Going for a road test at UPS, any advice?

So I took a day off last Thursday (which really sucks because I lose a lot of overtime anytime I take a day off during the week) and went to take my road test. Showed up 20 minutes early, check in at the guard shack they direct me to HR.

Walk into HR and don’t see anyone, poke my head into a few offices and find a gentleman with his back turned to me eating a sandwich. I clear my throat which startles him, and he asks if he could help me.

I tell him I am here for a road test and he says ok give me a minute and I’ll see what I can do. After about 5 minutes to finish his sandwich he comes in and asks me who I am supposed to talk to? I tell him I have no idea all I know is I am scheduled for a road test at 2pm.

After looking at a phone list for a really long time he starts dialing numbers, after a minute or two he states that this phone isn’t working and “how nice” He then tries the other phone and gets a hold of someone, he explains that I am there for a road test and the must say send him to somewhere else, to that he replies “I don’t know where that is?”

After some more conversation with the person on the phone he turns to me and asks me if I have my medical card.

I have to tell him no because I never bothered to shrink my last one down, laminate it and keep it in my wallet. i just keep it in my work clipboard in my work truck. I haven’t been asked for it in at least 4 years and I just had a full inspection 2 weeks ago and they never mentioned it.

He explains to me that I have to reschedule. I leave pissed off mostly at myself for not remembering it but also at UPS for not reminding me to bring it as the sent me an email reminder about the appointment that said to make sure you bring your license.

At first I thought the heck with this but after some more consideration I decided to go ahead and reschedule. So I take another day off, (did I mention it’s my busy season and I am really not making my current boss happy taking days off during the week 2 weeks in a row) and go back Wednesday to try again.

Show up 20 minutes early again and head to HR where I find absolutely no one. Sit down waiting for someone to show. 15 minutes later, it’s now 2pm and it’s my appointment time still no one around. I stand outside HR and ask some people walking past if they know where the HR people are? They are shaking there heads and finally a lady walks up and asks what’s going on.

I explain my situation to her and she says let me see. She walks into HR and looks around for someone, then gets on the phone with someone and tells me they are sending someone down to get me. Finally I am getting somewhere.

I patiently wait over half an hour and nothing, it’s well past 2:30 and I was ready to roll out. I walked out the door, then decided to go back and look at the phone to see if I could figure out who the nice lady called.

As I am trying to figure out how to work the phone a younger gentleman walked in and asked me about a road test. At 1st I thought he was also there for a road test but then I realized he had UPS uniform on. He thought I worked there as I was sitting at the desk staring at the phone.

Once we figured out we where looking for each other he explained that he was waiting for me out in the yard and that someone was supposed to walk me out there.

So I finally did the road test, young guy was real nice, said I did great. I figured they would grade me on my pre trip, but he didn’t care about that at all. I was a little rusty shifting as I haven’t driven a manual in over 2 years. Plus he said I had to double clutch which I never learned to do. I was taught to float gears and that’s what I have always done.

Between being rusty, trying to double clutch, and the clutch being a little grabby I had some really rookie take offs. But it didn’t seem to phase him. He said recruiting has been sending him drivers straight out of school, said he had to stop a road test the week before because the applicant couldn’t shift worth a dang.

Unfortunately they couldn’t answer all my questions about the job, specifically whether or not I could transfer to a closer facility, and how much my pension would be after 25 years.

I am continuing the application process even though I am still not sure this is the job for me. I still need to do some comparisons between my current job and the feeder position. I will outline the differences tomorrow in another post.

Thanks for reading!

 

Ok, stupid question.
Does UPS pay for the normal holidays such as New Years, Memorial Day, 4th of July, Labor Day, Thanksgiving and Christmas?

I just assumed that they did, but when I was researching Walmart I found out that they do not. So I would rather not assume.

Also how does one go about getting a hold of a Union Representative, are they allowed to talk to you before you actually join the Union?

Those recruiters are really hounding me, my next step is to go for the drug test and medical exam. Hopefully I can find one that can take me on a Saturday as I really don’t want to take a day off.

Thanks for all the replies so far.