A GMAN question
 

or any other old timer. I was talking to the head of orientation of the company I work for today. He asked me how it was going etc. Well to make a long story short I mentioned how I felt about the HHG pay. He then proceeded to tell me that's what the company is paid based on and started telling me how HHG pay came about. He said something about the government used to pay trucking companies to move people for whatever reason and that guys use to sit in truck stops and jack up their trucks and let the miles add up without any real wear or tear on their trucks. Hence the government instituted this whole thing.

Sounds like a crock of ... to me but I was wondering if their was any truth in this whole thing or if you knew how this whole racket of HHG came about?

Thank you.

That is a really nice story.

I'll put it next to "Three littles pigs", and title it "Big Fat Greedy Corp. Hog"

That system was made to benifit shipping companies with higher profits by shorting the driver.

That being said, it has been in place for so long, it's just considered the norm. It's a part of the truck driving world.....I would preferr practical miles instead.

Of course now, I get paid by the load.

Re: A GMAN question
 

there is some truth there. It was originally established by the Department of Defense to calculate the cost to move service members. Here is a little article about HHG, Practical, and Hub miles.
http://www.etrucker.com/apps/news/article.asp?id=17675

Very interesting, thank you very much. What's more, in my original post I didn't add that the guy told me that practical miles are only about 3 percent more than HHG. I thought it was more than that but per this article it seems about right. Well it's always good to learn something new.
Thanks again.

Yes, the HHG system originated with the military and moving GI's and their families. They still use it today. It's anyones guess as to how many drivers actually sat in truck stops spinning up the odometers.

no problem :)

The reason HHG and rand mcnally miles are still paid today IS NOT to short the driver or rip him off in any way. Its about competition for freight. If you are paid HHG miles, the company is being paid HHG miles too by the customer. It seems many drivers think the company is charging the customer hub miles, paying the driver HHG miles and just pocketing the rest. Thinking its all some big conspiracy so the CEOs can get a new yacht. Simply put it goes like this. Company A bids for freight with 600 paractical miles.....Company bid comes in and bids for freight with 560 HHG miles.....>Who gets the freight?
Personally, Im convinced if everyone went to paractical miles, just as many people would still be griping that practical miles is still not hub miles.

A little side story for you Cluggy on the same subject of miles, I think you will like.
I "inadvertantly accidently" lied to a driver yesterday. Yep Me, a recruiter who prides himself on being honest actually lied......
I had a job opened up yesterday. Local day cab job which actually paid Hub miles. (first job Ive seen like that) I told the driver about the job. Was honest about the pay. I then told him he would be running about a 150-200 mile radius of his area and home every night. ( just an educated guess). he was excited about the job and I set him up for an interview. About two hours later, I get a call from the manager over that account who interviewed him. He was laughing and told me everything was going great with the interview and all of a sudden the driver stood up and started cussing about me lying to him and stormed out. I couldnt figure out what I could have possibly lied about and called the driver back. After being cussed out for a moment I finally got him to calm down and tell me. It seems when I told him he would be running 150-200 mile radius, it was more like a 200-250 mile radius. Keep in mind, this was still a daycab job. Home everynight and off every weekend. For some reason the driver didnt like the fact that he would be getting a few more HUB MILES than I originally told him......Go figure :D

What??? You lied??? Who Figured? (recruitors do this from time to time, kinda like this story....)

As far as companies using miles to bid for contracts, bid whatever you want. But pay your drivers the miles they drive. By the way, I always knew JB was shaving my miles. 10 % my a$$. More like 20%, and then you Fu@# have the nerve to blame the drivers.

Of course, I made post like these before...........

HHG, Hub or practical miles.

Probably 99% of all shipments are figured on the HHG basis.

After that it is a company playing with the numbers to get drivers.
Some hub and practical companies will pay less per mile and HHG companies will pay more but in the end the driver makes about the same.

There are exceptions to this and you will just have to look at it and compare on a one on one basis.

Every company out there budgets what they are going to pay their drivers and only have so much revenue to do it with, the only thing here is the method in how they make the numbers work.

This is an issue that drivers always get bent out of shape over, be in reality it should be a non-issue. For all those drivers that say they are driving 20% more than what they are getting paid, they don't know how to plan a route very well.

Yes, I made a mistake and lied. The horror, I actually told the driver he would be getting LESS miles than he actually would. The horror....How dare I tell the driver his paycheck would be SMALLER. No wonder he got mad and hung up. Why would someone want a bigger paycheck. More money could mean more headache. :roll:

As far as the "shaving miles" thing. It just isnt true. We pay our drivers rand Mcnally miles and we charge our customer rand mcnally miles. You were always paid for every mile we charged our customer.