Hello all,
Thought I'd stop by for a power update.
I just as well jump right into it. To start with I have a weekly update from Thanksgiving week that I had started and almost finished before my computer started giving me problems. It's a bit out of date at this point in time, but since I put the effort into typing it up I just as well post it. Plus it goes into some detail concerning one of my more prolonged battles with dispatch. I would also like to point out that I found myself being a little more cantankerous than I generally allow myself to get, but I felt that this particular incident was well deserving of just such a reaction on my part. So, here it is.
WEEK FORTY SEVEN
Monday, November 23rd through Sunday, November 29th
This week started out in the parking lot of a Sams Club. I had arrived the night before and had a 5:30 appointment delivery. At 4:30 or so I decided to pull infront of the only open dock to prevent another driver from getting there ahead of me, much like what happened at one of these places a month or so ago. In that particular instance a driver that was suppose to deliver the night before didnt make it as scheduled and pulled in shortly before the store opened for receiving hours and parked his truck at the dock. So when they opened for deliveries they decided, Since hes already in the door, well go ahead and unload him first. The result was that I didnt bump the dock until 2hrs past my appointment time. Today I wanted to make sure that didnt happen and as I was getting into position someone came out of the store, got my BOL and had me pop the seal off and back on up to the dock. Wow, an hour early and I didnt even have to ask.
It did come at a small price however, because they needed an empty Wal-Mart trailer pulled out of one of the other docks to make room for local delivery trucks that would be showing up shortly. I had no problem with that and was happy to help them out. Especially since the early dock would mean a very early unload and I would be able to get an MT call in very early in the day and shouldnt have any problem getting a load out.
But as the trucking world goes, good news rarely stays good. I went inside to let them know I was in position and had a seat. This was one of those places than make you hand over your keys and sit in the break room while they unload you. Not that there was anything that resembled a break room in this place. I had a choice of a metal folding chair that offered me a bland view of an unpainted plywood wall or a small metal bench that forced me to stair at a large poster picture of Sam Walton along with some of his fonder quotes of inspiration. I wonder what kind of quotes would be heard from him today after seeing what his company has grown into.
I had planned on a short wait, but it eventually became clear that they were much more interested in unloading Wal-Mart trailers that had been dropped during the night. I wasnt all that put off by this though because my actual appointment time was still a future event. But that time too, eventually passed as I watched other trailers being unloaded and then detailed attention being paid to the shuffling around of miscellaneous pallet that appeared to have been abandoned by the night crew. In effect, every piece of freight within sight was being moved around except for what was residing within the confines of my trailer.
About thirty minuets past my appointed hour I did actually get a sheepish apology from the receiving clerk that had asked me to move a trailer for them earlier that morning. Remember? The one that they wanted moved so that local delivery trucks could dock. The same dock that since that time has had 3 trucks back up to it and get unloaded while I waited helplessly. Yup, that one! Well, according to her, two of there 3 forklifts wouldnt start this morning and was the reason for this unusual delay and she assured me that they would get to me ASAP. I wasnt thrilled about it, but at least there was a reason for the madness. She concluded the conversation with, Do you like cookies or muffins. Hey, Im a muffin man.
It was another hour before they got around to my trailer, but once they did it was quick and I was handed my BOL and a massive tray of muffins from their floor. They werent even the outdated, throw out ones. I had assumed she was going to give me one or two for the road. Instead I had two dozen of these monsters. Its nice to be treaded like a human being on occasions.
The MT call went in and it was still early enough that there was a good chance of getting an early morning pickup somewhere in the nearby area. The load offer came in and although it wasnt perfect, it would do. I would have to sit around to wait for a 10am live load heading to KY (790mi). The live load would end up costing me most of the morning, but the delivery was set for anytime Wednesday. This was a change from the last time I delivered to this particular Family Dollar DC almost a year ago because I remember that I had specific directions not to deliver before the actual delivery date. I also remember arriving at the truckstop just down the street very early the day before and I was forced to sit there and wait for midnight to roll around so that I could drop my trailer and be on my way.
