Do you look at safety ratings before you decide to drive for them

I do. As you know, their score could impact my score. I keep a link to the search page and eliminate a lot of application work that way*.

One consideration is that the people most likely to work for a company with a bad CSA are those who are starting out and haven't researched the industry.

Experienced drivers care less about the scores because they are either owner-ops or are on with a good company.

*One sidebar you might consider is how often a company advertises for drivers vs its CSA score. I haven't done formal analysis, but I'm betting there's correlation if not causation.

 

I have no desire to drive around with a target on my back ... if I find it isn’t safe I don’t drive it period especially for a new carrier ...

 

I do. I compare them to my last company, I switched companies after 18 years. I look at the 3 categories to learn if they are same as, stricter than, or not as careful as what I was used to. It doesn't tell you everything, but not every DOT cop is lying all of the time, so I want to know as much as possible.

 

Absolutely.
If t's terrible I probably won't be working for that company.
If I'm being nice... Drivers that don't at least check, are fools.
With the DOT number it takes less than 1 minute to check it... without it it may take a little bit more work


By the way it's not just new drivers that should be looking at it.
I had a buddy who went to work for a company with a bad score.
Especially HOS Violations .
He's been driving for 15 to 20 years.

I checked for him . He said I don't give a #### about that .. He ended up quitting because they kept trying to make him run illegal.

 

i never did. i'd simply ask others if they heard of "such and such" a company, rolled the dice, and went to work for them.

never worked for a bad carrier yet.

 

I never researched in my time because it is something we knew nothing about in those days. (There were quite a bit of stuff like CSA, PSP and so on) that are close held by company and not told to drivers. Certainly not to me.

What I WILL do is several things.

I'll drop by the drivers room. Listen a while. If I hear good things and happy drivers then I want to work for this outfit. If I hear stupid stuff, bad complaining or some serious accusations etc then I am not so inclined to work for the company.

I'll take a walk among the trailers. Peek into the billboxes of the loaded ones to see which are typical destinations, pay miles, what is in the trailer and so forth One example will be Texas to MN for Mt Olives Pickles People. That's a nice little haul. (I had a rejected load that was landfilled once up there, which was something they don't teach in school, how to get a big truck up a goat path on a vertical slope Some roads just are not meant for big trucks)

I'll visit the shop next. Depending on what is being fixed for why etc I can get a pretty good picture.

One time a Recruiter in JB Hunt said they aint got conventionals. When I got to Protho Junction Arkansas. (Essentially north little rock, literally a railroad junction town for the Union Pacific) and walked about the JBH Yard I found about 50 bobtail centuries mid roofs packed into long term storage in one far corner by the shop.

I knew normally I would never run for JBH considering the reputation they had in this industry, however it was a three week experiment that I quit fairly quickly after destroying yet another car with a cabover (Just like I told them will happen at some point)

Companies never listen to me, the driver. Why should I listen to the BS they have to tell that they have told a thousand times over to new hires long before I came along? I prefer to learn what I can from the drivers at the truckstop long before I consider them for hiring on and going to work for in the first place.

 

same way for me too...i didn't have a computer until mid 1998. and CSA wasn't even a glimmer in the DOT man's eye yet...

and nearing retirement, i could care less a companies safety rating. but tell you what, from what i see on the websites for truck crashes, and what little experience some have, and THEY are trainers, I KNOW WHICH companies to stay away from, by that stuff alone...!!!!!!

 

Check the safety score, inspect trucks, interview mechanics and drivers and then the safety dept. I interview the company because it shows me what I want to know.

 

I voted no. I was always just happy to have a job.

I worked for one guy, got pulled in for a level 3. I'm leaning on the DOT's desk, and I can see his computer screen, and it's blinking red with this big red 94 in the middle.

I thought, I don't know what that means, but it's not good.

Anyway, passed.

Worry about yourself out here, and you'll be ok. You have no control over what other people do anyway.

If you develop good habits, which are all the basics put into practice, you'll be ok. If you don't, we'll read about you on LIVE TRUCKING someday.