Eastern Freightways North Brunswick, NJ

i live down the road from this place. i actually filled out a application about 6 years ago. place looked like a dump back then and still does. trucks still look beat up and slow. if anyone looking to leave here lives around central jersey try giving centerline drviers inc in new brunswick a call and ask about there GAF account. youll gross 900-1400 a week drive a daycab freightliner 71 mph. decent trucks. if your there long enough and prove your worth youll get your own truck. new guys tend to slip seat. hours are basically 4am to 4pm some days earlier somedays maybe a hour later. spring and summer have plenty of overtime. i worked 24 hours overtime this week and could have worked more if i wanted to. ive been there for 3 years. cush job. all flatbed loads hauling roofing supplies. heavy loads. 78k everyday.(sucky) yard is in bridgwater nj. all local off weekends. o/t after 8. 18.00 to start. 19.00 if you pull a asphualt tanker. we do all nj some pa all nyc and boroughs some ct de and maryland. usually 2 loads a day. for an example of work load tommorw i go in at 3.00 am secure my load leave yard at 3.20 deliver at home depot distrubution in swedesboro nj. at 5.15 get unloaded by 6-7 deadhead down to balitmore terminal/plant. p/u load.(preloaded) weight load shoot back up to home depot in south brunswick in dayton. deliver around 12-2. get fuel if i need it. go back to yard. do paper work go home. if i wanted a few more hours there would be something to do. I.E tarp loads, shuttles, run some equipment to penske....... cake work

 

I started workng there a few weeks ago. I'm an owner operator for eastern, and I have been driving or 24 years. I think I have been around the block. How can you bad mouth a company you never worked for, or drove the trucks or anything. I first started driving for Hmieleski back in the day. Crappy brockway trucks and equipment,but job was great and so was the money. The people at eastern are nice, and they keep me running and thats what it's all about to me. SHOW ME THE MONEY!!!!! So don' t judge a BOOK by its cover

 

You definately do not want to work for this company. The LIE they start you out at .38 cents then take away .01, then you sit A LOT, you'll be luck to get 1500 miles in a week. The equipment is AWFUL, the dispatch does not know how to plan trips. If you ever want to get home it is a fight. To top it all off the dispatch supervisors (Tom, Brian) do not care about their drivers, they are the worst!!!!, Nemf terminals hate Eastern drivers and treat you accordingly,What a waste of part of my life! Good luck if you decide to work there, you will have no life except for Eastern.

 

I talked to Mitch Bookbinder. Are they better than CR England my former employer? Can I get into NEMF with 7months CR england experience?

 

