So, Merrick4, if you knew then what you know now, are you saying you would have done things differently?

I am seriously considering buying 2-3 trucks and putting them out on lease, but your current sentiment along with other negative comments are giving me pause. It sounds like you want out and are sick of the trucking business.

Driver turnover is actually down according to figures that I read not too long ago. Only a few years ago the national average was around 136%. According to that article the turnover is now about 76%. It is still high, but about half from previous numbers. Not everyone wants to deal with all the hassle's of owning trucks and dealing with drivers. It can be challenging.

Any idea why the turnover is less now? It seems like truck drivers are in demand everywhere in our country.

The economy is still sluggish. That may have as much to do with it as anything else. Most people are still concerned about the future and the economy so they may not be moving around as much.

76% is still high as hell. Maybe not for OTR trucking. But any other field besides fast food im sure 76% is high

76% is an old number. The turnover rate has been above 90% for awhile and I expect that it will have exceeded 100% in the third quarter. The past few months have seen some significant pay increases instituted by large carriers which is only going to accelerate the churn rate among drivers. The economy is not sluggish, especially as it relates to freight. Demand has outstripped capacity for a couple of years now and hasn't shown any signs of slowing, as of yet. However, the rest of the world is stagnating and commodity markets are slowing, which will slow our exports. The combination of excellent pricing power for carriers and low diesel prices is leading to fleet expansion, which will eventually bring the capacity equation back toward equilibrium. The only limiting factor on fleets desire to grow (and the thing that will save us from ourselves) is driver scarcity. In any case, it's a driver's market right now and turnover will continue to rise.

The economy is still sluggish. I have no doubt there is some churn. When turnover rates are published it can be a little deceptive. Turnover doesn't necessarily mean that drivers are leaving the industry, although that will always happen to some degree. Mostly, the turnover is drivers moving from one carrier to another. It is a little different with most other industries. Fast food had a 300% turnover rate at one time. I agree about the reason for some of the turnover, driver pay. Carriers have always been fierce competing for drivers. There isn't the shortage of drivers than some would have us believe. According to figures that I have seen there is a current shortage of about 20,000 drivers. That sounds like a lot, but it amounts to less than 1% of the total drivers in this country. That isn't a shortage. Rates have been up longer this year than usual. Some rates are down somewhat, depending on location and lane. I hope rates extend into the winter, but there is normally a seasonal slowdown. Perception is everything. Election years are usually a little different than non election years. It has been more difficult to predict trends since 2008. I don't consider things normal, but they are better than we have seen for a while. There is still much uncertainty in the marketplace.

Maybe things are different in whatever niche you happen to inhabit, but we are now four years into a freight recovery. Activity and volume have exceeded pre-recession levels with less capacity. That's what makes for a boom market which is what we've been in for at least a year. That just happens to be about how long carriers have had solid pricing power. I operate in the lowly refrigerated market but I keep my eye on the other segments and the platform segment has been by far the strongest. I suppose there are regional pockets that may not be as strong as others but overall relative strength has been the norm. Uncertainty may exist in the greater economy due to a muddy tax picture and questionable global growth, but the domestic economy is humming and the freight industry is full speed ahead. If you're not taking advantage already then you're a day late and a dollar short. We feel the downturn before it shows up anywhere else, so if you're looking for general economic indicators to tell you when things are slowing down, you're already behind the eight ball. Rates are strong and fuel is cheap and O/O's and small fleets operating on the spot market are in the best position to capitalize, but the ride never lasts.

I don't think reefers are as sensitive to economic changes as most other areas of the industry. There are loads to haul in most areas. There are quite a few loads from my home base and that is encouraging. Some rates are good. I don't think the economy is in the tank, but there is certainly room for improvement. I do open deck freight and we tend to see slow downs and recoveries before other segments of this business.

A few thing differently, but don't let my negativity stop you. We all have different personalities. This is a profitable good business I just don't like it. You see No Worries handle, well mine would be All Worries. Also (although No Worries might disagree :) ) I am not a very sociable person. I don't like talking to people much and very solitary. That's hard to do if you have over 50 employees. And I despise being responsible for other people's foolishness. But everyone around me tells me I'm sitting on a goldmine. Again this just isn't the path I want to take in life. But aggravation and all, it pays me good and allows me to enjoy my daughter grow up. I'm always the father that's there because I can.

Hey no worries, are you saying that you think this "gold rush" is coming to an end? They say it's going to be like this for a while. Also the big companies may be adding capacity but I have over 40 trucks of new technology and they are constantly down. Constantly.

