The New FFE Driver Academey

Sounds like there is good and bad things about ffe. but i seen other people make money then other say its bad there to stay away i guess i will find out in august

 

Is this the department above LTL? I had no idea about this. I will be looking for it as soon as I get back to Lancaster.

 

If you're working linehual then you're likely under Brian P's board. Anything related to FFE's LtL division generaly does well, it's why KLLM bought them, it certainly wasn't for the TL division.
I did well under him and so did my trainer. When these newbies get out into the wild as a solo driver with a typical DM that FFE will furnish them with, they will understand.
That's all I have to say about this.

I've always managed my time great, and I actually did well with FFE up until about the time Paul L left back in late January/early February.
Since then, I've had two new DM's my current one is okay but as far as getting over 2,250+ a week, forget it. I don't even average anything near that. Yet I have almost always made all my deliveries and pickups on time. I've had zero incidents or accidents and give nobody any trouble.
I've given it my all, FFE has not.

OH and if you're working linehaul then yes: other drivers are doing your work.
You're the guy pulling preload's between terminals and of course you're doing well, you also represent one of about 70-80 (IF that) of the drivers in this company. Go tell that to the other 1,000 and they will get a little more than upset.

Myself, personally I'd never become a trainer on the simple basis that it's too risky. To expect a trainee to be even half competent behind the wheel and drive 11 hours in his first 6 weeks every day as a team operator is a bit, ridiculous sir.
My trainer did that to me, and he, for lack of a better phrase, screwed me.
Yeah, I did a lot of interstate driving. Live unloads were far and few in between. Non-interstate driving and receiver/shipper navigation was almost entirely non-existent.


So the whole idea that you make good money with FFE as just "another employee" which is basically the line you're trying to drop here, lets look at the whole:

• You drive LtL linehaul
• You lease your vehicle
• you have a trainee to work as a team operation (regardless of whether or not you do or dont use the trainee as a co driver is entirely up to you, but you have the option to squeeze more miles out of a week if you chose to do so on any given week.)

And as I mentioned before, if that is the case; yeah, you're probably doing well.
And as I mentioned before, you represent a small percentage of this companies drivers.


I've got plenty of time to sit and dispute this, until I make it clear to each and every person that comes across this thread understands exactly just what kind of situation they're digging themselves into.

 

Maybe you missed the part where I did well as a COMPANY driver. This is pre lease, pre train time. My checks were usually between $600 and $800 per week. Even through the winter my weeks were 2000 +.

You mention new DM's and miles dropping off. If your waiting on your DM to give you loads your doing it wrong. As a company driver I always sent my DM a message 24 hours before a drop telling him when I would be empty and how many hours I would have. 8 hours before I delivered if I did not have a plan I would be on the phone with planners. That's where the majority of my loads came from.

I will not argue that in many areas FFE drops the ball. I'm not going to disagree that there are many better companies. All I am trying to say is if I have done well with FFE, as a company driver too, there's no reason others can't.

 

Oh, and on the trainer thing... I understand your point. There are more than a few trainers that shouldn't be trainers. I always tell people if you want to train just for the money, you shouldn't train. I have been a teacher in one form or fashion most of my adult life. It just makes sense for me to continue now.

I will run full teams with a trainee after the 3rd week if I feel he is ready. If you only allow someone to run 4 to 6 hours a day during training you do them a disservice. When they go solo they need to be prepared for long days. But, I do not let them drive 11 hours. I prefer to run off recap then have to reset on the road.

 

The fundamental issue I have with your statement is this:
You set forth the possibility of making a decent living as a company driver with FFE.
I will not dispute (hell I admited it) that at one point, I did well.
That was then, this is now. Last year I was doing well. A lot of Hershey, Alcon and JJ loads and over half of them were drop and hooks most of the time.

And again, that was then and this is now.
I don't rely on my DM to get me miles, I never have. I had to kick my second DM because he was getting annoyed with me going directly to the planners because he was unreliable for passing along the news that I was getting ready to place an available call.

I've not seen a real drop and hook with a preloaded waiting for me since atleast February.
All we (company drivers) get anymore is meat and produce loads with exceptional long waiting periods, some even stretch for upwards of 4 days and most of those are good and far away from any yards we have across the lower 48.
What happened to the good loads? Most of the Hersey, Alcon, JJ, Unilver, PG and Kraft contracts are still there, Alcon and Unilver to a lesser extent it would seem but nonetheless, still there?
The simple answer, again: IF they're not on the back of a 67/68 truck, they're on a train.

