How do you make more money as an O/O than as a company driver?

I agree to disagree!

 

That's not a lot of revenue. How long did you drive for them and how many miles was that?

 

This is not really true.

Lets use round numbers to make it easy.

As a company driver with a wife and 2-3 kids you pay for family health, dental, Rx, eye insurances lets say $100 per week. That is $5,200 a year.

If you are an owner operator you are really a small business owner and you can show that you business provides its employees with not cost insurance. So the business absorbs the cost. Your company can often find cheap insurance thru the state trucking assoc., state small business agency, chamber of commerce, some companies offer it o/o, etc..

 

It;s not always how much more you make,but how much you can keep!

 

truer words were never spoken

 

when i went o/o w/ auth. i made less then when i was a co. driver. the upside for me was more hometime and being able to pick my loads and destinations.

 

Don't get caught up in the "I made $ XXX,XXX last year!" BS. As others have said it is how much you net at the end of a year. I have seen drivers gross over $300K+ and net only $37K. Gross is a number used to fool you into signing up. I believe an old Stevens Transport leasing ad showed the top driver grossing hundreds of thousands of dollars, doesn't mean squat, it's what you keep.

If you do not know how to run a business, don't do it.

 

I'm on my phone now, so I'll respond more to some other posts when I get home (good stuff, btw!).

Just a note on insurance costs... I just bought health ins through my work (no dental/vision) for myself, wife, and kids, for just under $900. Soooo, I'm paying closer to $10,500 per year. Without vision/dental.

Leadfoot

 

Not really a point. Many truck companies do not even pay for the drivers insurance either.

 

Exactly. And a lot of their insurance will only cover bandaids and aspirin.

Lucky for me, I have pretty decent insurance available through my wife's job.