Crete Carrier Corporation - Lincoln, Ne.

Sometimes Interstate Dist. will do that if they need an extra driver to pull a refer load... But thats better then sitting with a dry van waiting for a load to be available. I dont mind pulling a refer once in a while.

 

They also had a bad wreck in Atlanta. Lady driver had just left the Marietta terminal, rear-ended a broken down UPS wiggle wagon sitting on the shoulder killing the mechanic that was trying to fix it. Then bounced across the 4 lanes pinning several cars to the inside wall. Last thing I heard is that charges were pending. No one seems to know what caused her to do this. And like the crash in Fla, the company has said nothing to us drivers. We are mushrooms here. Kept in the dark, and fed bull ... well you know.

 

Actually Crete and Shaffer's national divisions will now be run out of the same office. I e-mailed the Shaffer side about it when they first announced the move. All of the Shaffer dispatch and planning will now be done out of the Crete - Lincoln office. Shaffer will be the one losing most of the drivers, they are going from one-on-one dispatch to zone dispatch like Crete. We (Crete) may be asked to haul a reefer every great once in a while, but mostly we haul the dry, and Shaffer hauls the reefer loads. But when they(Shaffer) are in an area and need to, they can put a dry load on their reefer, which they have been doing all along, just most Crete drivers don't know it.

There are customers that use both dry and reefer, now those customers will only have one CSR to call for all of their freight needs. (geez, I sound like an advertiser). The York, NE and New Kingstown, PA terminals will be handling the regional stuff.

 

If I go with anyone it will be Crete out of there Deland Terminal. I live 1hr away. do you get to take your trucks home? I know for sure I will be going regional and or Dedicated. They seem better than all of the companies that hire greenhorns.

Hunter

 

started with Crete in mar 2006....
other than some major points on my safety record for logging(when i started they gave a 1 hour grace,then in october they switched to 15 min without telling anyone!!), i have had a great time driving for them. My terminal is in Ottawa,IL, that's up north on i-80, but i live very close to st louis,mo. i take my truck home with me every 2-3 weeks for time off. the only downside i've had is getting the truck serviced. i can only get it done while i'm out running, which hurts productivity. however, last year(2007) i averaged 11,583 miles per month. and yes, we must log it exactly as we do it. but it keeps them from overworking us,also.

 

I think in the near future, EVERYONE will be running legal (like it or not) when the so called black box can be checked when ever they want at a scale... My only question (for Crete or Werner) what do you do when your out of hours for the day, and you must drive on because all the truck stops or rest area's are full? You must log over 11 hours driving,.? right? It sounds like you dont have a choice when they put points on you. I guess you have to do what you have to do. Life of Trucking!

 

knighton, you log it as looking for safe haven. i just did it last night because i was at a cons. and had 15 mins to get parked, off of there property. took 27 to get somewhere i could legally do it. just call safety sap.

 

You will have a choice, though. Your mandatory teammate will take over if you run out of hours when only 30 minutes from shutdown. And then the shutdown will be for only a few minutes, as you will be a team, after all.

The sun is setting on solo OTR. Everything is being put in place as we speak to more or less force companies (from an economic standpoint) to run OTR loads team-only.

No idling in Cally, these new HOS rules, this black-box garbage, green propaganda everywhere you look, et al..... Not to mention high diesel prices forcing companies to adopt their own "no-idle" policies. Then there's Warren "All you can invest" Buffet and his railroad investments. He knows what's in store for the solo OTR driver. Just look up the word 'extinction' in the dictionary.

Change is a comin' to OTR, like it or not, ready or not.

 

That the Shaffer driver was misinformed. Shaffer will continue to pull reefer freight, and Crete will pull dry van. We may be asked if we want to pull a reefer load, because there is no dry freight available right then in the area we empty out in, but we don't have to accept. We can wait until something dry opens up, or they will deadhead us to a load. This comes from someone who works for Shaffer at the Columbus terminal who was asked about this subject. Besides, I've noticed quite a few Crete drivers who already pull reefer freight, so I don't think that it would need to be an issue of being forced to do it. Some Crete drivers have obviously had reefer experience and don't mind doing it.

I don't usually listen to a lot of the "changes coming" that I hear from other drivers at terminals, because mostly it turns out to be a lot of smoke from disgruntled drivers. I believe it when I see it over the qualcomm, or get it out of the mailbox at home on CCC letterhead. Otherwise, it's just not worth worrying over, and I'm certainly not going to go clean out my truck just based on hearsay. Crete pays me well, and doesn't ask a whole heck of a lot from me to keep them doing it. At least I don't think they do. While most drivers want those long loads, I go for the ones that can pick up not far from where I empty and be delivered the next day, leaving me ready to start the cycle again. My miles stay solid this way. So does my bank account. All that, and it's done without running myself into the ground. When I start getting Policy memos about all these "changes", then I'll worry. Until then, life is good!

 

I'm sorry to be the one to tell you this but you will be required to pull reefers. I was told by my Terminal manager at Council Bluffs that I had the choice of pulling reefers or clear my truck out. I had told them prior to employment that I DO NOT PULL REEFERS. The truck got cleared. Its all good though. It helped me make the final decision of not to drive any longer anyway. Money is good but at the sacrific of any type of normal life makes it bad. I'm not bashing trucking or truck drivers. I have total respect for these people, they have a hard row to hoe. As for me, I'm cooked after 5 years. I took me out of the oven before I actually hurt someone.