Unload your own truck at Swift?

[truckingtiger]

I spoke with someone at the school in Memphis today who said that drivers unload your own trucks. Is this true? I dont mind helping unload, but I dont want to have to unload 40K pounds of freight alone. What gives here? Do you have reimbursement if you hire a lumper to do it?

[Lunker]

At Interstate, some loads require driver to take load to the tail, some loads driver assist hand unload, most loads are power on/off. One load I did had 4 stops, 700 cartons and it all had to go to the tail end on roller racks because customers had no docks. I got paid $40 for the first stop and $10 each for the next 3. My back was killing me by the end of the day. I'll never accept one of those again. Another customer we have to hand unload is windows, but that one pays $40 for every stop. You can make quite a bit of extra $$$ if there's a lot of stops. As for hiring lumpers, that all depends on what the customer will pay for and whether or not the receiver has a union on the docks or will let you unload. Some receivers require the driver to have proof of liability insurance in case the driver has an accident on their dock. No insurance means you don't get unloaded until you pay the lumpers. Just be sure that if you unload, you're ready to break down the load per receivers requirements. That can take many hours by yourself.

[VitoCorleone99]

Whenever there's a Swift truck at a dock next to me, the driver is sitting on his butt just like everyone else.

[truckingtiger]

Whenever there's a Swift truck at a dock next to me, the driver is sitting on his butt just like everyone else.

Whew! That is a relief! LOL. Im good at butt sitting.

[bandits44x]

I knew a guy that worked for Swift about 2 years ago. He had a dedicated account delivering tires to Sears. He had to tailgate the load...but they paid him to do so. He was pretty happy, it got him home on weekends, and he got some exercise. I would guess that most of Swift's loads you dont have to touch though.

[truckingtiger]

I dont mind doing it, I justed to know what I was getting myself into.

[VitoCorleone99]

I dont mind doing it, I justed to know what I was getting myself into.

The vast majority of dry van freight is unloaded by the customer. In the case of a dedicated account, things are sometimes a little different. Grocery warehouses and some DC (a few WalMarts, e.g.) will require either the driver to unload or a lumper to be hired. In the case of WalMart, the customer and the lumper are one and the same. As far as I know, all of the major companies will pay the lumper. Swift could be an exception, but I doubt it.

On the choice between unloading or paying a lumper, my company has made its priorities pretty clear. We get $17.50 an hour with a two hour minimum. Since I have yet to see a load of this type that would even come close to taking two hours, they are willing to pay me $35 to unload. The lumpers will charge anywhere from $40 to well over $100, depending on the freight. The company pays this higher amount without hesitation. Therefore, I am 100% convinced that having me unload freight is not on their list of priorities.

Edit to add: Lately I would estimate that 80% of the loads don't even involve going to a dock. I roll in with a loaded trailer, drop it, hook to an empty, and leave. (Reverse the process when picking up.)

[TruckerChris]

I only unloaded 1 one load by myself @ gordon and only a couple with assistance... The one I had to do alone sucked. It was a load of gatorade that toppled over somewhere between Oakland,CA and Long Beach,CA. I had to restack the pallets, then pull them up a slight uphill with an old pallet jack... I did get paid like 90 bucks to do it, but thats only a fraction of what gordon would of paid a lumper...

Chris

[YoungZ.W.]

The Swift recruiter told my class that they had a policy were the driver either had to do a hand load or unload once a week.

[Double R]

The Swift recruiter told my class that they had a policy were the driver either had to do a hand load or unload once a week.

WHAT??????????
That is the dumbest policy that I ever heard. OTR drivers should drive, that's it. Customer loads and unloads unless you are a dedicated account and are PAID well to do it(not $25 for a whole trailer). That is a BS policy!

[Uturn2001]

Must be something "new" at Swift.

When I was there drivers were told to expect to unload one trailer per week on the OTR solo fleet. It was just how it figured out.

When I was there they did tend to whine a little when you hired lumpers, but I never seen or heard of them refusing to do so if there were lumpers on site. They would not, however, bring in outside help to off load a trailer.

[beeiatch]

The only ones you will have to do are tire loads which are driver assist, yeah right, you roll 900+ tires out of the trailer while the "assister" stacks them in the designated pile, (whoo real hard).

The other one is when you go to some grocery warehouse in Pennsy and have to unload and re-palletize Orowheat cookies, takes about 8 hours. never done it but I heard from many drivers about that load from Hell.

It is mostly 85% drop and hook and the rest are live unloads, which if you require a lumper they have no problem paying for it.

I don't remember when I had to phsyically unload a load, it's been too long ago.

[YoungZ.W.]

WHAT??????????
That is the dumbest policy that I ever heard. OTR drivers should drive, that's it. Customer loads and unloads unless you are a dedicated account and are PAID well to do it(not $25 for a whole trailer). That is a BS policy!


Yeah, I thought it was a little fishy. He said the reason for it was that way the driver was guaranteed at least an $80 accesory pay for it each week. 2 guys from my class go to Swift, and left rather quickly, but I never did ask whether it was true or not. The one guy said that when he was with his trainer that they made them take a Target dedicated run which was a hand unload. Another thing is he had to pay a lumper $320 for an unload one time, and coincidently Swifty lost his recipt but said he would still get paid for it which was untrue.

