local or OTR for first trucking job

Be wary of taking a local job if the company runs e-logs...

E-logs and daycabs don't mix well as they aren't forgiving if you are bumping up to your 14 every day. In my case, every week I worked, I had to use my 2 hour exception and knock out a 16 hour day. Use it once and that's it for the week. Then when you are running the risk of going over your 14 the rest of the week, you end up stressing out because, unlike a paper log, you can't condense a delivery or pick up to make it "look legal. There is no wiggle room. Not close to a motel? Then you just violated your HOS.

At least out on the road, you can plan it out better and stop accordingly since you have a sleeper truck. Not every motel has truck parking, and you're not always going to know where you might be if/when you bump that 14.

 

I run elogs and I don't have this problem and I work near a 14 hour day everyday. So that tells me you are either purposely running illegal to make more money, your company is forcing you to run illegal to get more deliveries and pickups out of you, or a combination of both. If I know I'm not going to have the hours left to do a pickup or a delivery I tell my company I don't have the hours left and that is it. They pull the load off of me and I finish what I'm doing and then go home. If anything I would say elogs are useful if you are a local driver since messing with a logbook is one less thing you have to worry about.

 

Im not sure i completely understand what you mean.

 

Nope. Not running illegal as I didn't even do that when I ran paper. What happened is we generally did two round trip runs per day. Most of our customers were about 2 to 2.5 hours away from the plant. We would do our first outbound in the morning 4-5 hours of drive time, plus an hour or so for unloading. We'd go back to the plant for a second load which was again the same distance away. The second run would stress me out as there was more traffic, and thus, more things to go wrong enroute. We generally ran into the Philly area, New Jersey, or down to Lancaster or York, having to deal with Harrisburg traffic. Things would inevitably go wrong somewhere and the second trip would take longer. So that is where we were bumping up against the 14 nearly every single day. It would be ok, if we had a longer first trip, and then the second one was closer in, say Allentown or Scranton.

 

I took up a local job right out of school, the way I see it, your first year in driving is not gonna pay very well so why not just get paid peanuts and at the end of your day hop in your car and sleep in your own bed, instead of struggling to try and make it off ramen soup at truckstops by going OTR.

Only downside is once I left my first job it has been impossible to find a decent paying job because they want "OTR all weather/terrain" experience. Even if the job is local, they usually ask for otr experience. If I can do it again, I would probably look for something regional at least, then again I live in FL so can't be picky.

 

I myself recommend OTR other companies look at that as more valuable experience, especially north east region because it is so tight. I worked for a day cab company running GM parts. swift, werner, said "They didn't care about that experience". same with automatic driving my brother in law has a year at western express driving a automatic failed the road test at usa truck wanted him to do a month of training same with swift and Roehl he said he made a mistake accepting a automatic even with a year of experience he has to road test because of this.

My personal experience is schnieder and Roehl have a no non sense training course where you can wash out the last week of training and there otr trainers are high and mighty but I learned more from my schnieder trainers in TWO days then I did with a month with swift. I just don't recommend them in a way... because I got little to no miles and schnieder took my last check to get it back I had too go to eeoc they said I went out of route dropping the truck in Norfolk over charlotte which was oked by my dbl and they said I cash advanced three times in one week which is impossible.

you could try dedicated. there that religious trucking flat bed company Monday through Friday mccelroy I believe.

 

Well I have a lot of respect for people in this thread and their answers have some truth - but having done local and otr this is my opinion: Do not waste your time applying for anything but a local job! You want to be close to your family, a family wage, respect, home time, and good driving experience. It is a real crap shoot to get that in any OTR job and to get it you will likely need experience.

OTR companies have their own job rules to play by. To make those rules work, get a family wage, and family time is almost impossible. And even though those rules were written by the big OTR companies they will bend and brake them to their advantage and your families disadvantage.

Don't forget you are doing this for the money and your family not for the experience. This 'needed experience' is the biggest bunch of crap. When these companies don't really need driver's or don't like you for some reason they state 'your experience is not what we are looking for.' Just BS looking for a reason to cover up some discrimination. For example, when I drove OTR they told me my prior year of dump truck driving experience counted for crap. They would have to train me and pay me starter wages. I drove better than my trainer; He admitted it and would have me drive into docks he wouldn't touch. What a waste of time training.

Even though I love doing OTR I am tired of the pay, the BS, the lack of respect, and never getting home. As I applied for local, many told my OTR experience counted for crap. For example, I just recently applied for a local dump truck driving job. I was told exactly that. 4 years driving all over the US and Canada counted for nothing; My experience was a liability with his equipment. I stated I drove a truck like his for over a year: 3 axle dump and two axle tag-along. Well his reply was he uses a 4 axle truck and pup and he cannot afford another lawsuit. Are you freaking kidding me I stated, "I currently drive 68' long doubles in the same conditions you do with your trucks. I have been doing it for two years, in addition to the 4 years OTR and the 1 year driving dump all with no tickets, accidents, or service failures." He had no good reasons, just excuses.

If you really have a need to go OTR most of these companies will always take you. Sometimes your local experience will be counted sometimes not; it depends on how bad they need drivers. I would spend your time applying for as many local pay-by-the-hour jobs as needed, students do get hired sometimes. Forget the OTR crap unless that is what you want and that does not sound like the case. These OTR companies need drivers;they treat their drivers like crap and pay like crap. That is why their turnover is over 100%. That is why they are constantly training.

 

This has helped me do incredibly much!
I have seen all kinds of mixed views on the subject but you are completely right.
I am doing this for my family and for the paycheck, like ive said in the past im not trying to get rich and I do love driving very much but im not looking to be the best ranked trucker or win any awards.
I just want a good job that will pay the bills and then some.
This job fits me perfectly whether its OTR, regional or a local job.
Besides, most of the local jobs pay a good amount more then the OTR jobs i have found anyways.

 

1 year OTR is a good start