First, you're right; unsociable is not how I'd describe you, but I know where you're coming from ;) I don't think the end is in sight, however nothing last forever and the end will inevitably catch most by surprise. We saw it with the last downturn; 2006 started off on a record pace but by the fourth quarter, the signs of the downturn were starting to show. Not many recognized them and we saw the carnage that followed from '08 to '10. The industry learned a crucial lesson about capacity growth during that time and that patience led to the boom we're having now. The climate for carriers has been steadily improving since 2010 and it's not because the economy was on fire; it was because capacity remained constricted even as demand strengthened. We're starting to see signs that those lessons are being ignored. Carriers are actively talking about wanting to add as much capacity as they possibly can because the business is there. Luckily, the shortage of qualified drivers is tamping down their ability to follow through...for now. They will eventually find a way to get their drivers and, when they do, they'll put so many trucks on the road it will make our collective heads spin. Unfortunately, the way that they will be able to attract those drivers is going to be through higher wages brought about by rate increases. We all know that, as an industry, nobody pays more until they have to and that point is likely to be the peak of the market. That means those carriers are finally able to put their desired trucks on the road, just as we're coming to a cyclical downturn in the economy. So we again get to experience increasing capacity as demand is falling. There is also the wildcard that is the energy sector. If oil falls into the $70s for any meaningful period, we will likely see a significant decrease in drilling and exploration in North America. That sector has been more responsible for our relative economic strength over the past few years than any other. If it were to falter, could the rest of the economy support itself?

I think we've got a few very good years ahead of us, but my advice is to always be prepared and know how you'll weather the next downturn; because there always is one and it usually comes sooner than most expect.

I agree with you, Merrick, about some carriers not learning from the past. The ATA and trial lawyers are pushing hard for a huge increase in liability coverage for carriers. If they get the increase they want, it is likely to push thousands of smaller carriers out of business. That will create some problems and opportunities for the industry. It will be problematic for most smaller carriers and independents. Many won't be able to handle the likely huge increase in insurance premiums. The large carriers stand to benefit from the reduced capacity. I expect another downturn in the economy. What we are seeing currently is an artificial propping up of the economy. While the economy is sluggish, the government is keeping the economy up by extending unemployment benefits and encouraging others to seek a greater reliance on government services. It is unsustainable. If the government were not so active in keeping people out of the job market, we would be experiencing a much more sluggish economy.

Some of these larger carriers have been buying up equipment in anticipation of a gold rush for them as capacity tightens and more drivers are thrown into the pool when the insurance increase goes into effect. They never seem to learn. If they held themselves back, rates would go up and the industry would be more stable. I don't plan on adding any debt. I plan to keep it that way. The only way I was able to survive the last recession was due to my lack of a lot of debt. It was still difficult, but here I am. Thousands lost everything. Those with huge debt were not able to keep the doors open. With the economy being artificially propped up, used truck prices are up. I would not want to buy any of the newer trucks. They seem to spend more time in the shop than running. Equipment prices, new and used are being kept high because of demand mostly from the larger carriers.

Well to update this journey I'm on. My workman's comp needed renewal so I figured no problem there, we pay hefty premiums and had one small claim over the years. Long story short it is utterly impossible to get workmans comp in South Florida. Apparently I have an incredible score but they won't touch long haul trucking. (and a few other industries too). So I was forced into a PEO or one of those leasing companies. I was so opposed at first as I have my systems in place but this might not be such a bad move. I'm with one of the largest in the country for trucking and some of their customers I was stunned to find out. Much bigger than I am.

I am being sued again by some ex employee but that is no big deal as they tried once and lost and this case is even weaker. I am in trouble, well not trouble, but every year I get a refund but this year I wasn't prepared and as I don't have anything left to depreciate I am looking at a massive tax bill. I'm mad at my accountant who is a relative and doing my best to avoid this. I'm realizing it's hard enough to make money in this country but once you do (and I'm not a millionaire by far) then the problem is how to keep it.

I settled with the claim with Transplace. They owed me like $24,000 in receivables and the stolen loan was valued at $140,000 which I only had insurance for $100,000 and a $10,000 deductible. So they took the $90,000 from the insurance and kept my receivables and I didn't pay the deductibles and nobody owes anyone anything now. So since I didn't pay my deductible I lost about $14,000 on that one. But learned a lot, especially you owe the value no matter what and the $100,000 insurance only covers that so know the value of the freight your hauling.