This time, however, there was no mention of restrictions on early deliveries, and I had every intention of showing up the day before to see what would happen. The worst thing they could do is tell me to come back at midnight.
In an attempt to speed up the delivery time I pulled into the shipper about 2hrs early to see if they could get started on me ahead of schedule and was delighted to be informed that my preloaded trailer was sitting in the yard and ready to go. Oh Joy! That was a pleasant little surprise and I found myself headed in the direction of KY much sooner than I had originally planned on.
I spent the rest of the day getting as close as I could to my final destination that night and pulled in by 8am the following day. I was worried that I would be turned away at the gate, but they didnt even bat an eye at my early arrival and simple pointed me in the direction of the shipping office. I ended up standing in line for about and hour waiting for the four drivers in front of be to be processed and was eventually hooking up to and empty trailer and waiting for my next load offer.
Well, looks like its back to the same ol thing. Deliver in the morning and get a load out scheduled for pickup that night. Its now about 9am and Im looking at a 9pm pickup at a customer thats about 120 miles away, just great! I was going to a shipper that I had been to a few times before in the backwoods of KY and have always had good luck getting out of the place early. I headed that way and hoped for the best. If the load was ready I would be on my way, if not I could put in a 10hr break on their property and spend the rest of the night driving.
I arrived to find that luck was with me and was told that they had just finished loading my trailer. It was still in the door, all I had to do was pull it out and let them seal it and I was headed to Chicago (662mi). I had just enough hours left on my logs to make it to our Indianapolis yard were I put in for the night.
My Wednesday got off to a very slow start because the load had an appointment live unload at 7pm (no luck with the attempted Tcall) and I only had a few hours of drive time left to get there. So that had me sitting around until after noon and I headed out with the intention of arriving 2hrs early in hopes of speeding up the day. Not that I assumed it would do any good. After driving my 3hrs for the day and what would probably turn into a 2hr unload the day would be shot and I didnt think there would be any chance of getting a load out that night. The fact that tomorrow was Thanksgiving didnt do a thing to boost my confidence. I was almost certain that I would be spending the next day or two waiting around in the Chicago area for my next load while the rest of the nation was sitting down with their families enjoying a nice fat turkey with all the trimmings. There are times when I dont think so much of this silly job.
The unfortunate part about this delivery time, (other than sitting around all day waiting for it) was that I would be driving through Chicago smack dab in the middle of rush hour. I was aware of the fact that this was the day before Thanksgiving and thought that traffic should be greatly reduced because many people wouldnt be working today. But I made that very same assumption last year as I headed into NYC and spent 3hrs trying to get over the GW Bridge. I really didnt know what to expect and decided to hang a left off of I-65 on Hwy 10 and take two lanes under Chicago and come in from the back side. This is a slower route than taking the interstate, but usually a time saver compared to dealing with rush hour traffic. Especially the I-65/I-90 interchange.
Other than a bit of a slow down going through Kankakee, the trip went OK until I made it to the general area of where I was suppose to be making my delivery in the Bolingbrook area. The address didnt show up on my GPs (never a good sign) but the directions given seemed simple enough. As it turned out they werent and I found myself driving around for another 20mins or so before I found out which turn left should have said turn right.
When I pulled in I couldnt help but notice 5 or 6 Crete trailers sitting in doors and realized that this might not be a live unload. I headed on into shipping to get the news and sure enough, drop load it is. This is what you could call a bitter sweet revelation. I was more than pleased that I was dropping this trailer, but not so thrilled about the fact that it was now about 6pm and I could have been here before noon. Oh well, thats just the way it happens sometimes. Ill file that memory away and the next time Im sent to this customer Ill know what to expect and proceed accordingly.
Time to put in the empty call and see what happens? I was hoping that there was a preloaded trailer somewhere in the area that I would be picking up for a Friday morning delivery. Although this day was all but shot, I would be able to run some good miles tomorrow and make my delivery first thing Friday morning. that was what I was hoping for as a best case scenario anyway. The worst case scenario would be a no freight message and a day or two of waiting around for something to pop up.
