well started solo with swift about week and a half ago started out running ran 2400 miles in 7 days not bad i thought then they dh me 700 miles up to gary in said reposition but after a day they had me tcall a load from chicago to columbus oh 300 miles said it had to be there sat 12noon so got here 1130 sat dropped trl after six hrs sitting went in to see bout a load go figure they forgot to take the tcall off me so been wasting six hrs with load still attached to my trk finally got it off my back and now its sun 11.15 been here 24 hrs and yep still no load getting a little tired of hearing freight is slow maybe. so quite putting people threw school but it does not take long to see thats how they make there money when freight is yep slow. o yea forgot no one in the office works weekends they are home where its warm with there family's while we sit out here waiting for a load or yep again for freight to pick up . well guess I'm gone for now and sit for a load ha ha ha

 

This is just a slow time of year for freight. It should pick up in a couple of weeks or so.

 

Sitting sucks, but it is part of the OTR Lifestyle. Try to do something productive with the time off that you have like washing your clothes, going to Wal-Mart or a grocery store and re-stock your supplies, and get some rest. Ask the clerks at the truck stop if there are any movie theaters or shopping malls nearby. Sometimes, just getting away from sitting in your truck for hours on end helps to ease your mind. And if you know you are going to be there awhile (i.e. 34 hour restart) try to find a cheap motel room verses staying in your truck.

 

if you at the swift yard you a pretty close to hotels, shopping, movies...do anything to keep occupied instead of sitting in your truck. that is why i never made it in the otr world, i just sat in truck and stewed about stuff

 

going out to a nice place to eat later should be better to bobtl and find a place tp park

 

WARNING: before I say anything about this, I need to know if you're HAPPY sitting around for free on a weekend like that? If so, then you might want to skip the rest of this post since alot of people get pissed off at hearing the truth.

This is exactly why I warn people to stay away from OTR - especially the big McMega carriers like Swift. You should be paid for each and every one of those hours that you're sitting around waiting on loads. And anything after 8/40 hours should be overtime. How many people do you know that would show up over the weekend at their day job for no pay? Nobody I can think of. That's why OTR is such a blatant ripoff.

Because the layover policy in OTR is a joke (you only get paid 24 hours AFTER you send in your empty call), the carriers overhire because there's no penalty for having you sit. Hiring too many trucks and drivers for the available freight allows them to keep fleetwide deadhead miles down and have more power units on the road available to customers.

So now the $64,000 question is how are you logging this? Technically, the book says that the whole time you are waiting on loads and available for work (minus DOT breaks etc), you must be on LINE 4, ON DUTY NOT DRIVING. But how are you REALLY gonna log it? Problably a mixture of Lines 1+2.

I don't really blame you because you pretty much have to in order to get some kind of decent paycheck at the end of the wek. But by sitting around for free and burying all those unpaid hours in the logbook, drivers allow carriers/shippers/receivers to be inefficient. If you went on the clock as soon as you sent in that empty call in or when you checked into a customer, you can bet your bottom dollar that you wouldn't be sitting for very long. That's why Wallyworld drivers are almost all drop-n-hook. Because they rate delay-pay, no way is Wal-Mart gonna pay those guys to sit around docks, truckstops, rest areas, etc for very long. Same deal with the LTL carriers.

 

Unless they changed it Swift had the worst layover pay policy I have ever seen. It stated that you would only qualify for it if you were on the road and not under dispatch for 24 hours. When I was there (1999) the dispatchers were notorious for having you sit for 22 or 23 hours and then throw a dispatch on you regardless of when the pickup time was. There were a few times I ended up sitting another day or two after being dispatched waiting for the pickup time to arrive. :roll: :roll: Just one of the reasons I only lasted 9 months there. Between that and being given 3-4 days to go 800 miles on a load that they would not allow to be T-called made for some really lousy paychecks.

 

jesh, he just wanted some help. i wander if cold frosty mug pisses himself off because people run otr? everyone does what they have to do to survive and support there family. i am happy for cold rosty mug for his choice to run local. as i am happy with the choice i have made to do what i do. i think he was looking for some advice or words of encouragement, now all you did was go on your rant about otr, like you always seem to do. are you from the buckeye cold frosty? maybe help him out, offer him some ideas of places to go, offer him some advice on different places to work in ohio

 

I rarely if ever log OD/ND unless I have to load it, which is NEVER or Unload it which is less than NEVER, or I have to monitor each piece going in the trailer which is just slight more than NEVER bordering on "aint done it yet"

I take a nap, surf the net or watch a movie. When they are done they knock on the door , give me the papers and I"m gone.

Why eat up your 14 when you dont have to ?

 

I am not sure it is a duplicious scheme for dispatchers to mess with the heads of drivers as the result of a system. Driver submits empty call. At a specified time the Qualcom software alerts the dispatcher that a driver is empty around the 22 hour mark (and subsequently will get layover pay). Policy states that Dispatcher must now prioritize efforts to get driver moving. Dispatcher assigns a load satisfying the policy requirements but ... now the driver is frustrated and really pissed off. What is the worse problem .. Swift is a huge company with inflexible execution of company policy.

At W&S one time I was dispatched at the 22 hour mark after sitting and then I got a 800 mile load in three days. I brought this to the attention of Macon who agreed that the circumstances were not optimal. I got layover pay .. and then a nice 2000 mile run. Easier to do with a smaller company.

Just to rant a bit ... most managers/directors do not understand systems thinking. They just implement polices that solve immediate problems without any thoughts of long term results. In this case .. increased turnover. "Hey turnover is high industry wide so why think about this ... they will just quit for some other reason" ... But .. If you thought about this you would measure your fleet managers on overall Tractor Utilization (a few trucks moving lots and trucks standing still is bad -- too wide variation) , and bonus top performers, but you are only eligible for bonus if your home time fulfillment is 80% or higher and driver feedback scores are at a certain level .. this will make the fleet manager think.

Ahhh alas I dream that management in any industry will wise up .. they think how do I cut cost and outsource my problems