Roehl Question

Eh, I doubt they would ever bother to take legal action, especially for a measly 3 grand. The effort and money involved to enforce legal action would make it rather unprofitable.

FYI, in other career fields this is generally regarded as a very shady practice. Legal, but shady. The company decided to hire you so you can make them money. It should only be expected that they provide OJT. Don't quote me on this, but I'm pretty sure trucking is probably the one of the very few fields they can get away with it.

But the reason they do it is because of high turnover, NOT 'training costs.' It just serves as an incentive for drivers to stick around. If you do bail on the contract, all that would happen is they send it to a collection agency, and then go their merry way. You could quite literally spend the rest of your life refusing to pay them, as long as you'd be willing to take the credit hit.

 

Ummm...high turnover = money loss.

I do agree it seems this is the one of very few industries that you have to pay to play. But I also think the cost of training in this industry is much higher than in others as well.

 

Yep. Don't think I said anything to the contrary. With other fields though, if turnover was too high, they'd do things like increase pay and quality of life instead of forcing people to keep working by threat of lawsuit.

 

It's definitely higher than the fast food industry, but then a newbie driver will be much more profitable to trucking company than Billy on the fryer will be to a burger joint.

 

My instructor told me today that the trainees coming in with a cdl is lower than normal since the change but new cdl trainees is at an all time high.

I am in a class by myself. So I get 100% attention and so glad I chose Roehl. I almost went elsewhere because of the commitment but glad I didn't.

 

If you are happy with your choice then that is all that matters.

 

I'm not going to spend time searching for this but ................. I read a comment somewhere a few weeks ago about someone doing pretty much what you just outlined, and it blew up in their face. They did the CDL training somewhere, then left believing they could sign on with another company and pretty much skip on the tab. Problem is the company they trained with, decided they weren't going to verify that any training had been done. The prospective company would not hire without being able to verify training. IMHO, the prosepctive company should have seen 1,000 red flags go up on that driver.

My previous research lead me to list Roehl as my first pick on CDL training. Nate's comment about the cost though have become a red flag but I'm going to talk to a recruiter first and read the contract before I jump to conclusions.

 

I finished orientation with Roehl last Monday and been on the road with my trainer since Wednesday.

So far I have seen zero negative with my choice and think I will have no problem reaching my 75,000 miles and most likely many more with Roehl before moving.

 

Good news Nate_K. Chinatown mentioned them in a post I made about a good company to look for after I graduate. Glad to hear they are treating you right. If you have any more updates on your time with them I would love to hear it. Thanks!

 

I have been doing a blog on trucker truth site of my daily experiences from day 1 of orientation.

It might be helpful.