For anyone considering this company unless your truly desperate I would recommend looking elsewhere. First off Rhymtime is 100% correct on all. I'll give you a breakdown of my little over 4yrs there. I was told New equipment, 2300 average miles weekly. Was also told I'd be home every weekend as we believe in family's and being home with them. Guess what you start out with a freightliner 1998-99 model in orientation they say we should have the newer models in about 3 mths. Guess what they have 2006 and newer sitting in different yards plastic on the seats untouched, its all for tax purposes. Now thats what I went through 4yrs ago and had to wait til i got a 2005 volvo and those are automatics waited 14mths before I got one. Now they do have their elite few drivers that they take care of. The first year was pretty good I got close to 2300 miles but not there but was treated good , made 56600 that year. The following year and each year got progressively worst making alittle over 3000 less than the previous year, they did last year a 5% pay cut and a pay raise freeze.
I've noticed this past year very and I mean very poor treatment of drivers you have dispatchers (which I could name names but won't) that when a driver has a problem they say and I quote "thats the life of a driver you signed up for it". I use to volunteer every other w/e during my first year use to get good southern runs, then the following year noticed it was w/e runs with 600 miles or less and was told we don't do Florida anymore as we can get you down there but not back up. Now the following week talked to a new driver who just so happened to come up from florida. I believe it was because of my pay rate why the stopped giving me good miles. I was terminated late this year of 2010 and seen maybe a total of 8 southern runs this year, and made less than 40,000 at .435/mile I was let go because I had to come to a sudden stop and the load shifted and caused damage to the front of the trailer I'd estimate about 100-300.00 but they repair all their own equipment. When I went back to the shipper they admitted that the load I had they normally use flatbeds for so they can strap them to the sides of the floors. They did not tell me about this til after the incident, as if they did I would of told the dispatchers before taking the load, but everything to me looked properly secured when I looked. They said there was no flatbeds in the area, so eastern took the load and took the gamble and I paid for it, as the new general manager Tony Campo didn't really want to hear anything I had to say and I'm sure wanted to make an example of me and I could tell just by his look what he had planned. This is the same guy that started about 3 weeks prior to coming in the drivers area asking the drivers what they feel need improved and I wasn't shy on telling him. He basically let me go saying it was my fault and should of known the load is secure or not, and I told him by van trlr types it was, metal bands around the load to pallets, but I didn't know the load was flatbed type til after the fact from the shipper and I'm sure Eastern knew it was a flatbed type. They have been currently I found out from a few company's I've contacted that the safety dept. (which is Gary Stover who is quite a gem in itself) is saying I was in an accident which I wasn't no vehicles in question, no officers involved, nothing on dmv, it was considered an incident at most but they're saying accident for their own insurance kickback. I'm not the first as I have heard of this same dirty tactic in keeping people that was employed with them from getting employed. I find it shameful that a company that I gave 4yrs of my time made them quite abit of money never called off sick once would treat someone of excellent work ethic this way. But this is Easterns way of treating drivers.
This company treats its drivers like robots, I've been noticing this quite drastically this year, they use the economy as an excuse for everything for the past 2yrs. They have a pay raise freeze for 2yrs now, This Tony Campo is saying to everyone they're working on a .02/mile increase, which is a bulls... tactic just to make the new drivers stick around for false hopes. The company use to be open on Saturdays 3yrs ago, this helped the drivers who had to work on w/e a great deal. But that changed to now they're close at midnight friday. So if your stuck working on the weekends your pretty much screwed in getting to someone if an emergency is needed. The company treats all people that work in the office dispatchers, mgmt. all like gold as if they're the backbone of the company they get personnal time off no problems, weekends off no problems, but the real backbone of the company the drivers you got to go through alot of nonsence to get weekends off anymore, personal time off, better be a good one. One good thing to remember with this company they will try and figure every way under the sun to blame the drivers as they will never take blame for anything, they're like 3 year olds.
Now as of this year, they blame the economy of course I call it poor sales and marketing, majority of drivers especially new ones are averageing less than 1100 miles a week and when I say week mon-saturday (sat morn to afternoon).
I've talked to alot of new drivers 3 of which I've taken home that either quit because they weren't making money to survive on or were let go for reasons I'm unsure of. I was averaging this year about 1800 miles and was going out from late sunday evenings to and coming in late saturdays, I've been forced to work a good deal this year on the weekends. I've had major breakdowns about 5 times this year, and this is a 2006 volvo. Their eqipment does suck your lucky if it gets pm'd twice a month. Now their mechanic is great at the yard and isn't his fault as he's got alot on his plate, but one big problems is the other mechanics at the nemf yard, all of them make it a point to hate Eastern they don't want to work on the trucks, the nemf at Irwin pa believe that eastern drivers are scabs, guess they don't know the definition of what a scab is. The head mechanic at Elizabeth n.j. makes it a point to actually say he hates eastern drivers. The owner of the whole outfit Shevell himself should really open his eyes and take a look at both his company's, but all he's worried about is having his driver parade him around the elizabeth yard and wave to people like he's the pope. He supposedly has an open door policy, ...lol good luck on that one.
To some it up, if your liscense is a mess, go to Eastern, put up with the nonsense if you want don't expect to make alot of money unless your the chosen few elite drivers those thats been there 8+yrs and a few of the that kiss up to the dispatchers. Otherwise try to stick it out for a year to show stability and use them as they will definately use you and mess with you once you leave, they have no loyalty at the present management for their drivers, they don't care.
Here's an actual acct. that happen to me in regards to the chosen elite drivers that will stick up for this company of course because they get the world handed to them on a silver platter but ask anyone thats been there right now between 6mths to 4yrs to get the real lowdown.
(about 3yrs ago I was offered a dedicated position to the linehaul run from irwin pa to chicago ill 3 times a week now that would be alittle over 3000 miles it would be me and this other driver (aka one of their chosen) but the down fall they said I would have to take a .035/mile cut in pay and couldn't take my truck home so I'd have to use my personal vehicle to irwin when I start the run during the week.
I did the figures and I'd still be making good money so I took it. My mistake and more lies as I found out 2 weeks into it that I was only getting twice per week instead of three times, so this greatly deminished what I would of been making, and I found out from the other driver that he was getting 3 times per week, he got to drive his truck home and he didn't have to take a pay cut. So I demanded my pay back and went back to regional they tried to tell me that they said twice a week I said no you didn't as I wouldn't of taken the position if that was the case.
All I can say is good luck with this place and I feel for you, if you work for them.