It only took a few minutes to get my answer and it wasnt anything I had expected. I was to pickup a preloaded trailer down in Kankakee (about one hour away) with a delivery in PA some 500 miles away, 5 days from now. That one knocked the wind out of me and as I was trying to comprehend the horror of it all another message came across the Qcom telling me that this load needed to be picked up before it was considered a late pickup and that I could Tcall it in our Chicago yard. That was close!
Although I wasnt getting stuck with a 5 day, 500 mile run, I wasnt looking forward to this. The entire run would total about 100 miles and the vast majority of the run was on two lane roads and by the time I was done running around I would have burned another 3-4 hours off my log. The next problem this load posed was that I wouldnt be shutting down until late in the night and instead of being ready to go on my next load by 5am or so, I would now find myself sitting around until late morning before I could pickup my next load. Freight was going to be tough enough to come by as it was, this little shag run to cover dispatchs butt was going to put me in a bad spot. Then, of course, there was the so called two hundred pound gorilla. I was headed to one of our customers that is a drop and hook facility. I would be dropping my perfectly good and EMPTY trailer in their yard in exchange for a loaded trailer. I would then take this loaded trailer to our yard and drop it there. Heres where I knew a big problem would present itself. This is a holiday weekend and every driver in the area that made it home for Thanksgiving would be dropping their loaded trailers off and what few empty trailers that reside in this yard at any particular time would be long gone.
These were all things that were foremost on my mind as I accepted the load. I suppose I could have pointed these facts out to dispatch at the time the load offer was sent to me, but I wouldnt be telling them anything they didnt already know. I realized they wouldnt want to hear it and I saw no reason to make a fuss. This was just one of those times that a load needed to be covered and I was the one who was in position to do it. Knowing the empty trailer issue was going to be a problem, I did send off a message in hopes of getting the ball rolling on my next load by asking if they had any Tcalled loads in our yard that needed to be repowered that they could preplan me on while I was taking care of the shag load. That message was totally ignored (not a good sign).
The shag load went by without too much trouble, other than the 11 2 bridge that I came across when I tried finding my own way to the shipper. I was so close too, less than a mile away. I guess thats why the directions took me so far out of the way. This caused a momentary delay, but soon enough I was hooked to my trailer and ready to head on back to our yard. I once again sent a message off to dispatch to let them know that I would be dropping this load in the yard within the hour and again asked if they had anything sitting around that needed to be repowered, (no answer).
True to my word, I was back to the yard within the prescribed time frame and as suspected there wasnt an empty trailer to be found. I let them know I was ready for a load with a message saying something to the effect of Ive dropped the loaded trailer, please tcall, Bills are in the box and lock is off, there are no empties available, do you have a load I can bobtail to or a load in the yard I can repower for delivery or something I can tcall at another terminal to keep me moving, I have till 3:30am before I need to break
The reply moments later:
Tcall complete, make sure bills are in the nose and lock is off, what is your PTA and MT
Ugh! There you have it, proof that no one reads.
My response:
Ready for load now (currently 9:30pm), have till 03:30 before break. No mts in the yard and I gave mine up to pickup your shag load (just to remind them). Do you have a load I can bobtail to or a load on the yard I can repower to deliver or Tcall elsewhere?
One minute later:
OK, check back tomorrow
Such is the frustration one has to deal with. I ask very precise questions and get nothing but indifference in return.
What this means is exactly what I feared when I initially received the shag load. I had and empty at that time, now I dont. Without and empty trailer I am dead in the water. No MT, no load, thats the general rule and Im anything but happy with this development. On a normal day this would be bad enough, but this is Thanksgiving weekend and there is a real possibility that I will be sitting here for more than a day waiting for a trailer. I have no intentions of letting dispatch blow me off like this. I have hours left in my day and Im wide awake. Im ready for a battle.
