Question for new drivers through 30+years experence

Location to where I was living at the time, reputation and had options like either going to their school or I could get my CDL elsewhere and then enter their driver finishing program (in truck with a trainer). Also look at what type of driving they offer. OTR, regional, dedicated, etc. What fits you adjenda.

 

1st company was strictly pay. went to a school that guarateed a job with one of 3 companies, and usa truck offered the most cpm out of the 3. no one i knew drove, didnt bother with web searches, just basically eenie meenie. thank goodness my stupidity didnt land me in one of the "bad" companies.

later when looking i had a list of many questions id have to know the answers to before making a decision. including:

pay per mile?

benefits?

apu? if not, bunk heater? and installed inverter? (if no apu, then both of the others must be present. either no bunk heater OR policy against installed inverter will make me look for another company)

average miles per week? (2500 is most likely a lie, they are using industry standard) average length of haul? (higher average loh means more miles per week with less effort)

home time...how many days out equals a day off? how many can i save up to and use at one time WITHOUT having to change trucks? (i like to stay out for several weeks, and take several days at home. if they wont allow me 5 days minimum, then no thanks)

bonuses for fuel/safety/performance? (many companies offer 1 or more cpm for achieving goals in one or more of these 3. as they should, especially fuel. each 1cpm equals $1250 per year to a driver driving the average of 125k miles per year...its a big deal)

where can i leave the truck when i take it home? (i live in a place where i cant park at my house. truck stop or mall are my 2 options, so i want to ensure thats okay)

how does company figure miles paid? (hhg miles is the worst...criminal really. you will drive an average of 10% more than you are paid for. hub miles is best, but you wont find many companies paying that way. practical miles is in between, and you will drive maybe 2-5% more than you are paid for)

per diem pay? optional or mandatory? ( you do NOT want per diem pay. it will cost you around $500 per year average. and most companies charge money for it on top of that. 1-3 cpm for the privilege of costing you $500 per year. each 1cpm equals another $1250. the one exception to this rule is millis. ive heard they offer a bonus week of vacation for taking per diem, and they charge nothing. so a bonus worth $800 or so might make the $500 loss worth it.)

make your own list. these questions are important ones. im sure there are many others that are important to other people as well.

 

I based my decision mainly on two.things... Average length of haul and what they are carrying. I went refer because with the downturn in the economy, people still have to eat and as the other guy said, length of haul is easier money.

I came out the gate after training averaging 26-2700 miles per week.

 

I looked at miles first, then benefits. With a family, I needed the miles right away. Picked a boat hauler then a flatbed company running coast to coast. Get all the endorsements plus a passport & TWIC for more opportunities.

 

My biggest pet peeve is when a company has an desk jockey that's there to try to hold my hand while I work. The more handholding that goes on, the stupider the entire company becomes, the more the safety rating plummets. So the first thing I try to avoid is the handholding. If I call about a job, the person on the other side of the phone tries to hold my hand, I hang up.

 

I based my decision off of pay and hometime. Starting out I didn't want to be away for weeks at a time. I promised my wife that when I got out of the military. I was home every weekend even in training. The pay was an easy factor too in my decision the company I went with was a union company and paid a rate that I see people still dont make with experience. I started out making .36cpm plus free benefits so it was a no brainer with zero experience. I stayed there until they shut the doors. I then went to hauling cars (another union job) and made a killing but I grew tired of the union crap and being laid off at any given time (wasn't long periods of time usually a month or so a year) and then went to FedEx and that's we're I'm at now running a small fleet.

 

I was 22 years old & yarned my way into a junk trucking company. That button on the shifter made the truck go faster. The rest I asked And learned the hard way. No Accidents, No tickets, (moving) 30 years.

 

The first was all about $$$$$$$$ now I'm smarter and home every day and still make more $$ than most OTR drivers

 

Truthfully, I was so green that I went with the first outfit that offered me a job (Midwest Distribution, home of the "Dollar Truck".)

From what I read here on the internets, nobody today would put up with what we put up with in the "old days", LOL.