UPS Team OTR

The brown feeder tucks are owned by UPS. The white sleeper trucks are all leased by UPS. They will lease them for 250,000 miles and then get a new one. Guess its cheaper to do it that way. That is also why they are white and not brown, because we don't own them and too expensive to paint a truck that will only be used for a year.

 

Pay: $33.79 an hour at peak scale. Take 4 years to reach peak scale. Mileage is $.70 a mile, but 80% of the work is hourly. I make about $35 an hour, because of extra pay for pulling double 45's and triples. Most Feeder drivers will make $90k to 130K. This contract has 3 years left and we will make $35 an hour base pay at the end. With my bonus pay I'll be close to $36 an hour.

Rules: By the book on DOT and HOS. Violating hos of service is a big no no. Never been pushed to go over hours. Union rules vary from local to local, so it's hard to be specific. Biggest is runs are bid out yearly and are awarded by seniority. Seniority rules can vary from local to local. For example; I came out of packages and my seniority carried over to feeders. In other areas drivers would start out at the bottom of seniority in feeders. I have 25 full-time years and thats how I bid. If I had been in Utah or other areas I would only 3 years of Feeder seniority since I've only been a Feeder driver for 3 years.

Benefits: Never met anyone with better benefits. Free health insurance. I pay nothing each month for my insurance. No deductible. Cap at $2000 per year out of pocket then it all free. Honestly never have come close to that until this year. My wife has breast cancer so lots of nickle and dime bills. However, insurance has paid out $300,000 so far for her treatments. Guess it will be close to a million by the time she better. Pension when we retire. Also, 401k which is not matched by UPS, because they donate so much to our pension.

Equipment: Lots of International, Mack, and Kenworth day cabs. Some twin screw others single. I have and International single axle. Love it. I just run between Northern Colorado and Denver. Sleeper trucks vary. They are all leased, so whatever the leasing comping gives us. I see lots of Freightliners.


I like UPS. There is nothing that compares to UPS in the trucking world. Walmart, Fedex are good, but still way behind us in pay and benefits. If you get hired by UPS make sure you know if it a temp job or a permanent job. Temp jobs can turn into permanent jobs, but most don't. Just make sure you are clear on what type of job it is before you quit your current job. Seen a few new drivers get burned on that.

 

Mileage pay 2015: Single trailer $0 .7873 Double trailers: $0.8045 Triple Trailers: $0.8212 a mile. Not sure what you mean by strict. UPS has its way and you MUST do it their way. Yes you do have to wear a uniform, no beards, clean shaven, etc. No its not that strict. Feeders is way better than packages for a accidents. I've seen a guy punch a hole in a trailer backing a dolly under it and only get a slap on the hand. Also, know a guy who rolled a set of triples and get his job back. Was suspended for 6 weeks, but they brought him back. Usually supervisor will ride with you for a day and go over safety stuff all day if its not too bad. Gets more harsh if you roll a trailer and its your fault.

All feeder jobs are posted at upsjobs.com. Most teams come from inside from other feeder drivers bidding those runs. They pay really well, so the guys with the team runs are usually very senior. Union rules apply so the person with the most seniority gets the run when its bid. Once he has the run he can then pick his teammate. Best advice I can give is to apply for any feeder jobs and get your foot in the door. Once you are hired then you can start bidding runs. Runs are bid yearly. Word of caution. Make sure you know what you are applying for; permanent or season feeder job. Seasonal will only last a few months around Christmas or during the summer and then you are laid off. Might hire you if they have an opening, but its rolling the dice.

 

In my opinion beards are actually very trendy now a days and mostly every men has beard which portray his matureness and I love it. There are many who love grooming beard. Its important to take immense care and useful sources to grow his beard properly.
In short beards and mustache can be attractive too. Beards are the contemporary part of the history and deals with a great royalty. Its been said that having a beard or a mustache is a sign of a real men.

 

I also hated working for UPS as well, for all the reasons that @browndawg mention, as well as what @brown5280 said. I got hired as a casual feeder driver off the street for one of their lager terminals when they needed more drivers to handle the Amazon account. I was the bottom man of over 250 drivers, so imagine how long it would take to build seniority. The bottom 30 drivers were basically on call. I came in with over 20 years experience and had a rough time doing it the UPS way. They even mentioned during orientation that experienced drivers have a harder time transitioning than drivers with a couple years experience, because their relatively inexperienced and more open minded to doing it the UPS way. I never really liked wearing their unform, and hated shaving my beard. They do micromanage you, and I started off on their old contract where the starting pay was $16 an hour. I really couldn't live off of $450-500 a week, and wait 4 years to reach top rate, because the bills needed to be paid now. So I left UPS to go back to LTL and worked for UPS Freight. UPS Freight was a lot better experience. The atmosphere is a lot more laid back, and even though you still had to wear the uniform, just the casual atmosphere was more than compensated for it. When you worked the docks, you didn't have to wear the uniform, which was a plus. And even though they also had no beard policy, it was never enforced because the Overnight drivers that transitioned over when UPS bought them out didn't have to abide by this policy, so their was no point in enforcing it. But again, their starting rate was also $16, and I couldn't live off of $450-500 a week. Even though I was much happier at UPS Freight as a P&D driver, I left that job to work for USPS and I couldn't be any happier.

A lot of people mentioned to me, you must of been crazy to leave UPS, but UPS isn't for everyone. If they had a liveable starting wage, I would of probably stayed with UPS Freight, where the linehaul drivers make just as much as the feeder drivers do. I hated working for UPS parcel, liked working for UPS Freight, and love working for USPS.

 

How do you pick which driver you want to team up with, let's say a non smoker, one who showers daily, keeps a clean truck etc..

 

Try asking?

 

Are you still there? How fast are the team trucks governed at? Do they hire a husband/wife team off the street or no?