Empty & Loaded Miles Paid

So here's the scenario:

I am an OTR driver and get paid empty and loaded miles the same.

Recently, I was due some planned and approved hometime and offloaded early in the morning. There is a dispatcher for the company but the owner does some dispatching at times. The owner called me while I was being offloaded and told me to wait for another load home. I spoke to the dispatcher later and asked to be compensated for the extra time waiting. I overheard the owner throwing a fit in the background and firing me in so many words.

The previous week I had spent approximately 18 hours in detention on only 2 loads. The owner claims that he was not paid any detention for either load but he paid me "out of pocket". I don't know exactly how much I got paid for detention [which is a long story].

So there I was waiting again, but this time at the request of my company. So was I within my rights to ask for compensation to wait several hours for a load?

 

There is no handbook. It's a small company. Basically any time something like this comes up the owner just complains about how the drivers make more money than he does and that if he pays whatever is being asked then he might as well close his doors, blah-blah-blah.

I finally put in my year with a single company and I am interested in driving for someone else but I'm not too excited about filling out apps and running the gamut of crappy, rip-off, lying companies out there. Especially since my hometown is El Paso. I don't know which is worse, Chicago or El Paso...

 

Fair enough.

I don't have a contract with the company and we don't usually wait for loads. I have come home empty from the same city almost every time I've ended there.

I had no problem waiting, however it seems fair to ask for something for my time- instead of deadheading home like normal and being home by late afternoon, I waited 3 hours to get the load, another 2 hours to bobtail to the pickup and get loaded, then drove to the yard, drove home for the night, then got up the next morning to deliver the load which took another 3 hours. So I'm all in for 8 more hours on duty and another day of getting up and waiting at a dock for the same pay as the empty miles would have paid me.

It would not have killed the owner to throw $50 my way.

And the problem is not that the owner said "no", rather his first reaction was to fire me just for asking.

If I wanted to care about the "cost of running a truck" then I would be an O/O.

 

If I wanted to be treated like meat in a seat, then I would sign on with a mega.

Small companies where you talk directly to the owner about loads and truck issues should be different than megas and "most companies".

There's no way I'm waiting 10 hours to get dispatched at any company. If I'm away from home then I'm driving unless I want to be sitting and taking a break.

 

We'll have to agree to disagree. The work I do pays my bills not an inanimate object and all that is by the grace of God alone, not any human being. If it wasn't in that truck, it would be in another one. That's the point of being a company driver. It's not a "mentality" rather it is a fact.

As for "taking pride in my ride", then I have paid out of pocket for that truck as well, without being asked to. It's presumptuous of you to think that my acknowledgement of an owner's responsibilities versus an employees means I'm apathetic about the condition or operation of the equipment.

Maintenance, plates, insurance, IFTA, permits, repairs, fuel etc are all the owner's responsibility, not the employee's. If that's too much for any particular owner, then they are the ones who should reconsider being owners. Just because an employee knows it's not their responsibility or concern, doesn't mean they should reconsider being an employee.

The reason why I started this thread is to find out what other perspectives there are on whether a driver should be compensated for his/her time when ordered to wait several hours for a load that does not yet exist. I believe it is a different situation when there is a load and there is a schedule for pickup and/or delivery at a later time. It is also different when a driver is in the middle of their time out on the road and there is time between loads.

However, every person must decide for his/herself if they are sitting too much in the course of their time on the road. Just like an owner must decide for his/herself if a driver is taking too much time off in between time out on the road.

So, yes. If it becomes a regular occurrence, that I'm being booked loads that brought me close to home but then I'm being forced to sit and wait several hours each time for a load home without pay, then I must decide if I want to work for that company and if things could be better in that respect elsewhere.

That's why I asked here. I'm sure other drivers have similar or different expectations in that regard and I would like to know- are you fine with waiting several hours to pick up a load that doesn't exist when within a normal amount of empty miles from home at the end of your time out on the road? Would you ask for compensation?

Filling out an application is not a problem, but it is a waste of time if the recruiter or owner lies about expectations and numbers. And lying about those things is the rule and not the exception in my experience. So in that case, yes, spending any of my time filling out applications due to an interest in a company based on total lies is a deterrent for me to look for something else.

We keep talking about how bad things are in the trucking industry and one of those things is how little the driver's time is valued whether at a dock or truckstop. If we don't start to value our time then why should carriers, brokers, shippers or receivers do so? If we don't stop falling for the same lies told by hiring carriers, then why should they stop lying to applicants?