Other than that getting the other hip done next month even though I barely feel it. But I know there's a lot of damage and while I have good health and good insurance I might as well get it over with as I don't want a total hip replacement at 50 or something like that. Can't believe another year in this business is coming to an end.

I am sorry to hear about the workers comp and insurance lawsuit. Litigation is one of those unfortunate aspects of doing business in today's world. I am not sure what you are referring to about the PEO?

HI GMAN,

A PEO or is what they call those companies that the employees are now employees of them. So we retain all control over pay, hiring, firing etc, we send in all they payroll amounts to them and they pay them instead of us. It also seems to have a lot of benefits as I can get better group rates on workmans comp which that I don't need as my rates were good, but health insurance, 401K and they also handle the Driver Qualification file. We are signed up with DAC but we did everything manually (our application) and now potential drivers can just go online and fill out an application and we can just log in and decide if we want him or not.

So, your drivers are now considered employees of the PEO? It sound sort of like you have leased your drivers and equipment to the PEO?

No the PEO has nothing to do with the equipment. The driver's still work for us but are considered co-employers with this leasing company. Here is an example of one which I decided not to use https://www.peoplelease.com/index.html

Remember most of my equipment is leased anyway. I have structured this where I can walk away at any time.

Happy New Year everyone. It was a rough end of year with tax liabilities (by the way I don't know why they call him Uncle Sam, if I had a real Uncle that wanted all that money from me, I would never speak to him again), lawsuits (going well) workers Comp issues (resolved) and now yesterday or the day before I was notified we will be audited next Tuesday by the DOT. This is not such a small operation anymore, (nor a huge one) but we did break 10 million in revenue this year (again that's revenue not profit) and there are a lot of drivers and things going on. We have been in a lot of accidents lately and almost none of them our fault, but I think that is what's triggered this.

What can we do? I think we are prepared. I know we are strict with the random drug tests, have an accident register, scan every log that comes in and make the driver's fix any violation. But if you have followed this post, what do I know? I mean I know more now than when I started but still this grew and I'm sure they will find something wrong. I'll update with the audit results.

I hope things go well with the audit, merrick.

Merrick....there is always the debate of new truck vs older one. Since you have many of the new ones what has been your experience with the EGR/DPF that everyone complains about.

Thanks GMAN. You know what they say, expect the worse and hope for the best. By the way I forgot to add to the list of my year end woes of lawsuits, taxes, insurance etc, I got my other hip done. But way less damage on this side and you would never know that I had hip surgery 3 weeks ago yesterday. As they say (and I truly believe) well at least I got my health.

Honestly, I don't pay much attention to it as they aren't my trucks ( I lease them) and we just call the Ryder helpline with breakdowns. With that said, we having a ton of trouble with so many sensors I can't even name them all. I never hear anything about the EGR anymore. That was a huge problem when they first came out. The big problem now is something to do with the regen. Ryder is not being trained properly on these things and they just found out that you have to clean the regen filter or some filter with regard to the regen.

If I were just starting out, I don't think I would buy a new truck. I had a long talk with one of the drivers today. He wants to basically do what I did. I told him I don't think I would redo this. I also told him that that was my opinion and he does have a great attitude and work ethic but a lot in life is timing. I got into this just as everything went downhill. I had freight out of Florida throughout the whole downturn. I could get insurance which I don't think I could do in South Florida today. Then I switched to Ryder when they had so many trucks sitting they had special pricing to entice people to get the trucks off the lot. A lot of this so called success was just due to timing and luck.

This is a brutal business even if you do make money.

There is much more to running a business than most realize. If someone is in business and hasn't been involved in a lawsuit at some point, they have probably not been doing much. When some people don't get their way about something the first thing they want to do is find a lawyer and file a lawsuit. It is the world in which we live. I expect insurance rates to go up again this year, especially if the trial lawyers and the ATA get their way about forcing all carriers to raise their minimum liability. We will all be paying higher taxes this year, thanks to Obama, obamacare and some of his other taxes that will kick in this year. I am glad to hear you are doing well after your second hip surgery. I am sure it is a relief having it behind you. No matter how much fame or money you have, without your health, you have nothing.

I have read this thread from start...well almost start, skimmed the first 30 pages once I realized this thread...journey began in 2007. :lol:

I personally want to say thank you for taking the time to share your experience since day one until today. It definitely seems like it's been a constant roller coaster and I'm looking to get my first leased truck from Penske sometime next week. I'm excited and nervous at the same time. I've been watching loadboards for a few days now and being based in Memphis may work out for my friend and I in running our authority. He owns the auth and I'll be running under his wing for a while and we'll both be learning as we go along. He's coming up on his one year anniversary tomorrow actually. He's only had a 26' box truck and 2 cargo vans, and I'm footing the bill for the tractor and trailer. We hope to be fair with our drivers (starting the first one out with .45/mile, others .38-40/mile) and hope we can keep that promise with the contacts that he has made as well as the various loadboards. We understand that being on the road is tough mentally and physically and we definitely want to bring our drivers home daily if they wish to be. I just hope it all works out!

