The other night on my way to work a TMC truck passed me as he came out of the scales on I 85. It was a beautiful Peterbilt pulling a load of four or five tractors. I thought man just three years to go and I can drive for TMC. I have a few years to go until I retire and then I can do what I want to do. But I have a question. I have my CDL, well really I have had it for 18 years, I just renew it every year, but I have no experience. I got it when I came out of the Army because I wanted to drive a truck. But I took a another job and well now I am a few years out from retirement and I want to start planning now. My wife is okay with it now and the kids will be grown up. So how does it work for someone who had a CDL but no driving experience? Anyhow thanks.

 

[quote="Bill44"]The other night on my way to work a TMC truck passed me as he came out of the scales on I 85. It was a beautiful Peterbilt pulling a load of four or five tractors. I thought man just three years to go and I can drive for TMC. I have a few years to go until I retire and then I can do what I want to do. But I have a question. I have my CDL, well really I have had it for 18 years, I just renew it every year, but I have no experience. I got it when I came out of the Army because I wanted to drive a truck. But I took a another job and well now I am a few years out from retirement and I want to start planning now. My wife is okay with it now and the kids will be grown up. So how does it work for someone who had a CDL but no driving experience? Anyhow thanks.[/quote
you will have to go with a trainer for 6 weeks or so after orientation. you might have to go to a refresher class prior to going to work. i was in the same boat as you are when i came to work here. i had driven for a couple of different companies while i was on shore duty or the ship was in the yards. i went to the persian gulf and came back and retired. but i had to go to a refesher for the company to ensure that i knew my business. only 5 days of listening to gears grind. if you send a pm to TMC , he can get you the info on a refresher class near you or in iowa.

 

i got on a load of lumber going to orlando, fl. it loaded in white city. se of medford. this is gorgeous country up here. going to spend the night at the pilot in central point, or and get up in the morning and head to vegas for a day or so of gambling and then head on across. next time you hear from me, i may be a millionaire

 

Man, it seems like a long time since I posted on this thread, almost a month. I am currently at home for a three week leave of absence. My family needed some help here on the farm and I had to put my family before TMC. I did have to turn my truck in at Indy and rent a car to get home. Hopefully with all the other empty trucks at indy they won't re-assign my 92005 before I get back. Probably i will get another truck though. It is a shame because I just got that one broken in with 102,000 miles on it. I put 45,000 miles on it in 15 weeks. I was finally getting some decent fuel economy out of it as well, though perhaps that had to do with two weeks of loads weighing under 30,000 pounds. :lol:

I did finally break into the 29% bracket. For several months I have been short between 3 and 10 points, partly because my revenue wanted to hover at $798.35 or something similar. My revenue is atypical for most long haul drivers due to my location. Living deep into this corner of the country I usually get empty on a Friday and go home, picking up a load again Monday. That leaves me with zero miles and revenue for two and a half days. Not that I am complaining about getting more time at home, just explaining why I make less than some other drivers could. The other component of that is the rate out of Maine is generally about $1.10 to $1.15 per mile for these 1900 mile trips. :roll: I got my Out of route down to 4.73% this month running out west mostly. I also got my Fuel Economy up to 5.99 MPG.

So to review:
Do I like TMC? Yes.
Am I satisfied with my pay at TMC? Yes.
Could I make more money if I was home less? Yes.

Von: I don't know how you survive on line haul in the Northeast. The rates suck, and so does the out of route. :lol: If you ran with your CB on once in a while we could have had breakfast together last month. On a Monday night I parked at the Stormville NY rest area on I84 WB. When I awoke there was a TMC truck parked two trucks behind me. I was gettting ready to roll out when truck 92277 pulled out of it's parking spot and zipped past me. I assume that is still you. :wink:

 

Stormville, yuch. That would have been me.

Line haul sucks up here sometimes but I have very elderly parents and a very sweet young lady to see on weekends. What's a boy to do?

 

Hello All,

I have been looking into joining up with TMC for quite some time, but so far my initial experience is quite discouraging.

