The question I'm asking is can you take "hometime" anywhere? Does it have to be in the state of your residence listed on your paperwork? I stay in Mississippi but my children stay in Illinois so Id like to take my hometime in Illinois sometimes and Mississippi sometimes. Is this ok?
Yes assuming it's in a normal operating area for your fleet. Typically when you put in a "hometime request" for approval, it asks for date range and location. In some cases they may assume your normal home location and you may have to make a phone call to insure they change it in the computer for that particular hometime. As you get about a week away, they'll start to look at that location request for planning and staging purposes.
We would take our Home time here at home in Arkansas. However as a husband wife team, we took our time off in a hotel of some good quality and rental car to run around to enjoy some of the local offerings anywhere in the USA for a few days. It was a very motivating and refreshing time when you can get out of that truck somewhere and get cultured in a museum or do something like renting a trail horse for a day and take off with a group of others in a activity or some such entertainment. We also had family around the USA. But you never tell Dispatcher that. Once they find out for example Indianapolis you will never be dispatched there based on the theory that you do good work when you do not get sent to cities containing your family, friends or other distractions that might cause you to run out of route or lay around a few hours or a few days however that worked out against Dispatchers. We used to enjoy Indianapois all the time until that dispatcher found out we had friends and family up there. Welp. That was the end of our Indy deliveries I guess LOL. Just as well, the girls around the Pilot on southside off exit 4 I think it was was getting really young and pushy. Even though we were married.... ugh. They really should stay home not being grown and all. It's discouraging to see such trashy behavior in a nice city like Indy. Good luck!
In my case, I can take hometime anywhere in the lower 48 pretty much. But it's a giant OTR company that has trucks and terminals everywhere. Depends on the company really. Small regional operation probably has limited choice. In my case I can drive tractor and trailer to my house. Some require you to leave it at terminals.
Some companies allow you to take home time anywhere in the nation. Others will only let you take home time at your home address. Melton for instance only wanted you taking home time at your home address. You had to get permission to take it elsewhere. If your dispatcher didn't give a #### it didn't matter though lol Basically just be good to your dispatchers, if you ever need a favor in trucking your dispatcher is god. You really can do whatever you want even as a company driver if your DM is on your side.
When I drove for Swift hometime could be requested to any zip code in the lower 48. It didn't matter where your home terminal was. You made a request at least one week in advance to give the planners time to route you there. Sometimes I used home time requests to get out of a bad area (slow freight). If I was stuck in the southeast I put in a home time request for the West coast. Once I had a long haul heading west I cancelled the home time request. Learn to work the system.
You can take hometime where you prefer just make sure to give your dispatcher a couple weeks notice then start reminding him A few days before your requested time off.
3 weeks left Chinatown. I was extremely nervous at first but I have two mouths to feed and a little fear/anxiety was not gonna stop me from achieving my goals
This is going to boil down to company policy there is no rule or regulation that says it must be your state of residence
