Swift Transportation

Your post sounds all too familiar. I've read it here many times, and each of those posts was a different username. You don't have to worry. Your story is so common, I doubt many here will consider it "your fault". I do wonder about your post, though. You worked there a year, you should have learned all about SwiftQuit and its rep within the first three months. I, too, am a former SwiftQuit driver, and I learned all about 'em in my first three weeks while driving their slow wagons. After getting hit by the lightning bolt of reality at SwiftCo, it was all downhill from there.

 

I went to Swift because I had heard that they had just increased their pay scale and that they had what they call comfort zones which were supposedly supposed to allow you to be home more often while still making decent money and that idea appealed to me at the time.

I also thought that since I had previous experience with CRST as a trainer that I would be able to be a trainer with Swift and make even more money, but that never happened as they screwed me over in all three catagories.

I guess maybe I should have done my homework better before signing on with them, but at the time it seemed like a good idea. Little did I know as to how badly they were going to screw me over. I guess that I now have learned my lesson or at least I hope so. All that I can do now is to try to pick up the pieces and move on with the rest of my life as best as I possibly can, but that may not be very easy as they are now trying to fight my unemployment by claiming misconduct.

I admit that I made some mistakes, but I did not committ misconduct as I tried very hard to understand and adhere to both company policies and procedures as well as the law, but more often than not they would never communicate with me and tell me what I needed to know.

They also more often than not just simply assumed that I knew everything and told me that if I did not know then I should look it up in their driver manual which is grossly out of date and I did do that as often as I could, but that still left me with questions about how the company operated and as to how they wanted me to do things, but more often than not they would never answer me when I asked them questions about either the driver manual or about as to how they wanted me to do things and all that did is to allow me to guess as to what the correct procedures and policies were.

I even had an incident with them in which they assigned me a service failure because I told them that I had run out of my 11 and that I would not be able to do the load that they had me pre-planned on within the time period that they wanted me to do without running illegal. As a result they got all pissey eyed at me for it and decided to give me a service failure for it.

I was not even assigned to the load as of yet as it was only a pre-plan and when I told the night dispatch that I would not be able to do the load on time legally, they told me to turn down the pre-plan stating the reason as to why and that is what I did. I thought that was the end of it until I got a message on the Qualcomm saying that the driver had caused a service failure later that night.

That made me very angry with them and I tried to discuss it with my dispatcher the next morning, but he would not listen to me and told me that it would stay. This all occured while I was up in Caldwell, Idaho. The load that they wanted me to pick up and deliver by the next morning was supposed to go from Boise, Idaho to Pullman, Washington and I had just come from Seattle earlier that morning.

After that they gave me a load that went from Boise, Idaho to Kalispell, Montana and they wanted me to take U.S. Hwy 12 to get into Montana and that is exactly what I did.

That was the first time that I had ever been on that road before and along the way I found that the max speed that you could safely go on that road due to the terrain and the road conditions at the time was about 45 Mph and as I got up toward the Monatana side of it I came across a huge stretch of road that was covered with ice and snow.

I slowed down as I did not want to get into any kind of an accident on that road so as a result it took me longer than I had anticipated to traverse that road. At the time I was low on fuel and Swift has a policy that they will not give you fuel without you sending them the comdata station code for the truckstop that you want to fuel at and without that code they tend to keep your card locked so that you can not get fuel without authorization from them before fueling at the place that you would like to fuel at.

When I got into Lolo, Montana and got my signal back on the Qualcomm I notified them that I was running late on the order due to the road conditions and I asked them to allow me to fuel at the pilot there in Lolo.

It took them a long time to respond and give me authorization for the fuel but they were quick to argue with me about the road conditions on that road and basically called me a liar. I did not like that and that made me very angry with them and as a result I called the New Mexico State Police and tried to report both incidents to them over the phone after I got to Kalispell.

I talked to an officer there that supposedly worked in the CMV enforcement department and I explained to him as to what had happened and he told me that he would have someone call me back the next day, but that never happened. The impression that he gave me at the time was that he was going to file a report on it, but apparently that never happened as I have recently found out that the officer that I spoke with that day never filed a report and the New Mexico State Police does not have any idea as to who I spoke with there as they do not keep records of who worked and who did not work that day according to them.

After that things were quiet until I arrived home and found out that they were terminating me for what they called at the time safety and performance. I did not argue with them on it as I knew that it was pointless as I knew that they were not going to listen to anything that I said. After they told me that I cleaned out my truck and then after I got home I filed for unemployment just as quickly as I could. This all happened around Christmas of last year.