Sent in my app on the website about a month ago, and did not hear anything for about 2 weeks. Then I get a card in the mail to contact the recruiter. 3 days straight called and left messages. Tried to speak with a different recruiter and they sent my call to the original one. Then this week I received a letter with the new pay schedule and another invite to call. This time the original recruiter answered her phone, pulled up the app and asked a couple of basic questions. Note: I intended to make a change the first of June. Anyhow, she calls me back about 30 minutes later and asked about an incident that happened in 2004 (minor non-claim deal) and wanted me to call back Thursday after the DMV report came in.
Now I call Thursday aftenoon, voice mail, argghh! Yesterday, Friday I call, get a different person that informs me that the first recruiter is no longer employed there, and that I have to start the process all over, since the first recruiter sat on the app for over 30 days. Not the most professional attitude.

From what I have read in this string, most everyone is happy with the company and there are no major issues out on the road.

1. Is it just the recruiting department that has issues, or does it go deeper?
2. I live in the San Antonio, TX area - anyone having issues getting frieght in and out - i.e. hometime?
3. Any suggestions or advice dealing with recruiting would be appreciated.

Horseman

 

The recruiting department can sometimes be a bit overwhelmed. You just have to be persistent. For recruiting get ahold of Matt W. He sometimes posts on this thread as "TMC" When you fill out the online app you can direct it to him and then give him a follow up call to make sure he got it. Just being a little proactive on your part can make a lot of difference. This time don't wait for two weeks before beginning to follow up. :wink: Trucking companies get a lot of applications that never lead anywhere, make sure they know you are a serious applicant.

For the most part it is only the recruiting department that is understaffed. My Fleet Manager answers the phone on the first ring most of the time, or will answer a qualcomm message within ten minutes. Some times are busier than others, like Monday mornings when a lot of trucks are getting empty and Friday afternoons when he has to make sure that all 40 of the trucks on his long haul fleet are all set for the weekend. Sometimes my FM has to wait for a response from Customer Service if there is a problem with a load and that can take a while, especially if the CSR then has to communicate or negotiate with the shipper or consignee and then get back to my FM who gets back to me. Usually once every couple of weeks I get a load screen that doesn't include a load number or pick up number that needs to be tracked down. Once I got sent on Tuesday to pick up a load that wasn't going to be ready until Friday but for the most part TMC runs like a well oiled machine.

I have a theory that the whole recruiting process and orientation is designed to weed out certain applicants. If you aren't determined and persistent you won't make it all the way through the application process. You also need to call both the Monday before and the Thursday before orientation to confirm that you will be showing up to orientation. This proves to them that you can read a calendar and keep track of appointment times. In orientation you have reams of paperwork to fill out, including another application just like the one you already filled out. Part of this is to see how well you follow instructions, and part of it is to see how your attitude is after doing repetitive tasks. (In case you didn't notice, driving 700 miles in a day is a repetitive task in a way. :lol: ) Also during two weeks of orientation each day starts at a different time. To see if you can wake up and function on time. There were several other "tests" during orientation, see if you can figure them out. :lol:

 

Thanks for the reply!

I had called the next business day, and they had recieved the app, but it had not been assigned yet. Anyway, that is done, and I will start the process over. Thanks for the heads-up on the recruiter, will request him.

According to the 1st recruiter I was speaking with, obviously she was not on her game (reason she is not there anymore), with my current experience, to expect 1 week orientation and 2 weeks on the road with the trainer (no current flat bed experience, have pulled reefer and pneumatic tankers). Hopefully that stands true.

TMC Drivers I have chatted with over the CB, seem content and happy. Only one was griping and complaining, but I believe his issues were personal outside of TMC, and was just blaming someone besides himself for his issues.

There is a steel plant 4 miles from my property, that I occasionally see TMC trucks pulling out of, and several drivers live in this area. I see 2 of their trucks parked off of I-10 every weekend.

Looking forward to getting the ball rolling again.

Thanks,

Horseman

 

Yellowstone has teams that run CA to Ga running for Boeing. Yellowstone is another one of our many companies.

http://www.yellowstonetrucking.com/driverOpps.asp

 

I was sitting at the TA in Albert Lea, MN Monday morning when what I THOUGHT ws a TMC truck backing in beside me had a Yellowstone logo on the door.

Boy was that a surprise.