Ill try again:
Cant I repower load out of the yard. There are at least 12 loads sitting here and Im not too thrilled about giving up my mt for a shag load and then not getting a load because of it. I just dont want to get burned for helping out.
The reply was fairly quick (at least Im not getting the cold shoulder, yet).
There are no productive loads on the yard
That I didnt doubt, but it failed to answer my question about tcalling one of these loads at another terminal. After all, the definition of non-productive from my point of view was sitting in the back of a truck with no mt and no load.
There were a number of dropped trailers in the yard and I checked BOL on each of them to find out where they were headed. Most of them were delivering in the Chicago area and a handful where destine to WI. None of these would do me any good, but there were three headed to the east coast and one going to Wilmington, OH. I wasnt thrilled about going to the east coast, but I could tcall any of them at one of our PA yards and would be happy to be rolling, but the load that I had my heart set on was the OH load. I could run it down to Columbus and Tcall it there. It was only a 350mi run or so, but I could have it there first thing tomorrow morning and work on getting a load out of there. Anything would be better than sitting around here wondering if an empty trailer would show up.
My blood was beginning to heat up and for a moment I did consider dropping it and wait to see what would happen in the morning, but I was feeling rather stubborn at the moment. I think the main reason for this unwillingness to let it go tonight was the fact that I gave up my empty trailer and ran the shag load without a single complaint to dispatch, and now that same dispatcher was blowing me off.
Once I had surveyed the available trailers it was time to send off my next message along with a good serving of guilt:
I hate to be a pain, but with no trailer I know I have little chance of getting a load and even less chance of an empty showing up here tomorrow. I gave up my mt to pickup a shag and now its biting me in the backside. How about trl# xxxxxx, its going to Wilmington, OH. I can tcal it in Columbus and work on getting a load out of there
The response was again quick:
Sorry, you will need to wait for a trailer
Wow, that one got the blood boiling. I was ready to pickup the phone and call this dispatcher out for the bs he was pulling on me. I had to sit on that one for awhile and regain a little composure, but still needed to make my point in as civil of a manor as possible. A number of thoughts went through my mind, but I settled on a short but sweet massage to get my point across without evoking too much resentment from the other side:
Thats one hell of a way to say Thanks
Where do I go from here? I put a little thought to it and came up with:
call me stubborn. Why cant I pull the OH load and tcall in Columbus. After all, you had no problem with me picking up your load and tcalling it here. How about returning the favor, its bad enough being out here over the holidays without sitting around waiting for a trailer.
I have a pretty good idea why I wasnt being given the OH load. By doing so it would be tcalled in Columbus which would put it within close proximity to its final destination and the company would then have to pay the next driver a shag fee, therefore adding to the final cost of the load. I understand this, but from my point of view I was loosing much more than that and like I said, they owe me on this one. I imagine it also had something to do with the computer generated load availability and perhaps this particular dispatcher didnt have the authority or over ride anything, but this is all conjecture on my part and at the time my only concern was getting an mt trailer.
Thats when the communications stopped. No reply! I waited for 20mins to make sure he wasnt busy with something else at the moment and confirmed that I was indeed being ignored:
Ignoring me wont make me go away. Why can I not take the OH load and tcal in Columbus, I dont understand why I have to sit here and wait for an empty trailer when that load is sitting here. I did the shag without a single complaint, well, now I have a complaint.
I was almost feeling guilty at this point, but I had committed myself to pestering this guy into submission. I was fully into my persistence stage at this time.
I had actually expected that message to be ignored also and was prepared to call in and deal with it that way, but to the dispatchers credit, the discussion was continued(I dont know who has the more frustrating job, driver or dispatch):
I needed that load picked up, if you want to deliver it you can
To this day I dont know if he was serious about that or if he was trying to be a jerk. I suspected that latter, but chose to chuckle and assumed it was his way of jabbing back:
I know you needed it picked up, thats why it did it without complaining knowing this could happen. Now I need a load and you know the one I picked up for you is only 550 miles and delivers in 5 days. Now Im asking for help because tomorrows crew isnt going to care about what I did tonight.