The unemployment office approved my unemployment after about a month of waiting, but then shortly thereafter Swift came back and filed an appeal stating that I committed misconduct and they are claiming that it is due to citations and violations. I knew that there was policy relating to citations and vilolations, but what I did not know until the first unemployment hearing is as to what they consider excessive citations and violations as the employee handbook does not specify as to how many citations / Violations a driver can receive before they are terminated.

So far they have been trying to use against me a citation that I got in march of last year in California because the license plate light on the trailer went out on me as I was driving down the road. I did my pre-trip on the trailer and it was working at the time that I picked it up, but it must have gone out on me as I was driving down the road. I told both dispatch and maintenance about it while I was still on the scene with the officer and they told me that since I was heading back to Albuquerque that I should just have it fixed at the TA and that is what I did. It turned out that it was a problem with the wiring and that is why the light went out on me and in my opinion that is something that Swift should have known about and addressed prior to me picking up the trailer as they are required to inspect, maintain, and repair all vehicles under their control on a systematic basis according to the FMCSR.

There is more to this story, but at the moment I am dog tired right now and I need to get some sleep.

There were other incidents that occured while I was with them that they are trying to hold against me and I will share with you those incidents after I get some sleep.

I personally do not believe that they should try to blame me for what happened with that trailer as they should have had it in the shop previously so that they could inspect and repair it as they are required to by law.

 

I forgot to mention that the service failure and the issue with the DOT happened in the middle of November. The firing took place in December after I got back to the terminal.

 

I have been with swift going on 4 years I have turn down many of Pre plans down because I could not get it in time because of the load that I was under took longer to delivery because of weather, accident, or the one I hate the most grocery warehouses. In the 4 years I have never seen over the Qualcomm a message saying a driver had caused a service failure.

Yes sometimes it can be a wait for them to open up the card that can get frustrating at times. What I hate mostly happens on nights or weekend they will open up the card and not tell you over the Qualcomm it's been open for what ever gallons. I have never had them argue with me if a road is ice covered or snowy hell all they have to do is get on the internet and pretty much find out if it is or not. Or you could have called Lewiston, Id and had them say yep its iced covered on Lolo pass. I hate hwy 12 its nice looking in summer and spring and fall but winter sucks. Also when did they allow us to go that way last time I was over there we could not go that way. The New Mexico part I am lost but I did not start on page 1.

They should not be holding a citation against you that has to deal with a light but it might be more to it. Because the peoples republic of California has those stupid fixit tickets they give. swift has to send them a copy showing that they fixed it. Now you telling us if the trailer light was fine when you picked up the trailer and went out on you. And found out that it was bad wiring if a mechanic looking at the trailer sees that all the lights work how in the hell is he or she going to know that there is a short in the wire until the lights don't work and they replace the light and that does not fix the problem and they do further steps to find out what's the problem.

 

I'll have to agree..There has to be more to this story than the OP is stating. I kinda' got lost as to why you called the Hwy patrol to report the 2 incedents. What 2 incidents????

Also when I worked for swift when you finished a load you put in your PTA and that is how you are planned or preplanned for your next load. Sometimes you do get tight preplans but you can turn them down. You CANNOT get a service failure for a load you never accepted. In fact if you get preplanned and don't acknowledge it within a certain time period the automatically take it off of you if I remember correctly.

I also question OP's level of experience since he/she states he had to frequently ask for instructions as to what to do and referring constantly to the blue book (driver manual) especially being a trainer at a previous company.

I could be wrong but this story isn't jivin' with me. There's more to this story. Read between the lines of this story and you'll see.

 

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the DM's in phx are constantly changing, there are some VERY bad apples among them, treating drivers with great disrespect and get u fired.
However, seems they are trained to make u leave or get u fired from about 6 month to 1 year because then u become to expensive for them, new students are taken in every week at $0.25/mi plus SWIFT GETS PLENTY OF GOVERNMENT TAX INCENTIVES for hiring new drivers (but they must stay at least 6 month).

here is my experience with Phoenix terminal tehy have NO respect for their drivers, the DM's have no clue what they are doing, the mechanics endanger your life by "saving" and lieing to you

hey, exact same happened to me, i was terminated 1 day before year was up for "insubordination", did not agree with inexperienced DM wanting to send me into dangerous construction zone for fuelling 50g, i was already parked at a safe Flying J, the after our DM opened up the 50g fuel for me at the safe location with NO problem.
DM went to complain about me and I was fired same day I was going to start my annual leave.

