Newbie questions Lumpers & Down time Pay
 

Hi All!

Starting school on the 10th of September- been pre-hired by two of the majors. As I have been going over the stated benefits and trucker tales here and on other boards, a couple of questions have come to mind.

1. Seems most companies will pay for Lumpers. Do you generally have to pay out of your own pocket and be reimbursed or is there another system. How many times do you think you will have unloading assistance only to find you're it :sad: Do you have a problem getting repaid for such out of pocket expenses?

2. I've read tales concerning some of the largest companies not paying detention or layover pay. Is this common.?

Thanks
Rick

Re: Newbie questions Lumpers & Down time Pay
 

at us xpress if we need a lumper i just make a call and thay put the money on our fuel card then we make out a com-check to pay it. 98% of what we do is drop & hook, we have never HAD to load or unload a trailer. but if we want to we get paid $100 if we don't want to use a lumper, it's up to us. we don't pay much (about $15 a week) out of pocket and we have ALWAYS had it paid back on the next check

it has never been a problem for us we have always been paid detention, layover or breakdown pay. we've been paid as much as 28hr's detention when thay f-up the pickup time.

Most of the larger companies will have you write a comcheck or something similar to pay for the lumper. You then get and turn in a receipt with your bills and all is well and good. If you fail to turn in the receipt (and any other documentation the company requires) you will find the cost of the lumper deducted from your pay.

Some companies pay detention pay (when you are held up getting loaded/unloaded) some do not. Some that pay have very specific procedures you have to follow in order to collect while at others it is automatic once you enter your arrival call. When I was at Knight, for example, many drivers would complain about never getting their detention pay. When quizzed about it I found out they would fail to send in the proper qualcomm message that company required. Same basically goes with layover pay.

One "trick" some companies use with layover pay is their policy will say you get the pay if you are not under dispatch after "X" amount of hours. They will wait until the last hour or two and then dispatch you on a load even though that load may not pick up for another 24 or 36 hours. Well it screws you out of the layover pay since you are now under dispatch. If you gripe and they pull it off of you the clock starts all over again.

Thanks Uturn2001 and Flood.

Flood could you PM me? My wife and I have been invited to the USXpress orientation.

Rick