I've not seen anything remotely resembling a load over 1,500 miles since January. I'm a driver that can easily push 650-670 in a truck that only does 62 mph in a single serving, and I can do it 6 days in a row.
I am very cooperative and try to do as many favors as I can in the hopes that it will be returned.
I hold myself in a professional manner, dress and act accordingly especially with customers.
Do I deserve to starve for miles?

You see where I'm going with this?

 

I started the academy on July 9th, 2012 and my hire date was July 26th. If the one year is based on that hire date, then I have completed it. I don't want to go anywhere else, but I can't seem to be getting the runs I want. I call the planners, but I'm not having as much luck as other drivers. I should mention that I am a lease operator. I definitely make more money than when I was a company driver. I could make even more money, but I don't try to drive 700 miles a day. A 2500 mile week for me is just fine. I have no bills and live in my truck, so I can handle lots of slow time with no issues. I just got off a 3500 mile week and the settlement was nice, but I neither need nor want to do that every week. My only complaint is that I can't get to the areas I want to on a regular basis. For example, it took 10 weeks to get back home. I live in Florida, and it's hard to get here. I know where the runs are that come here, but I can't seem to get to those areas on the right days to get the loads that come here. It's crazy. Now that my year is complete, I plan to go to Lancaster and talk to whomever I need to in order to see if there is something I can do to get a more regular load schedule. If not, I will look to another company for some sort of dedicated deal. As a lease operator with FFE, or any company for that matter, I know that I can make close to $100K a year and not work hard (and that's solo, without being a trainer or team driver). I have figured out what it's going to take to do that. The challenge is finding who I need to talk to at FFE to make it happen.

I will have more to add later, but I wanted to make a few observations now concerning this past year.

1. The 6 week training will suck more than anything you have ever experienced. Sure, you could be one of the few who gets a human being for a trainer, but don't count on it. Plan on getting someone who "runs that truck" and only cares about miles and putting money in his pocket. Of course, the academy will tell you otherwise, but I PROMISE you that most trainers only care about the money. They don't give a **** about you. My advice is to play dumb, pretend you know nothing, and just accept the abuse.

2. The road service department is fine if you are a company driver, but if you lease, they suck. I have paid for many repairs out of my own pocket and then had to go to the leasing department to take the money out of my maintenance account.

3. If the batteries on your truck go bad, DO NOT replace them with gel batteries (which is what Freightliner uses). Only use lead acid batteries. They are cheaper and don't fail as quickly.

4. If you go to the northeast, prepare to wait for a load. Sure, sometimes you get lucky and don't wait long. Other times you can wait for days and days and days. In June I waited 3 days in Detroit for a load. I went to Detroit thinking that I would easily get a load coming from Canada. Wrong. Wrong. Wrong.

5. I have not been to NYC. During my second week I went from TX to Lynn, MA. It sucked, but I did it. I wouldn't think it's a big deal if I had to do it now.

6. Never, never, never trust Peoplenet's Navigo unless you are going to a large DC or some place you know FFE trucks go to often. If they send you to a place you have never heard of, use Google Maps, Bing Maps and/or Mapquest to verify the address is correct. If you are going into a large city, use the preview function of Navigo and look at the route Navigo is taking you. Use a map program with satellite view to go through the route street by street. Make sure Navigo is not screwing you. Sure, you don't have to do this, but I promise you that once you have to back out of a residential, or you drive an hour out of your way only to find an empty field where a DC should be, you will start following my advice. Once you can afford it, buy a trucker's GPS as an added backup. One more thing. Peoplenet reboots on its own every now and then. If that happens when you are in the middle of a city during rush hour and you are relying on Navigo for directions, you're SCREWED.

7. FYI, there are at least 250 lease trucks. I know this because I had to pick up my new registration and I counted the number of envelopes in the box. That's 250 other drivers calling the planners trying to get the best loads. You can still make money, just understand that you have to work for it.

I have more to add, but that's it for now.

If you attended the class that started July 9th, and you're still with FFE, please respond. I would like to know how many people made it this far.

 

One more thing. 10 weeks ago I was at the Walmart DC in Arcadia, FL and I talked to a company trainer. He was one of the people who started this thread. I forgot his screen name. If you read this, please let me know who you are again.