Previous day, same DM wanted to send me 130mi one way -opposite direction of pp load- to p/u mt trl. I dared to ask wheather I actually need an mt because it could save the comp money NOT to go 260mi roundtrip for mt - DM insisted I MUST go get mt - I did as told - 20mi on my way, same DM told me that I do not need the mt and could bobtail to get my load!

was I fired because I gave good advice? NO, because this DM was always lazy and did not do his job, and did not want a driver to always point out
his mistakes and shortcomings!! THAT IS WHY I WAS FIRED!

now i have a big problem finding a job because my DAC shows "dismissed , not eligle for rehire" and an "accident" f 08/10/10 when I drove over right curb on my very first day of driving with my mentor on a public road, off I-10, El Paso, Rush Hour traffic! The citation was removed by traffic court, NO damage to equipment whatsoever! Mentor did NOT adhere to training policy - not to take a new driver ibnto rush hour city traffic on first day!

There is more: I hit my knee on steering column, thought nothing of it but it was swollen for many days and got worse, finally ask the comp nurse where to find a doctor, was immediately sent to a clinic after I had to report this as a workman's comp claim. I was treated several days at clinic, had pt ...and sent on my way, had more problems with knee, got worse, still have pain - however 2 month after I had treatments at a clinic SWIFT insisted I must go to, they denied the worker's comp claim!! and I was left with all of the medical bills to pay myself!!!
I did not mean to file a claim in the first place, did not want their clinic but was forced to go there then refuse to pay - only to create financial hardship for me?!!! I am still in Industrial Court to fight this claim and I am still having knee problems -
Swift's attorney offered me a $1200 settlement, when my medical bills are already at $4000 and all of the time and agrevation I had for no reason and totally unsuspecting and innoscent!

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Lolol @ resurrecting an almost 4 year old thread.

 

Really? You ran out on your log book and got a service failure BEFORE you picked up a pre-planned load? You didn't tell them 2 days before that you were close to your 70 and enter your hours into the qualcom? Didnt you call Safety about this?

And if a previous driver never said anything about the wiring when doing his post-trip inspection because the light worked as you stated when you picked up the trailer how in the world was Swift supposed to know about it? Osmosis? Secret signals from a trailer transmitter?

You don't keep a spare on your truck? The light just stopped huh? that does happen but it won't redline you. The citation (fix it) should have been turned into the company and then when fixed by them back to Cali. Any unemployment court would look at that and laugh at the company who tried using that as a basis for denying unemployment

They aren't driving the truck, you are. I let the companies complaints go in one ear and out the other about the road conditions. As for the fuel: if you needed the fuel that badly why didn't you call the fuel department or a dispatcher on the phone? I've needed to get fuel because of the weather, I had enough to make the trip but because of a storm or cold I wanted a full tank before leaving, and can't think of a time I argued with anybody to get it. Poor fuel management. You should have not come close to running out of fuel. Your fault

Report what? That you not only do not know enough to fuel your truck when it needs it but that you drove slowly over an ice covered road and made it safely to your destination? Or the company wanted you to fuel at a specific fueling point that they had a bulk fuel discount at?

You didn't trip plan the route and see that there were a bunch of squiggles on that road which means twisty or check the weather if it was that time of the year? I had suggested routes a bunch of times and then went a different way after telling my dispatcher why I was doing it without much argument.

 

Heh....this one just keeps getting funnier...


Okay, people who were fired. What's the whole story?

SouthAfrica, did you go into the terminal raising hell with that DM? What "dangerous" construction zone are you talking about? Is it that you didn't want to move from your little spot where there's a restaurant to another spot where there's fast food or maybe just a C-Store? Afraid you were going to miss out on your girlfriend showing up?

What's really going on?

Because I haven't heard of a driver being fired for refusing to go into a dangerous situation. If that's what really happened, maybe you should get ahold of Paul "Opie" Taylor. He just recently won a lawsuit against Prime for similar circumstances.

As for the accident, why was a citation even written if there was no damage? Did someone have to call a tow? Because if they did, of course it's going on you as an accident. If you simply drove over a curb and were able to get out of it, you would have been clear of it before the Law even showed up. There's more to this. Either spit it out or quit complaining.

 

There may be no answer here, ma'am. This thread is almost 4 years old.