Good company for husband and wife team?

I keep hearing good things about Interstate. Seriously thinking about them instead of CRST. But do they have a school or pay for your school upfront with a committment?

 

Yeah.. they sponsor a school in Tucumcari, NM. Basically IDC prehires you and sends you to the school. They will pay upfront for your way there, your tuition, your motel room ( no room sharing!), travel to Tacoma, WA for orientation and local training. Local training is usually about 4 days and is done either there or in Troutdale, OR near Portland. While going through that, your room is paid, some meals if in Tacoma, and then paid travel to get your truck. You are paid for orientation, then paid a weekly amount while with your trainer. Once you are in your own truck, you begin paying them back.. I am currently paying $50 a week.. should take about a year to pay them back.. and if you stay past that, you get your money back! I started with them in May and love it!

 

From my experience with CRST I would definitely advise you to choose Interstate. I would steer clear of CRST completely. I wish I had.

 

Keep in Mind:

With Interstate you better enjoy CHAINING up (putting chains or cables on your tires in the cold/blowing weather in most cases you aren't paid to stand out there and chain up) (it's not as easy as it looks either).. in inclement weather, they will expect you to continue to drive regardless if you aren't comfortable and want to wait out till the roads are better...

 

I didn't know there were companies out there who actually DID pay you to chain up. With IDC you are required to chain up when the chain laws are in affect. It's usually the supertruckers that refuse to chain up that cause the accidents that will slow you down more than the actual act of chaining. Already this year on Vale, 2 trucks that refused to chain up slid into each other and caused traffic to stop. They were charged $2000, I think it was, and all the trucks behind them that were stopped in the traffic without chains were charged $500. My first thought was GOOD! When I get in this truck, my number one priority is to keep my husband safe and sound while I am driving, my 2nd priority is to keep YOU safe as well. There aren't enough fines in the world that can replace a life. Last year, we actually only ended up having to chain up 2 times... but even if it were 20.. so be it. We also run with the concept that you should chain to get OUT of trouble.. not to get INTO trouble. We use this handy dandy computer and internet connection to check the conditions of the passes on the Road
cams and make our decisions based on that. If its bad, we find a better route. Haven't gotten fired yet for a few out of route miles in the sake of safety. I mean, we are talking about a company who will deadhead us 250 miles to get us home.. I don't think they have HUGE issues about going 50- 60 miles further through Salt Lake City, rather than Vale.

 

We checked out Interstate a couple of days ago, we like the company and have seen them running all over the country which is what we like to do, however when we talked to them a couple of things came up that we did not like that much.

One was the auto transmissions another was that we would not get one of the Volvos (they are leased or something like that) it would be a columbia - we dont mind columbias but after teaming for a couples of years in one, they make good solo trucs but teaming was to tight for us (we like to stay out for 6weeks or so and hence we have probably more stuff han most..~S~).

The main thing we dont like is that if we take the truck home it can be only for 6 days max. any longer then we would have to take the truck to a yard in Tennessee !! bear in mind we live in Jacksonville Florida !! and find our own way back home....not a very good senario for us. I know 6 days at home is a long tme but my fiance has a young daugher that he needs to see and if he is not home over a weekend then he misses out...we can not risk that.

That being said it appears to be a good company.

 

Suprised to see Interstate hiring in Florida. I spoke to them back in July and they said they don't hire much out of Florida because they cant get people home each month. Be careful this is a tough place to get home especially if someone has a little one they have to come home to reguraly. Other then that I have heard their a great company to work for. Good Luck!

 

Thanks for that info....they did not tell us that, they gave us the impression that we would be able to get home fairly easily....hmmmmm. Thanks once again.

 

Opinions are something everyone has and autoshifters cause a lot of controversy, but I love the automatics. We are currently training in a Volvo and while I admit I would love to have one as opposed to the Freightshaker.... The Freightshakers are not bad either.

As for the freight... I live in FL and have talked to several other drivers from FL who all get home when needed. IDC is careful not to hire too many drivers from FL just for that reason. We needed a special waiver to get hired right out of school, but what can I say... IDC loves its husband and wife teams.

With the vacation thing.... they wont fly you to Jacksonville for a week or two. While the 6 day thing is the general rule, when you live so far from the terminal, they will let you take your truck home. Now if your talking more then 2 weeks.... well I can honestly say but we live near Daytona Beach and have been assured that we will be allowed to take our truck home for our vacations/breaks as long as the breaks are not excessive due to the distance involved. Lets face it.... they need the trucks to run to pay for them.. very few companies will let you keep the truck at home for extended periods of time.

 

What kind of miles do teams average with Interstate Dist.??