Good luck Twinsen. Treating the drivers well is a double edge sword. In the years I've started nobody ever can say I owe them a penny or have abused anyone but trying to by right be these guys, well I guess call me jaded. One thing goes wrong and all the good you did goes out the window. They have no idea what it's like in the office and what it takes to get decent customers and good paying loads. They want to count your money instead of their own. However I actually had one tell me, and I'll always respect him for this, (we were talking about one driver who was talking about how much I make) " I come here to drink the milk, not count the cows".

Again call me jaded, but make sure you realize that while it's a team effort and everyone needs each other, (the office people can't deliver the freight and the drivers can't get the loads the people in the office get) always remember who the lawsuit is going to go to. Because one of them gets a little greedy and want to start fooling with the logs, he'll get OOS and it reflects bad on the whole company and you can fire him but it's on your CSA score for two years. Anyway again best of luck to you. We are all here to answer questions and help so don't be bashful of asking.

Just a point to clarify you may want to confirm.

It's on your CSA for three year. First year is 3x weight, 2x second and 1x the third year.

What does weight mean in this case?

You get a CSA violation, its worth 5 points.

1st year, 5*3= 15
2nd year, 5*2= 10
3rd year, 5*1= 5

There's a bunch more to how it figures into your actual score that includes severity a right and, time

Its the total weight/ time weight makes up your score.

I do believe you are mistaken (of course I could be too) but last I looked it was 6 months *2 and one year * 1 and it falls off after a year. I check the CSA site regularly to make sure nobody got a ticket and didn't inform me and also to see what's falling off.

How do they get away with penalizing you 15 points for a 5 point violation?

http://csa.fmcsa.dot.gov/Documents/SMSMethodology.pdf

Yeah, it's a shame you can't give someone the world and not be able to expect the same back. I guess I want to be slightly above fair, lol. Don't want anyone taking advantage of us from the jump! We actually got our truck just yesterday afternoon. It was supposed to be this past Saturday, but they had some delay in getting us the truck. It was supposed to be a 2012 Freightliner Cascadia, ended up being a 2012 Volvo. Not complaining by any means, lol. :cool:

Well we had our audit in January. Everything was going well until she asked for the fuel reports. All down hill from there. I had actually left the office and when I got back I realized they gave them the timed reports from the fuel card. Again everything went down hill from there. Long story short we were given a conditional rating. Now this is where this becomes interesting.

Before the officer left, I found out that our log auditing company can up load our fuel transactions once a week to cross check for falsification. The officer told us this was fixable, send in the Corrective Action Plan and nobody would know. She said send in 30 days of clean logs of the drivers she chose and all would be good. Well when we got the letter it was dated like a week after the audit and it was impossible to send in 30 days and on top of that a full Corrective Action Plan.

But I rushed and got it in 6 days late (they want it 15 days from the date of the letter which we got a good 12 days after the letter was dated. Unfortunately a few wouldn't listen to us and kept falsifying their logs and we had to terminate them. The officer was nice but was incorrect about her statement that nobody would know if we fixed the problem. The Conditional hit exactly when they said it would. I made a big fuss and got the program manager on the phone for the Florida FMCSA division. She said that it was going to hit regardless on the specified date but final determination wouldn't be until the 8th of this month. This makes no sense. If it's not final why put it on the website. We lost a few customers (not direct shippers). Anyway today we received notice that the Corrective Action Plan was approved (though they have consultants that write these I wanted to do it myself. I sent in a huge package with examples of the changes we were making and have made). So that was that. Also we got a $5600 fine. Not bad considering how many violations we were found to have.

I see now that shippers don't care more the brokers. Carroll Fulmer was placed on conditional before us and still have it. We spoke to them and they said it doesn't really affect them as they have mostly direct shippers accounts. All I know this was a lesson learned and we don't want to go through that again.

Next up is we have had it with Ryder. Their service is absolutely atrocious. They don't care. Tomorrow we are meeting with the District Manager of Penske. From what we hear they have better service but everyone seems to have their own opinion. It can't be worse than Ryder though. That's for sure.

Merrick you wouldn't happen to be Vero Logistics would you??

