Why I HATE Plus1

It seems to be the new way to weed out less than intelligent drivers.
Perhaps.
Because accepting most pplans in the Plus-1 system will get you a service failure if you do a proper pre-trip each morning, or take the required 30 minute break, or be slowed down by the many construction zones or rush hour traffic.
Any number of things that take longer than the computer deems acceptable in running balls-to-the-wall.

But I still don't get why the mentors are not explaining things to the new drivers.
They are the ones with experience in this system, so why aren't they passing that information along?

Is there an unwritten rule in mentor training?

 

my mentor only taught me a little but we also used mac 30 for most loads, he would tell me to calc the time we would need to do the load and if we cant then put the times we can.

I normally look at a pre plan and I will calculate the miles by 50mph avg plus a little extra time like you said for other things, if I cant make it in that then I wont do it or I will do my mac 9 and add a couple hours to the drop. I am still 100% on time so I assume im doing something correct.... I hear a lot of drivers talk about service failures and some will claim its not their fault etc. To me if you got a failure then it was your fault somewhere along the line, rather it was accepting the load and not planning it well or just taking too long to get somewhere. There will be times where a road might shut down on you, a big accident causes hours delay but I always do a mac 22 if something like that happens, I have been late 3 times 2 of them only being minutes and 1 being over a hour from an accident but they did not give me the failures when I did the 22 and explained the situations.

 

I've had 3 service failures.
2 were my fault. I overslept.

The other one, I was 10 miles away and got in accident traffic. It just stopped. A truck exiting from a scale got into it with a car.
I sent a Mac22 while I was stopped, but I got a SF anyway.
It was a JIT load.

But I've been 'late' on many loads. Usually the Mac22 covers it because I've had a good reason for being late.
That might be a late dispatch, having to find an mt, weather...
And sometimes it is a Plus-1 late - late on the dispatch time, but not outside the customers' window.

 

the accident wasnt enough reason to avoid a SF? Seems a bit ridiculous

 

I thought so too.
But Swift didn't.


A number on a page, and one that really did me no harm.
I have maintained a good on-time ratio, and that is what really counts.

 

Moose, as far as your Mentor question, yes, us that really know about it, to teach it, but keep in mind, we have mentors out here with less than 1 year exp, and some of them do not even really know about it. I have ran into drivers out here, 1 years, and have never heard about it.

 

I think plus1 is easier for Swift veterans to understand and to manipulate because we know how things worked under the old system, and we also know that there are usually pickup and delivery windows to work within.
I suggest that you call or message your DL if you have any doubt that you can legally pickup or deliver at the times shown in a preplan. A good DL should help you by letting you know if there is more time on the preplan than what you see, and help you make the decision to accept or decline the plan.

 

Steve, we can do that. It is if turning down to do hours, they want a eta for either pu or del

 

PLUS1=+1 headache a week.

 

Swift is not the only place that has this issue. It's annoying for sure.