Finally, there was a crack in the armor:
Sorry, there is nothing I can do. You can check the Ottawa yard if you want to
That wasnt the greatest game plan, but it was a step in the right direction and much better than what I was looking at. Off to Ottawa I went and 45mins later I was pulling into the yard and I started to get out to see what I could find. I didnt even have both feet on the ground before I was approached by someone that appeared to be a bit frazzeled. Had I not seen him get out of another Crete truck I would have be a little apprehensive, after all, it was now right at midnight and I wasnt expecting such an animated conversation. Words like, What are you looking for?, How many hours do you have?, Are you looking for a load? and so fourth.
I had to jump into the conversation running and try to make sense of what had already been said while trying to keep up at the same time, but the general jist of things was this. He had already been in the yard for 16hrs waiting for and empty trailer. He had somewhat recently (within the last 2hrs) hooked to the only empty trailer in the yard that someone had dropped while repowering a load out of the yard while at the same time explaining to me that he now had the only empty trailer in the yard, thus informing me that I was out of luck as far as getting and empty. The story continued.
Once he got the empty trailer he let dispatch know and was immediately sent a load offer. He thought he would be getting a load for the following morning, but instead, his load HAD to be picked up by 3am and delivered in KS (578mi) anytime the following day. He went on to explain that he hadnt gained back many hours today and he barely had enough time to deliver the load and didnt want it anyway because he would have to drive late into the night which was not good because he had been up all day. He was also all bent out of shape because he had already been sitting for 16hrs and decided to put in a reset while in the Ottawa yard to avoid some short days in the near future and this load was really going to mess things up for him. There were many more fragmented details that didnt really make sense to me but I was able to get the general idea of what he was trying to say.
Then came the really interesting part that involved dispatch. As it turned out, he had been going back and forth with the very same dispatcher that I had recently been battling with for about the last two hours trying to get out of this load or get something more conducive to his situation. I was stunned. This couldnt be the same guy that insisted that I must get a trailer before I could get a load. This couldnt be the same dispatcher that I had asked the very direct question of, Is there a load I can bobtail to? This couldnt be the same individual that has been trying to force the driver standing before me to take a load he didnt want while another driver, who had recently been bent over royally was insisting on reparations for the dubious deed. I simply couldnt grasp the absurdity of it, but then I didnt have to because Im just a truck driver.
From that point on the other driver sent off a message letting Mr. DahSpatch know that we had run across each other and solved all of our problems. Moments later I received a phone call from said dispatcher. Can you pick this load up tonight? Yes (I had already told him twice tonight that I was good to go until 03:30), I can even get it a few hours down the road. Do you have enough hours to deliver it on time? Yes, Ill have it there by 9pm tomorrow. OK then, Im sending the load info to your truck. I simply said with all the sincerity I could muster, Thank you for your help and understanding tonight. Is that what I wanted to say, of course not, but all was now good in my world.
It was a battle, but in the end I won out (for now). Instead of sitting around for the next day or two I was under a good run down to KS with a drop and hook on both ends and would be spending my Thanksgiving Day driving instead of sitting around waiting for a trailer.
OK, thats how it ends. I started this update some 2 months ago and kind of let it die at the time. It would have been nice if that would have been the end of my troubles for that particular week but the frustration had not yet concluded. After delivering my drop load in KS the next day I was faced with only a few hours of available log for the next day. I chose to do a reset and spent the next day sitting in a dirt lot waiting for time to pass.
When my 34hrs had passed I let dispatch know I was ready to go, but was simply told there was no freight and I was eventually sent a load offer that picked up the next day. Ever optimistic, I headed on over to the shipper in the hopes that the load would be ready early and I could then take a stab at a Tcal somewhere along the way. Of course the load wasnt ready, but I discovered 5 loaded trailers sitting on the shippers lot that appeared ready to go. This spawned another round of Qualcom volleyball that somewhat mimicked my battle with dispatch as described above and I could go into some detail, but in the interest of time and boredom Ill just jump to the conclusion.