I know you've been around awhile but some choose to expose themselves more than others here. I have met people from this board in person and on the phone or through email. They know who I am. I like to think of this board as a place where I can come and share somewhat anonymously though it's not hard to figure out. The only thing I have let be known is I'm from New England, I drink Ice coffee daily and I live in Florida.

I have always been like that and to be honest sometimes I regret it. In my teens I did steroids and was very big (and still am not a twig) but I refused to let anyone take pictures of me and even now when I bulk up I cover up as I do it for me not to show. But it would be nice to have pictures of what I looked like.

I do know why you're asking though as I am constantly reading and am aware of that battle and I support any type of battle like that. I'm only in my early 40's and there are people here a lot older than me and this country has changed. That's for sure. All local flavors are on their way out. We are a country of a big string of Walmarts and Applebee's. It's a shame really. I don't know if I still qualify as an owner/Operator as I don't drive or even interact with a lot of things and do mostly managerial things now. But for the true owner/operator to survive his or her biggest asset is customer service. Now it's either Walmart or Target, Home Depot or Lowes, Direct TV or Comcast (depending on your region). Do you think they care if they lose a customer? Where else are you going to go?

Well I don't have Direct TV nor Cable (I use Roku) but if I fight with AT&T there goes the internet and then I'm done. We are at the mercy of these corporations. I have actually had a Bank of America Rep who is related by marriage (and beyond that I highly respect him and consider him as a good man and as a great parent), well he always confides in me. He straight out told me that the Bank doesn't care if it loses a customer (and he bends over backwards for people) but if they threaten to go, then go because something about the government regulates just how big you can be.

And if they don't care about the little people, you'd be surprised how much they don't care about the bigger ones either. My wife's former employer had her company's relationship with J.P. Morgan Clearing firm severed (I don't even know what that is, something about execution of stocks) because they got in some trouble and wanted to decrease exposure to companies dealing with South America so even though it generated many millions in profit for them they cut it. But when you are J.P. Morgan what do they care? Then you put up a fight and nobody ever supports you anymore. Well it reminds me of that statement from some German guy but now has many variations:

First they came for the Socialists, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Socialist.

Then they came for the Trade Unionists, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Trade Unionist.

Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Jew.

Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me.

Great speech Merrick! We are becoming generation of IGNORANCE! Until people will realize,, that one who talks, make more noise, than 1000, who is silent, nothing is going to change. At least for the better. Back in Russia, we have an old saying, i'll try to translate the meanings, not the words "Small drops of water, could bring down the mountain, if it will be many enough!" Don't let anybody treat you with disrespect, wether that's your BIG bank, or anybody, who thinks he could ignore the "small drops". And these day, like never before, we have an opportunity to speak, and be heard! Doesn't matter if just by few, it's all will grow, like a snowball, and nobody will be able to ignore you anymore. No matter how BIG he is! Sorry! I guess i've got carried away a bit, but it hits a nerve!

Thank you Solo. I don't know what year you came here but I'm sure living under communism wasn't a picnic. Change can happen and a lot of times, well most of the time it's too slow. Before our time they had that Russian guy banging his shoe on the table saying communism forever and decades later there's Borris Yeltsin on a tank and then a few years ago I read there were more billionaires in Moscow then New York. Things change but it's frustrating the pace.

You are absolutely right. We are becoming a generation of ignorance. Last Thanksgiving I took a picture of the line outside of BestBuy and showed it to my little girl. She wanted to know if there was food in there. I explained these are foolish people living for material things. She asked in her childhood innocence "but I thought Thanksgiving was about food and family?".

Good luck trying to get people to stick together nowadays. You have better luck getting them together telling them that there's a big sale at BestBuy (or any other store). But I will make noise and the 1000 who remain silent or even criticize me can stay silent and suffer until they wake up. My name nor my morals can't be bought. They can take the shirt off my back but they can't take my dignity.

Again thank you for input; it's refreshing to see someone else (and there are probably more than we realize) that knows we are becoming a generation of dumbed down materialist.

Only reason i asked is cuz. Vero on facebook is bashing ryder. So when you said you are getting away from ryder and you live in FL. It just kinda clicked. So i went and looked up vero DOT# has around 40 drivers and did get a audit in January. Sounds like you. Thats all. I know you never wanted to say your company name on here. Anyway if it is you. and its ture whats on facebook about ryder i would leave them too. maybe buy some power units and use penske trucks too.

1st year, 5*3= 15
2nd year, 5*2= 10
3rd year, 5*1= 5

not bad...