Re: Newbie seeking information and advice.
- From: "tscottme" <blahblah@xxxxxxxx>
- Date: Fri, 15 Sep 2006 05:26:41 -0500
Please I beg you, don't concentrate on trucking companies with web sites and
rectuiters trolling the CDL schools. Yes' it's easier to click on web pages
and print details than to pick up the phone and scan the local yellow pages.
Please open the phone book and make phone calls to find out if companies
hire new CDL graduates and how many drivers they employ.
You sound pretty wise for someone about to take the plunge, better off than
90% of the school newbies that post in here. The typical post in here by
someone in your situation is "I just signed a 2 year agreement with Crooked
Trucking, Inc are they any good?"
Confining your search to big national trucking companies because they spend
the most effort trying to be known everywhere is a bit like looking for your
car keys only under the street light 2 blocks from your car because that's
where the light is.
A majority of trucking companies may not hire brand new CDL graduates, but
you shouldn't so easily resign yourself to working for just the better of
all the bad options. Every trucking company but a few is hiring drivers all
the time. If you just accept you have to work for a cookie cutter company
hiring disposable drivers you greatly increase your odds of generating a
workrecord that will only allow you to work for worse and worse companies.
Of those on your list, Schneider is the better company. However, they have
specific work rules and you may not fit them, or they may not fit you. You
would probably receive better training from Schneider as a new-hire than any
other trucking company. They did/do hire a lot of former military types.
My impression is that those drivers are happiest with SNI. There is a lot
to be said for working at a company with good experience hiring new drivers
and training them well. However, if SNI is not located near you, or their
home time, or other work conditions aren't suitable you would likely not do
well there. I run into a lot of experienced drivers that seem to think if
they complain enough a company will change, that's not likey. Much better
to contact drivers working for a local or regional company nearby and find
out their working conditions.
Keep an eye open for what non-national trucking company you keep seeing near
your home. Call them and see if they hire newbies and if they hire newbies
from your school. Some companies only accept newbies from certain schools
due to insurance restrictions. It is tough to do much research once school
starts as most schools will fill up your whole day. If you haven't got the
answers you need when school is over, don't take a job you aren't sure
about. Better to work at McDonald's for a few weeks, if necessary, and
choose carefully a trucking company.
Even if you do everything possible and know everything you want to know,
it's pretty common to work at your first company only a year. There are
certain work conditions that you won't know are important until you start
working. You may not know how to weigh one thing versus another thing. For
example, the company may have cheap and good health insurance but pay a
little less per mile or give you a truck model you wouldn't prefer. Or you
may not get home as often but be able to stay home longer when you do get
home. Some of this you can't know in advance, which tends to keep your
duration at the first company shorter than those that may follow.
A bad company can easily work you hard enough to cause an accident or work
you in such a way you feel compelled to quit early, which will make getting
job #2 more difficult.
All companies or recruiters will liely claim their drivers average 2500
miles a week and they are permitted in 48 states and Canada. You want to
get number of miles per week from current drivers and you want the recruiter
to tell you their primary traffic lanes, not where they have sent a truck
once every 9 months. I'd want to know that they reimburse all tolls, or
have toll cards to pay for toll roads. Do they prohibit you from taking
toll roads but expect you to meet a very tight schedule by driving through
people's driveways in the country to avoid the tolls? How long will you be
with a trainer if you are hired, how will you be paid during training? Are
you encouraged not to idle with bonuses or are you threatened with firing if
you don't meet anti-idle targets? I'd easily forgo any bonus if I had the
option to idle for comfort while sleeping.
A good thing to know about a company but the recruiter won't know is how
many long-term drivers do they have. Obviously, it's a good sign to see a
bunch of old drivers at a company if they are long-term employees. The
industry is rotten with high turnover, so a place with low turnover must be
doing something right.
Drivers complain as a hobby, so don't believe every complaint you here. If
you here the same compaints over and over, those are important. Hardly a
week goes by where I don't think I wish I was working somewhere else, but
that lasts for a hour or two and I still like my company.
--
Scott
In this war there are no noncombatants. Not only are we all military targets
in the eyes of our enemies, but we all take part in the fighting. Every
opinion we form and express, every conclusion and argument we make, and
particularly every vote we cast, influences our enemy and affects our
collective will. We need to be aware of this.--Owen Johnson
.
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