Indian River

I know this subject will end up being discussed, so here are my thoughts on the email we received and the new pay structure:

In my opinion, the only thing that will be noticeable is the CPM for empty miles. So, I went back and looked at each paystub starting at the beginning of 2025 to see how many empty miles were on each check. Keep in mind, a few of these checks had carry over loads / deadheads due to our pay cycles ending at midnight on Monday. So, the numbers can be misleading on how many miles I actually ran around empty in a particular pay cycle. Regardless, here are the empty only miles per pay period starting from the beginning of 2025. Loaded miles per pay period are not included in this list.

5/2 - 142
4-25 - 1114
4-18 - 974
4-11 - 1400
4/4 - 1303
3/28 - 1212
3/21 - 1624
3/14 - 1423
3/7 - 615
2/28 - 1109
2/21 - 243
2/14 - 1657
2/7 - 199
1/31 - 623
1/24 - 301
1/17 - 1091
1/10 -1500
1/3 - N/A (had been off for the holidays)

Total empty miles so far this year 16,530

For me, the difference will be .6 CPM, because I was currently earning .61 CPM due to my length of service having me in the higher bracket. For most, the difference will only be .5 CPM.

16,530 miles X .06 CPM = $991.80

Right now, we are four months into the year. So, to get an idea of how much this will affect me on an annual basis, I multiply by three. (4 months X 3 = 1 year)

$991.80 X 3 = $2,975.40

Breakdown pay and layover pay is and has always been completely irrelevant to me. I just don’t experience either one of those things enough to even care about it. I appreciate that IRT has and still pays for both, but I just don’t have shop visits enough for it to impact me. We’re talking three days in a company reimbursed hotel once every 18 months on average. Detention pay is in the same category for me. I can’t even remember the last time I had detention. I never ask for it or write it up either. I usually drop and hook or get in and out of customers quick enough for it to be irrelevant as well.

The vacation pay will be a $2,000 per year loss for me with the bracket I’m in. So, between the vacation and the empty CPM change, the impact will be approximately $5,000 per year according to my math. That is a taxable gross number. In other words, I would have been taxed on that $5,000 each year had things remained the same. To find a ballpark tax amount I multiply by 22%.

$5,000 X 22% = $1,100
$5,000 - $1,100 = $3,900

So, even though I’m going to take a $5,000 hit over the course of a year in comparison to where things were, I will most likely only notice a difference in my net income of $3,900. There’s no way to put perfume on that, and it is what it is. Personally, I can live with it. If a person in my bracket wanted to make up for it, or their personal finances couldn’t afford to take the hit, and they are happy working for IRT, here is how it can be done:

$5,000 divided by .60 CPM loaded miles = 8,333 miles.

8,333 miles divided by 52 weeks in a year = 160 miles per pay period. For me, all it will take is running an extra 160 miles each week to offset the email we received and keep things where they are in the deposits. 160 miles takes about 2.5 hours of driving. It’s peanuts. It’s a dirty trailer shuttle or something similar.

Like I said, I’m not trying to put perfume on a $5,000 per year loss. I’m just looking at things from a broad perspective and encourage everyone else to do the same who might be feeling disheartened right now. A mere 160 miles per week in addition to what you’ve normally been doing is all it will take to make that email meaningless. If your empty miles are less than what mine are in the list above, your numbers and financial impact won’t even be what mine are.

It’s just some food for thought. I’ve watched the company raise the pay three different times in the 8+ years I’ve worked here. So, I wouldn’t put it past them to bump things up once the economy gets back on track and the tariff wars get settled. As for me, I’m not going anywhere. IRT treats me good, and I’m happy with my job on a daily basis. Losing $3,900 in net income over the course of a year (that might only be temporary) isn’t going to impact me enough to matter. I watched them trim the fat off of every other thing they could before they touched the empty CPM and vacation pay in order to offset the current economy. There’s something to be said for that. I assume they will try to readjust some things where drivers are running around loaded more than we are empty to dampen the blow as well.

 

No. Here is the current vacation pay after the change:

1-5 years $750
6-9 years $1,000
10+ years $1,500

 

We’re still better off than we were three years ago. I think it was the Summer of 2022 when they implemented a significant raise across the board for everything. At that time, we were being paid .55 or .57 CPM for all miles, loaded and empty. The vacation pay was $500 per week, and they doubled it to $1,000 per week. They also raised everything to .60 CPM that year, too.

With the exception of the vacation pay decrease, the only thing that changed for the most part, is they knocked the empty mileage pay back down to .55 CPM. The .60 CPM loaded still stands. I think there are some tanker companies that are only paying in the 50’s for everything, loaded and empty when it comes to CPM. They probably don’t have the broad customer base that IRT has where they’re capable of running your lights out either, nor do they have the equipment stockpile and extra trailers on hand to set things up as a drop and hook the way we have.

I can understand skepticism when something like this happens, but I base my faith off what I’ve witnessed over the years. I posted a list of terminals in response to a question a few pages ago. There were eight terminals on that list. When I hired on, we only had three. That indicates growth and business success. Right now, every word in the national news media consists of financial experts warning of a recession, tariff war consequences, etc. While the loss hurts and probably disheartens a lot of people who haven’t been with IRT very long, I can understand them readjusting the chess board to deal with the economy right now. I really think it will bounce back up once the dust settles.