Day 1 of a Brand New NorthEast Regional driver.

When I've read this site in the past, I've enjoyed reading people's experiences from their recently started careers, because that's what I was most concerned with. Orientation process, training, hiring; the kind of stuff you'd rather get info on from the guy with 3 months experience instead of the 20 year vet, lol. I started my training Wednesday afternoon this week, so I'll give a brief rundown of what's gone on so far.

I got on with a smaller carrier, less than 100 trucks. They didn't do prehires, but I did fax in my application (pay attention to whether a company prefires online or faxed resumes if possible) with my school's recommendation (no idea if it was generic or not, I was told it was good). I talked with them about a week before my road test (note: I did not hear back from any company I applied to that I did not call myself after applying to. You need to call companies yourself it seems), and was told that things looked good, given nothing showed up in a background check and to call back after I tested. I chose this company because it paid 40 CPM and it seems everyone on here advises people to go for smaller companies as opposed to the larger ones. I have to say though, that I was close to regretting applying before my road test, and I'll tell you why. If you fail your road test the first time, you have to tell your company that you were talking to that you failed it (you don't have to say failed, but no matter what happened, that's what they'll assume) and then you have that impacting their decision to hire you. Not a deal breaker for all companies, but definitely a factor (have read a post on here from a guy that had Roehl refuse him after he called and let them know about his third failure). Now, some states are different, but in NY, it takes about 10 days (9 for me) to get your license. That is enough time to apply for, talk with, and set up an orientation with a company to get hired on almost immediately after your license should come to you in the mail. Worst case scenario, you'd start a week later than if you had applied before your road test. Again, not saying it's bad to apply before passing, but I definitely see the merit in waiting now, because I was sweating bullets, literally, sweating profusely the entire time I tested, lol. At my DMV, the test was actually very easy. Don't hit the curb on the parallel or the road, do the pretrip (I don't think my tester was barely paying attention to the outside part, just sound confident and go at a good pace). They don't throw anything difficult at you. If you fail, it's your fault because you were too nervous or did something dumb. Just keep yourself together for half an hour and you'll be fine.

On to "orientation". Wasn't sure what to expect here, I was prepared to get hired on with a big OTR company with paid busfare, group orientations and hotels halfway across the country. Not this place. It's a regional only outfit about 90 minutes away from me, so I drove myself and luckily had family that lived closeby (not sure what they would have "expected" had I not had that available). I did a sitdown/interview with the Recruiter/Safety Manager. I should note, that not all my experiences will be typical I'm sure, as not only was this a newer company, but a company that had not accepted student drivers before this summer. I was the second driver accepted, and the first one was a pansy that quit a week or two into training. After that, I had 2 short days of "orientation", but they weren't paid. That part's not a great sell (not that I'm trying to sell anyone on the company that I'm not listing, lol), and I wasn't too happy about it, having barely enough cash to survive a week or two on the road, but hopefully it makes up for itself soon with decent checks after training.

I almost forgot about the company test. I was a bit nervous about it, but my trainer tested me and was very easy going. Wasn't sure what he wanted for a pre trip, didn't really do one after mentioning that I wasn't sure what he wanted. We grabbed a tractor from the shop and went and hooked up to a trailer in the yard. Hooked up fine, walked around the trailer and called it a pretrip. Got out on the road and did OK. Instructor was pleasantly surprised that I wasn't grinding gears (his first trainee apparently did quite a bit). I did struggle a bit to keep the truck straight on the highway tho. At the time I thought it was a mix between me being nervous and having an old POS truck (hoping it's not like the tractor I get, I've been told it will likely be an 07), but my trainer told me that my trailer had a cardboard load, which apparently is heavy stuff, and shifts, so it may have been that. I'm going to find out soon enough, as I've been told that's what I have to look forward to in a few days, lol. We finished the test with an alley dock before dropping the trailer back where it belonged. It was tough... I've noticed since that the trucks that use that dock are straight trucks. There's not much room in front of it. Completely doable, as I did do it, but it's tight. My trainer/tester did help me a bit. He said it was more an evaluation than a test. If it was a test, I'd likely have failed after that backing, lol. Not a good test for a student IMO, but I guess it wasn't a true test, rather, not graded, lol.

