need advice on company demanding drivers drive in unsafe conditions ASAP

You all live in Arizona?

 

+1
Fired on duty as I call it. Do my job and go the heck home, Rinse and repeat. Fired myself ( do enough to fly under the radar ) and just waiting for the interview at the next company.

 

In reading the OP I must say that your husband is definitely being bullied by his boss. I am an O/O and I'm about to take a driver under my wing. I have two hard rules I follow, safety first and treat the load like it is more valuable than my own life, on my most recent run I was stuck in Cheyenne for three days due to heavy winds and orders and advisories from the Wyoming authorities to stay off the road. I kept in touch with the broker and the customer who was receiving the shipment. it may have put me three days behind schedule but the shipment arrived in undamaged and they were just as glad to receive it late and in tact rather than on time and damaged. Your husband should file a report also with the FMCSA. If the conditions are unsafe and the rig is unsafe it can be deadly. If his boss is worried about some deadline more than his truck being damaged, I am wondering if he cares about the condition of the cargo. Does he work for a "big name" hauler or does his boss run under a leased authority? The driver is on the hook for anything that happens on the road and any and all violations are also reported on the company's safety record and they will be fined a higher rate than the driver. Either way it is not good. It is illegal in pretty much any field of business to coerce any employee, fully vested or contract, into doing any kind of illegal activity. The only way that the employer is not required to deduct taxes out of an employees paycheck is when they are a contract employee. Unless your husband is leasing the truck and is a contract employee, his boss is responsible for paying all income tax deductions (federal, state, and local) as well as social security and Medicare. I would also ask your husband to advise his boss that in some states if the road conditions are unsafe the authorities can pull trucks off the road and can seize and impound the vehicle for violations. This outfit your husband seems pretty shady. If the company does not emphasize safety and the drivers' reasonable judgement as to what are safe driving conditions then they need to be shut down because when a driver is forced to compromise their own safety due to their boss' orders that boss has just compromised the safety of every driver on the road and should an accident happen where someone loses their life, they should be arrested and tried for manslaughter. As much as most of us are not fans of most of the regulations out there, some are actually there for everyone's safety. Your husband should pull over until the highways are under safer conditions to travel. If his boss fires him, his boss better hope he has a good lawyer because he fired an employee for doing what the law tells your husband he is within his legal right to do. I live in Minnesota and during the winter months the roads can be harrowing to travel on but they do have great snow and ice removal. Some states are not that well at it. Definitely, if I were him I would find another outfit to drive for and report this employer to every authority he can, including the state board or agency that handles labor issues where you live and lawyer up because this is a ripe law suit waiting to happen.

Safety first

 

The ball is in your husbands court. We know he looked hard for this job and took the company that would hire him. He needs to start looking around and apply for more jobs.

 

There are other options besides working for a company such as this. I recently came back to otr driving after being out 8 years. While I live in Texas, I drive for a company out of North Dakota. Now mind you, during those 8 years, I was driving flatbed and tankers, but locally. A little different than your husband's situation. However, if it's just the time away from otr trucking that's holding him back and not tickets, duis, etc, there are many companies that would hire him as a rookie driver, perhaps with a refresher course or training outright. That would be a better way to get that year of experience the better companies want than driving for someone that sounds like a criminal himself.

 

After 27 years of safe trucking I needed knee replacement surgery. I took about 1 year off and was fascinated nobody would hardly touch me after being off for 1 year.Was told over and over insurance companies require recent,continuous tours over years of experience.Had to do a stint in the container world which totally sucked,but what else could I do.

 

If your husband has filled out a W-9 which makes him a 1099 employee, That means he is considered a contract employee and he is responsible for his taxes. Either way he is not in a good situation from what you're saying. His boss sounds like he doesn't care about safety and is more worried about other things. I'd say he needs to get out.

 

The fact that he is being paid on a 1099 is illegal. If he were a true 1099 employe his boss could not tell him where to go, when to leave or when to get there. That whole thing is just a tax dodge for the owner of the truck. He needs to tell this guy stick it.