Well isn't that special? You want to do the one job in America that so many will tell you is beneath them, yet when they need a job, they come a knockin in our industry. Seriously, I don't know what your expectations are but after I'm done, you may want to run the other way, because I'm about to drop a load of reality on your loading dock.
First, if you really believe anything any recruiter tells you, your putting faith in the wrong basket!!! Recruiters are sales people and they get paid to recruit you!!! If your a trucking school student, these idiots will come to visit your school, and if you think they are coming there to help you, your wrong future good buddy, they're coming to generate commissions for themselves and referral fees for the school.
Now if you make it through school and get that CDL, you get an opportunity to train over the road for weeks with someone who is getting paid to train you and a bonus at the end, if you pass the hiring road test.
oh wait, didn't they tell you that??? Yes, you have to take a final skills test to get hired on for that job you've just spent weeks running around the country for $240.00 to $350.00 before taxes and deductions. Yea, you may have enough $$$ during the 20,000 miles training to eat, do laundry, and send a few dollars home to momma to pay all those bills that keep piling up.
ok so now you got the job, now your in for what is called work. Your life will now consist of driving, loading, unloading, route planning, trying to maneuver a big rig or the biggest straight truck you will ever see down the road. You might think about leaving your nice street clothes at home because you won't have much time to go out and party, your running the road weeks in and weeks out for cpm pay, which is cents per mile. It's like a dollar bill.
you run all over the place and a dollar is generated from your efforts, this is referred to as revenue to the truck and this goes to your boss, the big trucking company that allows you to call yourself a trucker. Then money comes out of that dollar to keep your truck rolling along with all the other gerbals and the 22 cents to 28 cents or whatever your getting to keep, is your cpm, cents per mile pay. Now if your getting 28 cpm, for every 1000 miles you drive, you get to earn $280.00. Huge difference between reality and the bull doozies your recruiter told you you could earn.
oh yea lets talk about home time. Hey your getting 1 day off for every week out, woo hoo let's blow our air horn for that. Well what does this mean exactly. It doesn't mean that your driving six days and getting one day off a week.
it means that when you get time off, you have generated days off based on how long you've been out. So to get a full week of, you need to roll 7 weeks straight, so at 7 days a week, that's 49 straight days of work to get a week off.
most recruiters will you that your out 3 weeks and off 1 week, now the problem with this scenario is that in three weeks, you've only generated 3 days!!! so now let's say your driver manager tells you take this load to Chicago and I will get you three days off, so now your thinking cool, I get to go home after taking this load to Chicago, and you drop the load and get ready to go home. Well the problem is that lets say you live 1250 miles from Chicago and your next load is in Indianapolis. Do you really think your going home??? Your three days off will be sitting at a truck stop in Chicago or somewhere between Chicago and Indianapolis.
no company is going to let you dead head 1250 miles which means 1250 non paid miles, fuel, wear and tear, just so you can go home for 72 hours??? Not happening unless you own the truck and if you own or lease to own your truck, agree you really gong to blow through money to go that far home for 72 hours???
trucking is a good job and good career for those who don't go through life with blinders on!!! it's a job and a paycheck, that's it.
what makes me qualified? 44 years, 4.2 million miles and only having been with two companies in 44 years.
So You Want To Drive a Truck
Discussion in 'Questions From New Drivers' started by milesandmilesofroad, Oct 9, 2013.
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Trucking Jobs in 30 seconds
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Trucking Jobs in 30 seconds
Every month 400 people find a job with the help of TruckersReport.
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