Onto training. I get 4 weeks, 400$ per week. 400 is on the low side for the companies I looked for, but it's also not an 8 week program like some and that's for 5 days a week. I was actually preparing to be on the road for an entire month, but my trainer is actually pretty lax. We seem to be just doing his loads, and after the first week we'll be adding on a couple extra loads, as we'll be doing what I've been told is light teaming. I wasn't excited to hear about this, as it wasn't brought up until I got into the office and ready to go the next day, but my trainer said even with teaming we'll be under 3K miles a week, so it can't be too bad. My trainer usually gets himself home every otherday or two, so I guess I'll at least be getting a day or two a week off during training. My trainer is actually a pretty nice guy, we get along well. He's flexible, but I've let him know that I understand I'm in his truck (which as a trainee, you are, don't be a jerk and move his stuff around freely) and he's the boss, and things are working well.

Right now, I'm at home after my first trip. It was about 7 hours to Jersey, with a return load to the terminal the next day from a place about 20 minutes from where we dropped the first load, then I went home. I started the first day by showing up to the office about 45 minutes before I was supposed to meet with trainer, to do paperwork. Trainer showed up and told me we'd only be gone overnight, so just bring what I needed for that, we weren't showering (not saying he's one of those smelly scumbags you hear about on here, just that we were only doing a short trip and it wasn't necessary to take a shower at a truckstop). Got myself in with minimal baggage, truck seeming very small at first, lol. Saying that, I got used to it a bit over the next 2 days, but don't think they're that big if you haven't been in one. There's room to stand up and turn around, then a bunk, that's about it. We left the terminal, trainer driving bobtail, and went maybe half an hour or so to our first stop. Went inside, got paperwork, looked at load. Load was not even a quarter of the trailer (53 ft of course). Fine by me, lol. Now it was my time to work. I got to pick up our "loaded" trailer, but we had to put the empty trailer in the yard back in it's place. Pulled trailer out and backed over to the side, dropped that. Hooked to empty, backed that in (eventually, lol), then dropped that and went back to hook back to loaded trailer. 3 drop and hooks with an alley dock, before even driving on the road, lol. Backing is tough, lol. I was pretty darn good at it in the yard. It almost doesn't even seem to help now. Maneuverability practice was good, but backing up to cones seems stupid now. It's very easy to get confused when looking in my mirrors. I'm good when I know what's what, but when there's rows of trailers and docks behind me, and I can't tell what's what and which one I'm supposed to be at after turning myself around, it's tough. I just get out and look though, a few times. People tell you to G.O.A.L. here, and it's true. Don't think your trainer is going to give you dirty looks or anything. If you have a good one, like mine seems to be, he'll be glad you're not a reckless moron tryin to back up blindly until he has to shout at you to stop. I'm not happy with how I'm doing at backing yet, but I've done it twice during training now and I'm getting better at it I feel. Just getting used to things, lol.

Actual driving time now. First load, again, barely loaded, less than a 7 hour trip to Jersey where I knew we were going to stay overnight and deliver in the morning (sleeping at the delivery location). We only did one stop, fuel, food and smokes. As a side note, I've been wanting to quit smoking for a while. I've actually reduced it a lot lately, barely had any the last week or 2 before training. My trainer smokes quite a bit while driving though. There's no way I'm gonna drive with him all day without asking for one, and there's no way he's not gonna get pissed off at me asking for cigarettes every hour or two, lol. I don't feel like it'll be too bad once I'm on my own, but that's a whole other story, lol. Anyway, one stop, which was almost perfectly halfway through. Again, trainer is pretty flexible. If I was a whiner, and/or needed something, we could have stopped again, but it wasn't necessary for a 7 hour trip ( Not sure how "hard" I'm ready to drive yet, but I don't wanna be a pansy either, lol). The driving from the yard was all me of course, started around 5pm, so after getting out of NY, the driving I'm relatively familiar with, it was night driving most of the way down. Pretty hilly on 81 south, few turns I wish I was going slower on, and I mean curves on the highway in 65 MPH zones, lol. Got us down to Jersey, into yard (had to be reminded of my trailer in lot, lol...) and backed up into dock. Got it in after just a couple tries, trainer helping a bit, but it was at night. I'll give you kiddies that haven't started a tip for your first couple dock bumps. Pay attention to whether the pavement in front of the dock dips or not. I didn't. I also wasn't riding my clutch, because that's bad, right? My trainer told me to go slow when backing, but I didn't think I was supposed to ride the clutch, so I just did it in neutral with no gas. I was closing in and I seemed to be relatively straight, thought things were going well. Then I got the biggest jolt I've ever had in a truck, lol. I hit the dock a lil hard... Nothing too bad, trainer said he'd seen worse, but it was enough to learn my lesson, lol. It triggered the on board camera, lol. I won't bother going into the on board camera, lol. The one my company uses records only when an accident occurs, and you'll most likely watch a video explaining it. So, got that scare out of the way, hooked up to the empty trailer next to us and started our break to sleep after a little bit of paper work. Trainer filled out my evaluation paper (which he fills out at his discretion, he plans on every other day) with me there, telling me what he put. He didn't have any complaints or comments, other than backing of course, lol. Kudos to anyone that's even halfway decent at backing straight out of school, lol.

