Hogan Transport (St. Louis, MO) is a BAD COMPANY!!

Just a word of advice from someone who has worked there....AVOID THEM!! For those wanting some reading material, see my story below...

I got my CDL in Jan 2015 after graduating from Roadmaster Driving School. For those that don't know, they provide job placement and make you fill out at least 3 quick applications. What they also do is bring in recruiters from several different trucking companies to come in and get student drivers signed up fresh out of trucking school. One of those companies was Hogan Transport. I chose them over the others for several reasons. For one, the location was ideal. They were the closest to where I live (literally around the corner which made it convenient), at the time Target was EXTREMELY popular and they had an account witht them, Kim Kettering (recruiter) sold me with a ton of promises, and frankly, I just like the color blue.

So I get hired on the day after I get my CDL and I couldn't be happier. The thought of FINALLY making all this money and everything I'd been told. I was excited, anxious, but quite nervous, too, seeing how I was a total newbie. After a 2-day orientation, I get on the Target account and was told I'll be riding along for one month with someone who would train me. Cool. And that's when it all went downhill.

For one, they had SO many drivers quitting they couldn't even find anyone on the Target account to train me. So they made me drive 20 mins (each way), 6 days @ week to Groveport, Ohio and put me on the Kroger account. Not the end of the world, but it was definitely discouraging. Once I get there, I find out it's 100% touch freight. They are responsible for taking trailers of bread from Spartan Logistics and delivering them to the Kroger stores. I didn't know any better so I foolishly go along with it. I'm now unloading stacks of bread at 8 Kroger stores daily for an entire month. I FINALLY get my 1st paycheck from them only to see the amount is like half of what I expected! So I talk to my supervisor about it. He's like "she never told you about training pay?" Nope! She conveniently FORGOT to throw in that little detail. Not that I was getting rich off 37cpm as promised...but to find out I only made $500?? And if that's not bad enough, during my phone conversation, they claim I shouldn't have been unloading the bread anyways. Huh?? He's like "nobody told you that either?" What am I supposed to do? Sit there for an entire month in the passenger seat while some 60 yr old veteran struggles unloading an entire trailer himself? It would only make the 10-hour day LONGER for the both of us. I did what I was told. I believed what I was told.

After a month, I did get moved over to the Target account finally. I learned a lot, gaining experience as a driver, and the trucking industry as a whole over the course of a year with them. Even when I wasn't working, I was watching YouTube videos and asking questions from other drivers. The turnover rate at Hogan continued. The trainer (whom I kept in touch with) quit, then the overnight dispatcher quit, team drivers would walk in the office complaining, then quit. I put up with a lot of BS. Everything from "so what do you want me to do about it?" when something on the truck I noticed was broke....to them CONSTANTLY slip seating me. I can't tell you how many times I switched trucks (yes, regional runs, too). One of the strangest things to this day happened when they called asking me to lease my own truck (I wish I was kidding). They have a truck leasing office inside their terminal here in Columbus, OH (to try and compete with Penske next door). They had drivers slip seating all over the place and when it came time for my run that day, they did not have a truck for me...and they KNEW that I lived around the corner...so why not ask me to rent a truck? They would pay for it and I would then use that for the rest of the week. Remember, I'm not getting paid for ANY of this. I get there and they have only one employee (female) so I'm stuck waiting until everyone else is helped. When she finally is able to help me, I fill out all the paperwork, and we walk to the truck. It's littered with garbage inside. Apparently, whomever was in charge failed to check the truck back in properly. So there she is in a dress crawling all over the cab and immediately exits in disgust, then the door handle falls off. Yeah, she immediately put me in a different truck completely embarrassed.

I stuck it out for exactly one year at Hogan...right down the very day, actually. Earlier in the fall, my fiance and I began to make vacation plans. We decided to take our very first cruise. We'd been together 10 years so we figured let's celebrate and get out of town for a week. Hogan Transport tried ruining that, too.

With so much money to be made during the holidays, we made the decision to wait and take our vacation AFTER the first of the year and just go when things quiet down sometime in January. Even though I would be eligible then for one-week paid vacation (after having been with the company one year), I wasn't planning on using any of it for this trip, but rather use that up at some point much later in the year.

I ask for a vacation request form all the way back in September of 2015. I wanted to do things by the book and schedule it out well ahead of time. I'm told it's too early. I was asked to wait until closer to my vacation. They also said it's no big deal. It will get approved. We get to November 2015, I ask for a vacation request form. I'm told they are out of them right now. Fill one out closer to my vacation. Again, it's blown off like I'm bugging them about the dumbest thing. December 2015 comes. I ask for a vacation request form. I'm told NOBODY CAN ASK FOR TIME OFF DURING PEAK HOLIDAY SEASON. You're kidding me, right? That was the answer I was given. I was told to wait until after the holidays are over to submit any time off.

All I was trying to do is take ONE WEEK off after having been used and abused for a whole year. As with everything else, I did what I was told...and I got screwed by them in the process. So what happened? January rolls around and I submit a vacation request form. At this point, I'd had enough. We waited so long to book everything that it costs us much more for our trip than it would have originally. We were to fly to Miami on January 10th. I waited for 10 days. During this time I continued to work. Each day I would come in the office and look over to see my vacation request form just sitting there. It never did get approved. I never heard back from ANYONE about it.

So what did I do? I went on vacation! It was by far the best vacation we've ever taken...and to think Hogan Transport tried ruining it for us. I made a special trip that weekend to let them know I quit and turned in my key card. Even though I wasn't assigned on any runs, they still were butt hurt about it and listed me in their system as NOT ELIGIBLE FOR RE-HIRE.

Kim Kettering, recruiter for Hogan Transport (Columbus, Ohio) is a horrible, rude, and nasty person. Not only was she dishonest, she flat out doesn't care! I found this out first-hand. There's a reason they post SO many Craigslist ads on a daily basis! You've been WARNED!!

If anyone has any questions, feel free to ask me below.

 

Yes, also my internet here is rather slow.

Just kidding of course. Well, TBH I've been busy making good money. Spent the last couple of years gaining some experience and getting the confidence up to apply for better jobs and weed through the BS. Now making .75cpm and get decent home time. Couldn't be happier.