Your Thoughs on working for ABF

Heard Con-Way especially gets shafted with dockwork. I guess I lucked out. I average between 30 min to 1 hour a week for dockwork at the very most. Usually because I go from Terminal A to Terminal C, and make a quick stop to drop off/add on a pallet in between at Terminal B. Doing anything more than one hour is super rare for most of us.

We have exclusive dock workers for the same reason some terminals have exclusive yard hostlers... they get crap done waaaaay faster than any of us.

 

Don't worry too much about it mate. These threads will get hijacked a number of times before anything relevant will come out. I am surprised ACH1130's name didn't pop up on what kind of sandwich his better half made him when he was sick. We usually have to comb through half a dozen pages. It is just the way it goes here. On a side note: most LTL is all the same anyway, I am sure NightWind will find something useful on here to get a general idea of the LTL field.

We are huge minority on TTR, we are all friends here

 

i am guilty of responding out of boredom sometimes due to being on the computer all day at work I'll quickly glance through the thread,usually during long hold times when calling insurances or mdo i can see how an inaccurate response could be irritating to others

 

I would not go as far as to say irritating, more perplexed, don"t be beating yourself up over it, not the end of the world stuff. As far as your other post (# 167). That would be the rite move, hell it"s what i"m doing here, but as far as "the good stuff" goes you"ll want the bad to, but don"t get it twisted, as there is always good & bad in all of it depending on the persons point of view.

 

Anyone out there familiar with the A.B.F. N.Y. hub, specifically the Long Is. Bayshore hub?.Also mentioned was Con-Way, witch is literally rite next door to A.B.F. an O.D is somewhere close buy to, and U.P.S.,is rite down the road from me in Farmingdale N.Y., i"m next town south of it. Union or not, not particular, just want to work, and mentioned it in other post, the manger at A.B.F. said " start me on the dock to see work ethic than school in PA.. Thought maybe i could get work rite away without c.d.l., and from what i understand people can start there. Either way i got a school lined up, apply"d to, and if all goes rite will have c.d.l. in hand by end of March. 8 week course a.c.c.s.c., an p.t.d.i. cred.. On a side note (trolling here ) anyone familiar with Commercial Driver Training in west Babylon, N.Y...? Put a thread up on it in schools forum about 3 weeks ago an no bites.

 

As far as ABF's school, I was hired for the city driver training school about a month ago. I leave Sunday to start the school which is in Ft. Smith Arkansas. From what I know so far, road drivers are the only ABF drivers that dont do dock work. Most new guys I've met do more dock/yard work than driving at first. Doesn't matter to me as it all pays the same.

With YRC voting no to an extension of their contract today, things could change drastically. First, if YRC closes it's doors like they said they would, there will be a lot more freight headed to other LTL carriers which could lead to a bigger need for drivers. The bad thing is there will be a lot more experienced drivers looking for new jobs making it tough for a newbie to get hired on with a LTL carrier. Thankfully I'm already hired.

 

Ive been considering moving and throwing my name in the hat on a linehaul, if hired do you start on extra board? i would like 55 to 60 hours a week, is that doable from the beginning?

 

If you can get on at the babylon terminal without getting your cdl that would be the best route... Since you will literally go thru a whole cdl training school at fort smith and could save the money out of pocket

 

The money for the school will be from the W.I.A. grant. And have been on the list since mid Dec.,the next class start is Jan. 20., and i have stayed in contact with the person who i guess you could say decides who will be in that class, told me to call back on the 13th, hope that"s a good sign, i think if i already had the cdl in hand it would better my position, that being said i fully expect that they would still put me thru a training program and i"m good with that, would prefer it, yes i have the 4 years ex. but that was long ago with a company called Westbury Transport, did the home delivery & distribution for NewMark & Lewis, don"t know how old you are so you might not know of them, but probably know some one who does. You are the second guy to mention that Ft. Smith location, i"m wondering why the suit i talked to said i would be sent to PA. for training?

 

Ya you'll start on extra board. You should stat fairly busy, not to say there won't be some slow weeks. So on your good weeks, bank all you can to help cover your slow weeks. Try to live lean and mean for your first couple years.

Since we're paid by the mile and hour, the hours worked weekly is moot. I average about 2300 miles and 5 paid hours a week. I say as a new guy you'll average about 60k. My first year I made right at 60k, and that was 2005. Each year I made more. For 2013 I grossed 81k. And I'm one of the lazy drivers. There are drivers behind me in seniority that made 90k.

Hope that helps.