Linehaul Bids and the 10 Hour Break

They can call, you don't have to answer or change to on duty. Or they can just move on to the next person.

 

One company I was at would have us come in for safety meetings during our 10 hours off, but still expected us to continue driving that evening.

 

I did not answer the phone when I was on my 10 hour break ( except for family). Operations knows better - and if they don't advise Safety of the problem.

 

27 years same company and ive never attended a safety meeting. When “invited” I told them if anything valid comes out of HR’s cake hole you can email me the information. Never a response. I dont work bankers hours.

 

Legally waiting for a dispatch can be logged off duty. Talking to them on the phone doesn’t change that law either. I agree with you I wouldn’t like being woken up to bid, but I would rather do it one time a year or so than a junior driver taking a bid I had the seniority to get. Most reasonable companies put a bid sheet up so they don’t have to wake up all of their sleeping drivers to run the bids.

 

We used to do our semi annual bids by calling.
Found a better and faster way to doit.
Post a sheet up giving each driver a time to call for his spot.Gave them 15 min to make the call, if they missed the window move on to the next one on the list.
If calling in late they can take whats left.
Leave a signed paper with caller as to what you want with a few options.
No matter what you do their is always someone who will try to put a wrench in the works.

 

Do they at least tell you what day they’ll be calling?

We bid the same way at my place right now, except they pause the bid when they can’t get ahold of someone. The bid progress is posted every afternoon so drivers can see who’s been called and what runs are taken.