I finally got a better load, (not great, but better) one of the preloaded trailers, and pulled out hopping I would be able to Tcall it en route when I got to our Ottawa yard. It didnt work out that way and I ended up loosing another day sitting around. But that is somewhat of an expected occurrence during a holiday weekend and I was content with the fact that I had averted a 1800mi week. If nothing else, there is always next week to look forward too. It couldnt possibly be as bad as this one.
WEEK FORTY SEVEN
Monday, November 23rd through Sunday, November 29th
Tulsa, OK to Morehead, KY ........790mi
Kimper, KY to Bolingbrook, IL .........662mi
Kankakee, IL to Romeoville, IL .......104mi
Spring Valley, IL to Ottawa, IL ......578mi
Spring Hill, KS to Beloit, WI (first leg) ....499mi
Total Paid Miles ..2633 Miles
Actual Miles .2662 Miles
2633mi x .44 = $1158.52 + $35 Shag = $1193.52
CRETE - A Year in Review
Discussion in 'Discuss Your Favorite Trucking Company Here' started by evertruckerr, Jan 11, 2008.
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And here are the final numbers for the dismal year that was 2009.
Year-end Mileage:
![[IMG]](proxy.php?image=http%3A%2F%2Fi73.photobucket.com%2Falbums%2Fi209%2Fevertrucker%2F2010-01-14_081938.png&hash=ed75281bdd61b30a524db5ecb3c3f720)
Breakdown of Mileage:
![[IMG]](proxy.php?image=http%3A%2F%2Fi73.photobucket.com%2Falbums%2Fi209%2Fevertrucker%2F2010-01-14_082304summary.png&hash=92187e3ad38bcdc2ca963cdf8c37fbec)
And the final Paycheck for the year:
![[IMG]](proxy.php?image=http%3A%2F%2Fi73.photobucket.com%2Falbums%2Fi209%2Fevertrucker%2Fsm2009FinalPay.png&hash=0497c28d46264dd9e0d9f0592c15e458)
Although my final miles for the year ended up being about 23,000 short of last years numbers resulting in a $10,000 reduction in mileage pay, I spent much more time at the house this time around.
Even though my mileage saw a significant decline over that of last year I was actually able to show a gross income marginally smaller than last year due to a number of factors including cashing in of 3 weeks of payed vacation that added $3600+ to the total along with an increase in shag pay, short haul pay, detention pay and a couple of thousand for training pay along with my yearly 1cent pay raise that resulted in an extra $1226 for the year.
Over all I am more than please with how the year worked out compared to a large portion of the country's population. I feel a great deal of gratitude to Crete for making it possible for me to continue to earn a fair living in these trying times.Last edited: Jan 29, 2010
The Stump Guy and Rattlebunny Thank this. -
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Love that holiday story. Reminds me of last Labor day up near Milwaukee. Me and another driver had a drop and hook up in this yard with no mt's. We both contacted dispatch and they told us to wait for an mt. The place was closed until Tuesday and it was Sunday. We both bobtailed to a truckstop and spent the night there hoping to get some good news. The next day I asked if there was anyplace else to grab an MT and they said no. Thank GOD I had an awesome trainer. Called him and he told me about a Kellogs drop yard nearby. I contacted dispatch and asked them if they had any mt's there. Dispatch said there are none there. Called trainer back, he said just go there and find out for yourself. Sure enough there was just one(all I need) in the yard. Put in my MT and got a load in 10 minutes. I knew right then that if you really want to work and you know how to play this game you could make the miles. I love reading these posts by Evertruckerr! You can learn alot from these posts.
The Stump Guy, Kimmi, evertruckerr and 1 other person Thank this. -
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My past couple months have been decent, I would prefer to get more miles but I can't complain. ET has taught me a thing or two about how to maximize miles but he is still the king. Weekly miles starting with most recent 3051, 1070 home 5 days, 3638, 2530, 1917 home 2 days for christmas, 2608, 2766, 844 home 4 days, 2907, 3308, 2328.
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