Pay by the hour vs. by the mile

Pedigreed bulldog.

I don't see anywhere in the FCMSA rule book that states a company must pay a driver for all their time "on duty" just as there is no rule that states a "driver cannot be paid for time that is off duty". In fact.......I don't see any mention of how a company is to pay a driver. If that's how you want to define how a driver should be paid,fine by me. This also would be a principal reason why drivers pay is going backwards. The days of getting in the truck and cranking out the miles have pretty much come to an end...........the glory days of trucking are over. Drivers need to start looking at all the inefficiencies and realise they are the reasons those inefficiencies exist.......if a driver were paid for EVERYTHING they do then we would see imporovements in the supply chain. If drivers want to keep sitting around for free all they can look forward to is more uncompensated hours.

Don't use a rule book that doesn't mention one word in regards to "pay" throughout the entire book in order to defend a point of view.


Show me in that book where pay is tied to anything that covers hours of service and you might have an argument by using it.

 

Down the road,

I provided proof right out of the FCMSA rule book that he was wrong at the bottom of page 2.

Originally Posted by FMCSA Interpretation for 395.2

Question 10: How does compensation relate to on-duty time?

Guidance: The fact that a driver is paid for a period of time does not always establish that the driver was on-duty for the purposes of part 395 during that period of time. A driver may be relieved of duty under certain conditions and still be paid.

http://www.fmcsa.dot.gov/rules-regul...d=compensation

 

The thing you may not understand is that many companies use routing programs such as Rand McNally (Household Movers Guide) or PC Miler. PC Miler has several versions. Neither program will compensate a driver for all miles driven. It is common knowledge within the trucking industry drivers routinely lose out on 3% to as high as 10% of the miles driven (depending on routing, detours, etc).

Very few companies pay "HUB miles" but if you can find one that offers this you will be ahead of most OTR drivers.

 

we are paid hub miles when driving and performance base flat rates when bottom line..flat rates for loading,unloading,pre/post trips,inspections,safety breaks and fueling..if you can beat the times you make well above your hourly but if you go over your alloted time you drop to hourly...cant beat it..way better than straight hourly with incentive to make well over hourly pay..

 

You are correct, i had a local job pulling a reefer until the bottom fell out and had to move on, i was on elogs and had alot of dock time which some of it could go on off duty. The company said that they pay for " off duty time " so some weeks when the work was steady i would be at 65-70 hours on elogs but would get paid for 72-75 hours for the week.....

 

If you can find an OTR job that pays by the hour, Jump on it, you WILL make more, My brother has an hourly OTR job, team drives and gets paid for all of the hours that he is gone, from the time he leaves until the time he gets back, Just make sure you know how they figure your hours.

 

" It is common knowledge within the trucking industry drivers routinely lose out on 3% to as high as 10% of the miles driven (depending on routing, detours, etc)."

That is another reason it is so screwed up getting paid by the mile instead of by the hour, with overtime pay after fourty, or even after 8 hours per shift as the Teamster pay, (last I heard, that might be changed now.) Any way you look at it, truck drivers are screwed every way possible by the companies. Lots of hours with no pay at all, or so little pay you might as well not count it. And when they ARE paid, while they are driving, they drive lots of miles they don't get paid for. I hate to see it, I hate to see good workers put up with it.