We will see how it turns out. Hopefully I'll be able to soon start a new thread of Redcoat's adventures with Maverick but I'm not holding my breath. There have been too many disappointments in trying to get on with other companies. Every time you meet one of their requirements for them to take you, they've changed the rules and there is a new requirement that you haven't met yet.

Covenant is like a tar baby. The harder you try to get away from it, the more you are stuck with it.

It's sad in that here is a man who just wants to be able to comfortably drive a truck for a reasonable amount of days and to have regular home time to physically recover and mentally recharge his batteries. Is that too much to ask? Evidently so.

I will continue the daily grind of Redcoat's life in the other forum for bad trucking companies. When I started this thread here in the good trucking companies area, I was trying to give Covenant the benefit of the doubt. And now there is no doubt in my mind that Covenant is probably one on the worst companies to work for in the group of large national carriers. Working for this company evokes the image of all the Egyptian slaves dragging the huge slabs of rocks for the pyramid builders of biblical times. The drivers are the slaves, the rock is the company itself and the guy with the whip is... well, you know who I'm talking about.

Driving a truck is difficult at best but Covenant just beats the moral and any thoughts of trying to do a good job right out of you in record time.

I want to thank everyone who has responded to our pleas of help, our rantings and ravings, and stuck with us through some very bad times. We have crossed this year threshold on sounder financial footing albeit with the result of the worst credit rating I have ever had in my life. Anything we need to pay for from here on out will have to be in cash so I've been socking it away in our savings account for when the day comes that our rig will need repairs, etc.

And with that, I'll officially end this saga in this part of the forum. I'll see you all on the flip side.

Redcoat Wife

 

Oh nooooo. Say it ain't so!!! I can't wait to get a notification about this thread.

 

Redcoat Wife: I'm sorry Redcoat has had to endure what he has with Covenant. From the sound of it, they've gotten even worse since I left them.

Covenant has always been about exploiting rookie drivers for cheap labor. They claim to be a Christian company, but their values do not seem to reflect that.

I hope Redcoat is able to find a better employer, and I wish you both the best of luck.

 

I just wanted to let everyone know that my guy has been with Covenant for 2 years now and yes there were some issues in the begining but I think that was due in large part to the company trying to weed out those drivers that are not going to stay with the company.

My guy has been running in the refer division in a team truck for about a year now and he has a wonderful dispatcher. She is giving him at least 4500 to 6000 miles per week.

Now let me explain to you why he is getting these miles. When his dispacter calls and needs help because a driver is late or broken down and a load needs to be taken over, she calls my guy and he goes, no questions asked.

He even went so far as to reschedule his home time for the week of 4th of July by backing it up one week (due to so many dirvers wanting the time off) to help out his dispatcher.

But these small sacrifices have there rewards, in fact last week when his dispatcher was on vacation she left the following note to the person taking over her board. " In case of emergency break glass or call truck _____(and she had listed my guys truck number). We know this because there was an emergency and he did get a call and was told what the note said.

He has also be offered a positon as a discretionary dirver.

What I am trying to say here is the Covenant is not a bad company. Do they have there issues yes they do, are they perfect no they are not. But if you work within the system and do the job the rewards are out there.

So just like in any business if your prove yourself to your employer then you will reap the rewards of that. Covenant is no different.

So if anyone is having issues let me know and I will do my best to help.

Take care all

 

Answer me a question about Covenant, do they require you to team after Orientation or can you go solo?

 

For me it does make all the difference. I went to Cov. because I wanted to team for a while and then go solo and stay solo. But at the end of my 6 month mandatory teaming I was told nobody was allowed to leave team division. Really!? So, I set there and didn't find another partner. I had already had 7 partners in 6 months and I wasn't willing to put up with another one, no way. So, as it was Christmas and almost everybody wanted time off but I, they let me run solo until January. And after that, I was able to get a solo position in the Walmart dedicated division which I love!
My biggest complain about Cov. is the pay. I've been there for almost one and half year and still making .27.5 cpm (sometimes .31 cents). Yes, they pay some bonus, but still not much.... They also charge drivers for the PrePass (as if we were o/o)
I also don't like DOT checking our GPS records (in case they audit us at Cov.). Log dept said DOT is doing that in all companies that use Qualcom....
Maybe next co. I go to will not have QC.
Anyway, Cov. is a big co. like any other. If you learn how their system works and play the game right, it's not too bad.

 

Can't thank you enough for your chronicle.
A wealth of information, Thank you..................................

 

do you still work at covenant rocks will be there in april any advice