PAY..New drivers weekly pay

it works for me and im home every night. boss is not a bad guy and the only time i have communication with him is when there are changes like what trailers i am using or something changes as to where the milk is going. he is always very pleasant over the phone. my wife's cousin who moved from alaska with a CDL-A is driving for a different milk hauler (bugman). i know what he is getting and its not great. he works a 15 hour day and makes $170. after hearing that, i realize how GOOD walton milk hauling actually is to me.

despite the peanuts he is making he still does his job without complaint as he is also home at night. his pay is only around $11 hourly. he also has a wife and child.

 

i guess i also deserve some credit, i plan of sticking around here for a while perhaps years. i decided to stop "job jumping". heck this job is close my house, money spent commuting to work is minimal 25 minutes from home to company yard.

 

Also allot of my pay is actually comprised of time spent pumping milk, basically getting paid to stand around and wait. Gets a little boring but loading is easy. Take stick measurement for milk volume, check temperature, pull milk sample, fill out milk weight tickets, pump milk, check seals and wash ticket. Easy. I drive 120 miles per day on average, sometimes I wish it was more driving; but when the weather gets bad it's not a bad thing.

I probably spend 3 hours per day pumping milk.

 

Just wanted to point out that someone is paying for that free lunch.
Of course if your a cat that little detail wouldn't bother you.

 

My first year I averaged 1300 a week gross. My tax liability is low so more comes out for state than fed, I also invest 20 % of salary ( part of that is 401k) then the company does a 6% match 401k. Second year weekly gross significantly increased with job change avg 1800 weekly same diversions of income except the employer match is a bit different , also profit share. Third year same company so far this year I'm getting close to 2100 avg week. I will add results will vary by work ethic , company, and what you haul. My advice is whom ever you choose to work for , make yourself the most valuable to them you possibly can and with that the money follows.

 

2100 per week wow congrats. That's awesome money. I don't know if I could give up being home regularly. Maybe someday I would be open to home every other day but it would have to pay significantly more then I make now. not when my boys are young, out of the question at this point in my life.

Unemployment is NOT like welfare in the sense that your employer is paying for unemployment insurance. It doesn't really take its money from the taxpayer. I have only been on unemployment once in my life. I hated it, huge difference between what unemployment pays and what I make at my job.

No comparison and that very comment someone made is a joke. I make more then double, almost tripple that.

When I was on unemployment I got a state grant that paid for my trucking school. School cost $3200, I paid $195.

Over a year later I still live to drive truck. Love doing it. Found a job that works for my family situation. Shouldn't complain, not going to lol.

Local guys matter......lol

 

Well am I glad to be living in the best country in the world or what? I started a new job 6 weeks ago training pay was $32 per hour solo is $43 per hour with 4 weeks paid annual leave after 12 months.

 

$2345 for two weeks?? Are you monkey?? Working for bananas?? You can't be real to agree for that wages and survey on the road. Don't forget about tax time. And make shure to shower ones in a while.

 

Post some pics of your wife that working nights.. maybe we can use it

 

We once held three. Not all to the same beneficiary.

Now we just have the one big one.

Trucker wages feast and famine. After withholding (100 for state and 75 for federal) and tax deductions which approach 40% of gross, what is left isnt much. But when you finish taxes on say 65000 gross, 20000 spent on the road, and so on. That year we had a little over 10,000 refunded for the new trucking year and less than 5000 cash on hand. Rest were in the house in the form of annual payments to water, electric etc.

Different states do not have taxes, others have even more if you own a home etc. There is no one number you can depend on after school.

What you do need is financial thinking to go with the loads you are hauling. They pay you so much per mile, you have deductions, left with the net. Eat a little bit for that particular delivery, put aside the rest as savings. Do that for each load while also recording carefully all the information to crosscheck against your future payroll to be sure you were paid actually properly for the work done.

Your trucking expenses like tolls in my time was all cash, you also had to check and be sure you were reimbursed for all of them. Crossing the GWB and running the turnpike every day for a week in several states can run you several hundred dollars in tolls. Then there is the lumper fees. You would want to check and make sure you are not deducted for them. Every little thing has to be pre-approved with a Purchase order given for it. Otherwise it will be deducted from your paycheck.

Companies have no problems giving you a $0.00 check and saying you owe them another 1000 so far. And there you are. Usually when you borrowed too many comchecks. Then you find that you are fired because of excessive borrowing and sued for the balance due.

Sign a promissary note in orientation for 10,000 to pay back the company after CDL training? Only to discover the actual CDL School averages 4000 dollars? HA. You are stuck now. fork over the 10,000 dollars if they fire you within a certain term of time. (And they know that will come up at some point your first year for a preventable accident etc)

Miss a student loan payment because you are not dispatched near your home to do banking to pay your personal bills each month? It goes into collections and boom there you are along with whatever else that isnt paid on time.

Wrestling with the cellphone company for international roaming charges because it connected to that nice Canadian Tower long distance while you are in Seattle? Billed 1200 dollars? So sorry. Espeically after your arrival at home to see a book sized billing statement from your celluar carrier. Those durn brokers always calling you. Ha. Expensive. CH Robinson comes to mind. They have to go all the way down to the driver to ask questions that the driver knows nothing about. That is what dispatch is for.

Need I go on?

Oh let's not get into the several thousand dollars of electronics and so on plus the monthly outflow of your dollars feeding all of them with internet, wireless etc fees each month. God help you if you are playing a modern free to play game and pull out your credit card to buy virtual game content when you cannot even afford a dinner at the petro that day.

And everyone who has a pulse knows truckers have cash. I ran out of gas in such a such a state to go see my dying relative I need 5 dollars in gas to make mass (Which happens to be 4 states away... logical no?) beg beg beg. Parasites all.

And my personal favorite. Inflation. Int he 80's you make high 20's and that's pretty decent. Not bad but decent. That's after taxes etc. Fast forward many years later you gross 65000 with two people teaming and you find its half the potential because the company had you running around saving late loads from solos. And it's still takes a good percentage of that to run a house and it's taxes, insurance and bills. (Ternimix comes to mind, they have a fee of about 1500 twice a year to keep bugs out of your place while you are gone...)

And constantly build your savings. For us 9-11 came along. Killed the people who did third party payroll. Dispatcher asked us do we have money to keep going? Or do they have to send us both to the unemployment office to collect until they get caught up with new payroll? We had savings and kept rolling thankfully and one day they caught all that up nicely. It only took 6 weeks.

Oh and they paid the spouse 0.28 in training. It came out to a few hundred net. As a trainer on salary we both lived on that money a few months. When she came out of training, they I think gave her 0.32

Keep in mind 0.30 or better is what they paid top hands decades ago. Mileage pay is obsolete and should be annuled industry wide. Salary is the best pay if you can get it. There is no point in getting into Hourly because over time is exempt across the entire Industry. You will work 70 hours plus just like you did the first 40 and like it.