Day 2. You'll get to hear one grip about my trainer here. He set an alarm for both of us around 5.5 hours after we turned in, so he could pick up paperwork inside the stop we were at, then drive to the next pick up area close by for a live load. On the other side of that note, I couldn't sleep anyway, so I was kind of glad to be out of there, lol. I'm gonna throw out another tip here. Don't forget your pillow... I also don't suggest only bringing a sleeping bag. Having a blanket and a bag seems like it will be much more comfortable, and I'll know for sure tomorrow, lol. If you haven't caught on, I didn't sleep much that night, I was extremely uncomfortable. I probably would have been better off in one of the seats up front... So, the trainer drove us to our pickup area, we got loaded, and he drove the first 3 hours on the way home. We stopped for breakfast before getting loaded, mainly because we didn't have restroom at the receiver's lol. After my trainer's 3 hours we stopped for coffee at a very small T/S with a subway to switch seats and get lunch. Neither of us was that hungry. Coffee, snack and on the way. I only had about 6.5 hours to go. I had started to wake up a bit more before switching over, and I had gotten myself some coffee, so I wasn't too tired. I forgot to mention, we were fully loaded for this return trip. I was during my road test as well and forgot to mention something. Driving with a loaded trailer is different than driving empty. My school told me that they put "some" weight in their trailers, but it was BS. Driving with weight is a pretty big shocker, lol. The hills on the way down that were interesting were a little more so on the way home. Gotta weight longer to upshift and downshift even above 50 MPH (just not used to that, bein in a 10 speed, lol). You better not change lanes as quickly either. So, I got us home just fine, but that coffee barely seemed to put a dent into how tired I was, and I got us back into town just as I was getting so tired I couldn't have driven safely anymore.

Well, that was my first, very possibly over informative trip, lol. That trip had me back yesterday and leaving tomorrow afternoon and back again after a few days I guess. If you haven't guessed, the scheduling of my training is pretty unusual. Pretty lucky for me, but I wouldn't count on training this lax. There's no chance in hell you're getting home once a week training for most megas, lol. The only concern I have with the company I've chose is that I don't think I'll be getting the kind of miles I had hoped for, but hopefully the high CPM (40) makes up for it. My trainer said he averages less than 2,000, but I don't think he tries to drive too hard, he likes being home 2 to 3 times a week, so I'm hoping he's a poor example for miles to look forward to, lol. Still, 2,000 a week at 40 CPM is a decent enough check, considering I won't be driving my butt off for it. The company also has extra stop pay, which I don't know the rate of, 20 dollar an hour detention pay after 2 hours and 50 dollars for entering NYC. I can't remember if there are any paid holidays.
I hope some people find this useful, lol. it seems to be long enough... I plan to update pretty often if there's any interest at all. If I'm not driving, I'm probably gonna be killing time on the internet and checking on here, so feel free to ask questions if you have any, or to comment with your own experiences.

 

Because if you talk to them before your road test, you tell them when your road test is. If you tell them you're waiting 2 more weeks after you told them you'd be ready, then...

 

It's definitely not what I planned on. I wanted OTR, lol. I'm not done with the idea. I thought it would be crazy to pass up 40 CPM and being able to avoid the mega carrier situation right out of school though.

By the way, I see you always have great advice here; is it really hard to get a good tanker job if you only have dry van experience? Am I gonna have to start with Schneider bulk or some other place that's gonna pay me less than 50K a year even when I have 2+ years experience?

As for the road test part, they're scheduled weeks ahead of time, I'm pretty sure most companies know that. They'll know when you finish your CDL school if nothing else. You can tell em anything you want, but if you tell em that you had to reschedule or your road test was weeks after your course graduation, they're going to just assume you failed your first road test.

 

I'm all for making more money faster, but I'd like to stick with my first company for at least a year or two. They start at 40 CPM, which is awesome, but 45 CPM is their top rate, so there isn't a hell of a lot to work up to. I don't wanna be a job hopper, I'd like my next company to be a place I can stay with for years, or have the potential to at least. I might throw an app or two out to interesting companies every so often closer to a full year though.