 

I just dont understand WHY these trucking companys have to treat their drivers like they do?

 

...lol you have to be one of the office personnel at Eastern and no nothing about the life of a trucker and are only concerned about clocking in your 8-10hr day shift since you failed to see the point this guy was making!

 

Well jlkklj777 says in past and to this point making over 120,000 as a team, so split over 60k a year and in this so called bad economy Eastern loves to use as an excuse. Guess him and his wife is part of the few chosen elite that eastern takes care of. He doesn't have a bad word to say about eastern as they are taking very well care of him for some reason as part of the elitist driver club they have there. As I said in an earlier post I got screwed over there on a dedicated run for one of easterns chosen few. He doesn't know the reality of whats going on there
as he's never experienced it. Even if he got a pay cut he still averages hisself as he says 1300-1400 a week, which means he's getting consistant miles which if your not working under someones desk or been there more than 8 yrs you cannot expect to be getting better miles consistently than around 1500-1800 miles a week. This guy and his wife by hearing Ga quite often probably a dedicated run as a majority of the elite have is probably seeing close to if not over 5000 miles a week, and if its dedicated I'm willing to bet home every weekend with little problem. Now I have talked to many of the people thats been there for some years and even more of the newer drivers that come in, you learn alot of how great this company is, not, in its treatment of drivers. As I said in earlier posts I have driven 3 new drivers home that left eastern that lived in my area. All had the same to say, hated the company, no miles, cannot survive on the pay and lies upon lies told to them. As well as I had been told numerous lies from this same company. I do give my appreciation to the company for the job given to me and as I said the company was great 4 yrs ago, but 2006-2007 except for the equipment which still hasn't improved. But 2008 declined, 2009 2 times worst, and 2010 my god everything about the place is horrible I'd say 10 times worst. If you think the dispatchers and managers are so nice, just remember a fox smiles at the hens, just before he's about to eat them!!. They'll smile to you as they're putting the knife behind your back. And they cannot take responsibility for anything everything is the drivers fault in their eyes. Anyone that says the company is great believe me is very well taken care of by the company if they're drivers and those are a chosen few, or they are office personnel just trying to lure desperate drivers in. You don't have to believe me go ahead try them out but make sure you got some money put aside and a backup plan, if it doesn't workout, and watchout they will lie when you put them down as past employment, right now I'm going through that as I found out from a few company's that safety which we all know who that is, the runt is saying that I was in an accident and thats an all out lie, so now I have to check into legal matters on this. I even heard from drivers who had friends that worked for the company that left that were lied about on their application to other places from eastern. This is the payment I got for over 4yrs of loyal service, never called off sick, good work ethic which is how I was raised as I've worked from age 11 to in my 40's. This company has no loyalty, no integrity or honesty, except to a few drivers and to all their office personnel. Matter of fact their turnover rate speaks for itself. They have really gone way downhill since 2006-2007 and getting worst by the month, its not the economy its the dispatchers, coordinaters, managers and marketing. They can't get the freight, what they do get the better runs go to the chosen, they can't coordinate runs worth squat, out of the 10yrs I've been driving they're the worst coordination of runs I've seen.

 

I don't know about alot of company's but this one many have a large
ego and they feel they can, they're never wrong only you the driver.

 

I WORKED THIS OUTFIT IN 1969 AND SUCKED THEN ONLY GOOD THING THEY HAD TO JOIN UNION. THE SHEVELL'S SUCK BIG TIME THEY ARE THE DIRTIEST EMPLOYERS EVER TO BE IN BUSSINESS. tHEY HAD A FEW MOB GUYS IN CARLSTADT NJ. WHO ENDED UP INJAIL WHEN COMPANY FOLDED. MAYBE YOU DON'T KNOW ABOUT YOUR BOSSES NOSE CANDY PROBLEM WELL THATS WERE YOUR RAISES ARE GOING IN HIS NOSE. BELIEVE IT BABY i GOT NO REASON TO LIE, I'M RETIRED AND GETTIN MY UNION PENSION $3K A MONTH SEE IF HE PAYS YOU THAT. GOODLUCK !