Idle Air

The last i knew, the truckstops still own the entire lot and they do not condone Idle air kicking out non users. Any truck stop with a opened Idle air, thier non Idle air spots fill up faster than anything. And i'm not about to stay awake my entire break waiting for a non Idle Air spot to open up.
Untill they post, Idle Air Customer parking only, i will park there, if it's the only option.
I will also get on the radio and ask Idle air if they have any non operating spots i can park in, and chances are there is one or two, they don't mind letting me park in.

 

Or Jessee Jacksons suv....

 

Northstar and Blackw900, My apologies for taking so long to get back to you - unfortunately Jessie J. and I weren't invited to attend the fun party BlackW was at, and so had to look for other stuff to do during Labor Day. Hope you had good holidays.

I am eager to answer you both and I think you've got great points - most of which I agree with. Northstar says he doesn't need Idleair (we are dropping the dumb "e" soon) since he has laptop/cell/dish and an APU. If you have all that stuff, the only reason you'd use Idleair is if the APU wasn't working - why pay $1.99 when you can spend less than a $1/hour on APU diesel? On the other hand, Idleair is more likely to be quieter and there are less fumes than even an APU generates. If y ou don't have an APU - I'm not sure why you think it's better for the fleet to pay for the driver's idling. We believe that idling costs $4/hour ($3/hour for fuel # 1 gallon/hour and $1/hour of wear and tear on the engine). If you fleet is paying for idling or idleair, I would point out that breathing fumes - including the ones you can't smell like Carbon monoxide has it's own price on your health and that alone is the reason you should want the fleet to pay for it even if it were break-even instead of a savings.

I 100% agree that if there are no empty spots on a site, Idleair should not hog the available locations ever, but you can see in your two posts the dilemna Idleair has since paying users don't want neighbors idling and tired drivers don't deserve to get bounced around. For the time being, we have shrunk the # of active spaces by about 1/3 on all reactivated sites (TA doesn't want us on their sites at all so we will be back only no a few TA Franchisee sites like in Knoxville for the time being) so there is more parking freed up and in the future we are going to build spaces on the perimeter of parking lots instead of straight down the middle so that we don't waste good parking for non-users (and so users can enjoy the quiet and reduced fumes better).

As for BlackW's concern that for a few $ more you can get a motel and a shower in peace and quiet - I totally agree and you should do that if you can afford it or if you have time. We are $15 - 20/nite and I'd rather stay in a motel too - unless you want to stay with your rig or are in a rush. Also, if the temperature isn't hot or cold, why do either? save your money and just park and sleep.

We (Convoy) want to keep the price as low as possible and over time we hope to shrink it as we achieve financial health and an improved cost structure - we would love to offer "ala cart" pricing where you don't pay for HVAC if you don't need it. Historically, Idleair used to vary their price to be 70% of national Diesel prices. We (the new owners) don't want to do that - we aren't here to pick off drivers just because oil prices go up (unless our costs go up a lot, which they aren't at this time). We are offering an initial startup promotion to bring folks back (in addition to honoring the old company's member card credits - over $1mm of those alone.

During the Fall and Spring, when you shouldn't need AC or heating, we will emphasize pre-paid bulk discounts and improved DirecTV offerings, still, if you can save $1.99/hour - don't use it. If we can get the average price down via discounts and add NFL/Nascar perhaps that will still be attractive to many. If you've already got a battery APU, then your plug should be plenty and we will eventually charge just for the electric. We aren't ready for that yet though - we have our hand's full just relaunching sites by rehiring folks and cleaning all the hoses, etc.

Every active site now has an ozone-generator for cleaning smoke and other smells out of hoses - we are getting close to zero smoke-smell complaints these days. Starting in the Fall we will be able to offer all members a 25% discount on all Shark products (handvacs, steam mops, etc) since they are one of our new alliance partners.

We know we can't please everyone, and Idleair has had no shortage of financial failures in its past which we don't plan on repeating. ConvoySolutions wants to offer good value to drivers and help them protect their health and the environment and reduced petroleum imports while getting former IA employees back to work. If you are against those things, no problem - it's a free country. Hope to see you on the road and please continue the suggestions - though I'll take a pass on the Klan rally.

 

I would not even use this if for free.

One time hookup and the truck smelled of cigarettes. Once was enough.

 

I'm cutting my card in half tonight...You just convinced me to never use the service again!

 

Got a tough crowd here! Roadmedic, sorry you had that smoke smell experience. It was certainly a real problem in the past. We have now installed ozone-generator hose cleaning machines that are getting very favorable review (ie no complaints). If you ever want to contact Idleaire customer service and tell them we exchanged messages I will get you a $10 service credit to try the service again (if you need an adapater, they also come with a $10 service credit).

Appreciate your feedback.

h

 

With my allergy to it, I will not ever consider it again.

 

It depends on how much time you plan on spending at a truck stop.For me, it seemed like i was not close to a truck stop with idleair when i needed it. there are only a few locations starting back up. but its up to you.