Werner's Training.

That's a good question I wonder that myself.

 

If i am not mistaken it is $10 to get one. You have to go to their website to order one i think. Maybe could do it via cc too--not real sure.

 

2nd career: Werner is a good company to work for. You cant believe all that is being said on these forums. Some may be accurate, but there is no perfect company to work for. I worked for them for almost 1 1/2 years, and I have been thinking about returning, actually I have had my application approved. Good luck with career.

 

got my cdl in 2004 but only drove for about 3 mths.went to driving straight truck doing expediting.tried it again in 06 for 4 mths but they couldn't get me enough miles to make a good paycheck (300-350 pr week) so went back to expediting us and canada.made very good money last year,home most nites and weekends off.that gravytrain came to an end last month due to the economy so now looking to go back to big trucks,starting w/werner mon.looked at a lot of companies,maverick was 1st choice but they are saying hiring freeze until 1st of the year.other companies would hire if i got a refresher course.couldn't find one that made any sense.not going to pay $4000.00 for 40 hr refresh,so werner it is. hope not everything i've seen on here is true.

 

Also considering werner, need a pet policy, wonder if anyone knows how its been lately. thx.

 

Truly I don't care what company you go to ,you will find fault at all if you look for it. But when your new and need experience , you set your sight on that and just do your best and give it your all. You will find bad trainers in any company, and some companies have more then others. Never jump a truck because of one, but do call your company and request a new trainer if you are having problems. Keep a positive attitude. If you think negative you will never meet your goal. How you veiw your training and learning experience, and there is alot to learn( Even experienced drivers learn new things. )can make you or break you. This is the time you discover if this is really the job for you!

 

You are allowed 1 free Dac report a year!! No cost. Off hand I do not have the address tho where you submit for it.

 

Well I just left werner about a month ago went to the orientation in ATL 2 days of just basically filling out paper work peeing in a cup and watching some video slides. I started orientation on a weds got a trainer on saturday. Everything was ok untill I found that my trainer Liked to not use the wind shield wipers talk on his head set and try and read text messages while driving not to mention bumble around for his reading glasses, at in the hills of west virginia in the rain. But my training was mediocor at best they require that you log at least 30 back ups during your training and keep paper logs for at least 2 wks. i was only required 275 hrs but i guess it all depends on what they are looking for at the time. The pay was decent I chose the pier diem during training and got around 375-400 a week wether you were rolling or not. other than the way too comfortable trainer not too bad I heard if you can make it 6 monthes wih werner you can make it period.

 

Werner doesn't make sure you know how to back by the time you are done with their training period. If you're lucky, you'll get a trainer who is actually willing and competent enough to teach you if you don't already know how to back. My advice would be for your friend to make sure he goes to a good CDL course that will teach him how to back properly. Also, if possible, he needs to make sure he has some cash saved away so he has the freedom to jump ship if Werner sticks him with one of their many psychopathic trainers.

As for driving in general, I find it calming, but others don't. It's not really a matter of the job being stressful or not as much as it is a matter of how different people react to different things. The only thing that's stressful about trucking is the people in the trucking industry. With some exceptions, the people are flat out manipulative and dishonest. That includes everyone from management on down to other truckers.

Now for the stuff about Werner's "training".

"Werner Training" is an oxymoron. Their safety people say all the right things during orientation as far as running legal, proper maintenance, standard safety practices, etc., but Werner does little-to-nothing to guarantee that their trainers are even minimally competent in executing, let alone teaching, that material.

When it came to logging hours, both of my trainers were a mixture of clueless and dishonest. Neither knew exactly which line to log their hours except in the most obvious circumstances. Also, they both tried to make me cheat my logs in the few cases where it's still possible to do so (eg. logging "off duty" in traffic jams). It's one thing to inform students how many, if not most, drivers get extra miles by breaking the law, but it is completely unacceptable for "trainers" to force students to do things illegally.

Neither of them EVER maintained the proper following distance or managed their speed properly in traffic. In cities, my first trainer would regularly tailgate within 1 second because he thought the traffic that merged in front of him was putting him too far behind schedule. His "normal" following distance was 2-3 seconds. Another thing he would do was speed up to intentionally try to prevent people from changing lanes. When he failed, he'd throw a fit about being "cut off". My second trainer didn't tailgate, but even he only kept a 4-5 second following distance and would get upset if I didn't do the same.

One of my trainers had no idea what solid white or yellow lines meant. He also sped whenever he could and would throw a fit if I didn't do the same (I was costing him money).

One of my trainers said it was illegal to drive under 45 mph on the highway even in extremely low visibility, slippery roads, etc.

This is only a very tiny fraction of the incompetent garbage they tried to "train" me with.

The things I mentioned above are very simple things that would be impossible for trainers to not be competent at doing if Werner was selecting and evaluating them properly. The worst part is that it is next to impossible to prove that your trainer is completely incompetent without recording what goes on in the truck. Oh btw... recording that stuff happens to be against company policy... how convenient.

I read posts like this before I started driving and I said that there was no way it could be that bad. It is that bad. At Werner, the inmates run the asylum because there is no legitimate process in place to verify that the trainers know what they are doing. I'm not sharpshooting my trainers for a couple of minor mistakes they made. These are a few of the major mistakes that they made every single day and tried to force me to make. If the government had a pair, they would fine Werner out the ying-yang and even consider shutting them down until they got their affairs in order. Werner's "training" is dangerous and an absolute disgrace.

The bright side is that training ends eventually and if you're smart enough to figure out how to do things correctly in spite of your trainers, you'll be good to go once you get your own truck.

EDIT: Sorry... should've looked at the date of the OP. Too late now!