 

LOL. We met twice. Once in Lancaster when you were doing laundry back in July or August of 2012, and then again at Cargill Plainview in September. You were going to Detroit and I was going to Lynn, MA.

I wish you luck. Did you end of going to Roehl?

 

Wow...talk about a FFE apologizer. Dude I was the last student my trainer was allowed to train for FFE and he is still there, by the way. Indeed, he is a lease operator. As a matter of fact, he called me the other day for me to route him from the Laredo terminal to Salem, OR. He always calls me for routes, because I'm good at it and he knows it because I did all the routing when I was on his truck. This wasn't my first dog and pony show dude, as I had driven before and he saw that I could still drive immediately. Hence, I drove the night shift and he took the day shift. Not to mention also that I was the high scorer in our refresher class because I didn't forget how to drive like most of the others.

Moreover, there were other things I didn't mention, like they tried at first to stick me in an old 09 Century that was covered in dog fir and then when I protested, the guy pitched a fit until he found out that I used to drive, then all of a sudden he was relieved and was much nicer. Apparently someone put him up to it and now he had an excuse for not getting me in that truck.

Apparently, some higher up didn't like my hairdo or the way I looked or something and decided to screw with me. I think I know who it was, but I don't want to mention names. Thus, I had nothing but night loads for the first two and a half months, with the exception of one daytime load that was already late. It was a two pickup load with one stop, but because the load was already a day late, they moved me to the back of the line at both places. Hence, it took me all day, and then I handed it off to another driver who took it to the receiver, since I didn't have the hours.

Anyway, the following day, I begged them for a load all day long because I was desperately trying to get back on days. However, after telling me all day that they were working on it, they finally sent me a load at approximately 18:00. I had to pickup a load at the Hershey facility in Edwardsville, IL in the morning, but not before getting a trailer washout. I was at the Loves in Jasper, AL at the time. Of course, they new I had been up all day asking for loads, which is why they deliberately once again gave me an all nighter.

In any event, I could care less what you believe dude because it is obvious you are going to apologize for them no matter what, but all my friends over there knew what was going on because we talked constantly by phone, and, by the way, none of my friends ever had any all night loads and were perplexed by the fact that all my trips were all nighters. By the way, I also put my truck in the shop 4 times during that time to get the opti-idle fixed, and each time they fixed it. However, within a day or two, it would stop working again. In any event, once they put me in a brand new truck, all of a sudden the night loads ended. I guess they couldn't afford an accident in a brand new truck. Just guessing.

Actually, I originally had a sweet load going to Salt Lake City, UT, but right before I picked it up, they cancelled it and gave me that crappy load instead. Anyway, when I was picking up the load, there was a ton of other FFE trucks at the same place all picking up loads too, and they were all lease operators. Thus, it was obvious what happened. They pulled my sweet load and gave it to one of the lease operators.

Nevertheless, my new DM who I had never talked to before other than via the Peoplenet thought it would be cool to let me T-call my load after ignoring me for two days and then put a team load going to Ridgewood, NY on me. Of course, since he was my new DM, he was unaware that I was intimately familiar with Ridgewood, NY, since I had already been there twice before. So I sent him that message and he called me back to attempt to ridicule me. However, he had never dealt with me before and didn't know what he was getting into. Anyway, let's just say that the conversation between us didn't quite go the way he anticipated and he ended up pulling the load off of me the following day. The guy was/is a loser, which is why he works for FFE, because no one else obviously will hire that moron. When you are at FFE, you are at the very bottom of the barrel indeed.

I had to stay on their ##### for over sixth months. I never gave up! Otherwise, they would have ripped me off. Let me deduct $270 from your paycheck for no reason and see how you like it!

Being in a truck with another person dude is torture. Moreover, having to drive an average of 640 miles sundown to sun up almost every night is torture, as the most I can sleep during the day is 3 hours, but in a moving truck that had the air bags under the sleeper blown up, it was considerably less. Thankfully, they finally let me go solo after 5 miserable weeks. It was overkill, but anyway my trainer was claiming that he was making $3200 to $3300 a week while I was on his truck. I don't know, but that's what he said.

Apparently, you are naive as hell when it comes to FFE. You must be one of those brown nosers. Yep...that's what you are. By the way, I could go into far more detail and also say a lot more, but hell I don't like to type that much. Anyway, I did my year and now I have a much better job at Crete making a hell of a lot more money.