Stevens Transport aviary

It was good to see Barracuda, and his new company truck, although it is a black freightshaker .

It just happened that we were both in the same area, so we caught up. Maybe one day I will run into smokr out here...

Have a delivery in the morning, Salem, VA, then down to Richmond, Nabisco, then up to the Detroit area, Smokr territory.

I have been running hard this month, 3000+ miles a week for 3 weeks in a row. Hope everyone else is doing well.

 

I know this will surprise you all a bit (?!!) but my truck wasn't ready today. Still needs a 3 axle alignment, but I'm first on the list for tomorrow. Hopefully all will be right in the world and I'll be signed off and dispatched by tomorrow afternoon.
Sure would be nice to be sent to the NW or up north where the temps are reasonable. This 108 today is for the birds!
Came back from a weekend of hometime today. Went to the airport this morning and it was 55 degrees. When we landed in Dallas at 12:45 it was 101.
What a change!
We'll see what happens. Stay cool everyone.

 

Had a smithfield meat load going to A walmart this morning...kept getting QC messages from night crew if I was going to be on time. so after making my 415 am appt at 315 as I always do, I called and asked what, you guys bored tonight or nervous.

Now the story I got was, that a driver last week had run out of hours to drive at the gate of this very walmart, and refused to drive the truck any more. Needless to say walmart was not happy...There was another Stevens driver that was already at the walmart, and was called to go and move this other truck. The driver that said he would not drive was given a bus ticket to the yard. What happened from there I do not know.

Other than that just an uneventful drive across the back roads of alabama.

 

There is really not much that can be done to him. In fact if stevens does discipline him for that, it places them in a difficult position. The words "may not drive" in the his rules don't specify an exception for private property, distance or otherwise so technically the guy is correct.

However, he could use a greybarea called the same city rule and track the amount of driving done on the property along withthe on duty time.

But according to his rules, he is correct.

 

hehe, I've had that same load at least once every month for the last 4 months...

 

Just left the yard with my new truck and non working APU yesterday evening, after 9 days of Dallas hospitality.
This Walmart thing explains why everyone is running around the place reminding us to 'plan your trip, drive your plan, be aware of upcoming issues and most of all...COMMUNICATE!'
I am expecting another sticker to appear shortly. I don't know where they will put it, tho unless that new 700 has a larger dash. I had to remove a couple stickers just to find the fuel guage.
Seriously, tho... there was a buzz around the place centering around 'unexpected' issues that may cause you to miss a delivery. This explains it all.
So here I am in Kanas, finishing my 10 after a drop this morning and my APU won't work.
Ah, who needs sleep anyway?

 

Boy I feel for you. A non working APU? In Kansas during the dog days of Summer?? Are you leasing a truck now or are you still company? If you are leasing, your first stop should be a Thermo-King Dealer to have your APU repaired-the truck has a 30 warranty that covers everything. Personally, there is no way I could sleep in the heat- and that would make me a tired,fatigued driver that's a danger on the road. Hope you sleep in heat better than I do. I got a load assignment this morning to go deadhead from San Antonio to Tyson in Seguin, load going to Riverside, CA for delivery on Sunday. I get to Tyson and am informed that load won't be ready until late afternoon. Also get told that they do not have a trailer washout there, so dagnabbit I have to go 25 miles back west to have trailer washed out at Petro Blue Beacon. On the way ther I get a message on Quallcom that shipper has cancelled load, that I will get another one. 3 hours later I get Load Assignment- pick up load at Tyson in Seguin tommorrow, delivery for Monday in Riverside CA. Thanks Tyson, thanks Stevens. On track for a 1800 mile week. Not good for a leasee. May have to consider going back company, or find a Prime job somewhere else, but I really want this to work with Stevens. Ahh the joys of being a Truck Driver.

 

The driver was 100% correct that he could not drive. That is lousy trip planning, and I wonder if he communicated that to Stevens? To shut down at the gate to a Wal Mart DC says to me that he had another agenda in mind.

Stevens can retrain him on communications, and trip planning, and make him go threw grad fleet again. To fire him would open up a whole legal can of worms. But the story does illustrate why all of sudden the increase QC messages about are you on Time.

I have to love the Tyson in seguin Texas, set there for 22 hours waiting for a load to be ready. Then ran 500 miles and gave it to a team to make the appt in chicago.

Get that APU to a thermo king dealer asap, as stevens covers the repair for the first 30 days. After that it is your bill.

Nomad, 1800 miles a week as an alliance driver sucks. I would be communicating my displeasure to my DM, and to Archie, and see what can be done to resolve the low miles.

Glad to see Mr. Carver is still around, lurking.

Arcos, at least I got a good nights sleep at smithfield, listening to the frogs and crickets. I parked off to the side, away from all the trailers, and noise.

 

Yes, 1800 miles for a week sucks, whether you're an Alliance Driver or not. Theoretically, I could still end up with more. However, I figure it this way. I deliver in Riverside 0700 Dallas time Monday. After that trip I will have 1680 miles for the week. I should be empty around 10-11 Dallas time. Then, I imagine I will get a multiple-pick produce load that will take the rest of the day to pick up. So if I get lucky, I can run 1000-1200 miles off the load by Wednesday afternoon and have Stevens or my DM kill the load, and re-assign it to me from the kill point. This has been done by another DM for one of my friends that I went through Stevens school with and whom is also an Alliance driver (He has had much better miles than I have had since joining Alliance), so I KNOW it can be done. In this best-case scenario I could still get 2600-2800 miles for the week, which still sucks in my opinion. I have had two 2200 mile weeks and a 1900 mile week in the last 6 weeks, mixed in with 2700, 3054, and 2780 mile weeks. I'm really starting to think that my DM just sucks (I've never been late, no incidents). I am at my wits end and have begun communicating with another Company about making a jump, however I am being slow about it since I have learned in life that the grass isn't always as green on the other side as it looks from where you are standing. If I don't get over 2600 miles to scan by Wednesday afternoon, I believe my next course of action will be to request a new DM, and if I can't get one, then I may take a leap of faith to the other side. This crap certainly isn't the picture Alliance paints. Their motto, "You supply the elbow grease and hard work, and we'll supply all the miles you can handle", is pure bovine excrement. I'm obviously not a happy camper.