[rvrjr7]

wow i wouldnt last a week at swift. the first time they told me i had to unload a trailer id tell them im not a f@#$%^& lumper

[steelhauler2007]

Alot of companies would rather pay a lumper to unload.This way there isn't a chance of the driver getting hurt.The driver can rest while waiting to be unloaded.I have never had to unload a flatbed,don't have lumpers hanging around flatbeds either.Once in a while there might be someone that wants to tarp your load for you.

[VitoCorleone99]

Yeah, I thought it was a little fishy. He said the reason for it was that way the driver was guaranteed at least an $80 accesory pay for it each week.

Okay, time for a quick recruiting lesson. When they start saying, "Oh and you get this and you get that and then you add it all up and the money is pretty good," they're lying. Your miles are the only thing you can rely on, and even those won't always be reliable.

The Stevens guy was at my school in Detroit a couple of summers ago. He was telling people that they could stop by trucking schools with their trainers and show their trucks to students, earning $50 from his recruiting budget each time. Do that twice a week - there's $100. And they could "help" unload a trailer three times a week - there's $150. It was a load of crap and anyone who bought into it was a sucker. They try to cover for the fact that they pay $300 a week or whatever it is for training.

[BIG JEEP on 44's]

Yeah, I thought it was a little fishy. He said the reason for it was that way the driver was guaranteed at least an $80 accesory pay for it each week.

Okay, time for a quick recruiting lesson. When they start saying, "Oh and you get this and you get that and then you add it all up and the money is pretty good," they're lying. Your miles are the only thing you can rely on, and even those won't always be reliable.

The Stevens guy was at my school in Detroit a couple of summers ago. He was telling people that they could stop by trucking schools with their trainers and show their trucks to students, earning $50 from his recruiting budget each time. Do that twice a week - there's $100. And they could "help" unload a trailer three times a week - there's $150. It was a load of crap and anyone who bought into it was a sucker. They try to cover for the fact that they pay $300 a week or whatever it is for training.

That's like companies that dance around the pay per mile question with answers like you could earn this much in a year ,But don't want to show the pay scale that allegedly creates that yearly income, Because it's only like .26 CPM and not going to go up much for years and years ,And .26 cPM at 100k is only 26k not 45k ...And I don't care how eager you are to run freight you're not going to make 45k at .26 cpm as a solo driver as it would require about 185k miles a year .

[YoungZ.W.]

That's like companies that dance around the pay per mile question with answers like you could earn this much in a year ,But don't want to show the pay scale that allegedly creates that yearly income, Because it's only like .26 CPM and not going to go up much for years and years ,And .26 cPM at 100k is only 26k not 45k ...And I don't care how eager you are to run freight you're not going to make 45k at .26 cpm as a solo driver as it would require about 185k miles a year


Yeah, your right on that big jeep. After talking to drivers at some companies and asking what their weekley mileage is it doesn't come close to what the recruiters have told me. I looked into a dedicated account for schneider pulling for Wal-mart here in Ohio. The recruiter said I would easily make $35,000 my first year. So, I go over to pumpkindriver.com to get the real deal. They all confirmed that the pay is no where close to what she told me. They start you out a .28 per mile and that account averages 1400-1800 miles per week plus your stop pay. One schneider driver I meet at truck stop that was working on it said he made more money delivering pizzas then driving on that account. It seems as though recruiters in general well say anything anymore just to get a driver in the door. When it comes to finding out about a company the only source I trust is fellow drivers. Well, not all recruiters but most of the recruiters for the large carriers anyway

[DD60]

That's like companies that dance around the pay per mile question with answers like you could earn this much in a year ,But don't want to show the pay scale that allegedly creates that yearly income, Because it's only like .26 CPM and not going to go up much for years and years ,And .26 cPM at 100k is only 26k not 45k ...And I don't care how eager you are to run freight you're not going to make 45k at .26 cpm as a solo driver as it would require about 185k miles a year


Yeah, your right on that big jeep. After talking to drivers at some companies and asking what their weekley mileage is it doesn't come close to what the recruiters have told me. I looked into a dedicated account for schneider pulling for Wal-mart here in Ohio. The recruiter said I would easily make $35,000 my first year. So, I go over to pumpkindriver.com to get the real deal. They all confirmed that the pay is no where close to what she told me. They start you out a .28 per mile and that account averages 1400-1800 miles per week plus your stop pay. One schneider driver I meet at truck stop that was working on it said he made more money delivering pizzas then driving on that account. It seems as though recruiters in general well say anything anymore just to get a driver in the door. When it comes to finding out about a company the only source I trust is fellow drivers. Well, not all recruiters but most of the recruiters for the large carriers anyway

Some of the lifestyle apologists that drive for that wage and/OR give their time away for free might disagree with you. Not to mention that pizza delivery drivers are home every night also.

[BigBird01]

Not sure where everyone got there info at. But I worked for swift for 2 years. Just quit on Nov 5th. And in that 2 years I think I only unloaded about 4 loads. So the one a week thing is bogus... There are some dedicated accounts exp.. Dollar General, Sears Tires and so on that you DO UNLOAD but you get paid to do these. Regular OTR you might see some but not as many as you are being told unless things have changed that much in 2 months but I doubt it. BOL