I see a lot of drivers who complain about their companies, but tell us if you like your company and why.

I must say that I love driving for UPS. I'm still a package driver, but plan to get my CDL and move to feeders within the next 24 months. Hard work, but pay and benefits are great. Free insurance that I pay nothing for and only $100 deductible for the whole family. Last year I made $70,000 and this year I should pull in around $73,000 or $74,000.

You do have to start as a part-timer and work your way up, but it pays off in the end if your are patient.

 

I would consider you lucky to have a job like that. It seems hard to become a package driver, with the whole seniority thing. What are feeders?

 

I love my job and love working for Conway! Just hit my 90 days this last week, insurance has kicked in (not free like UPS but 1% of gross weekly income is the cost). I am about 100% sure I will retire with Conway unless something drastic happened. I might consider working for UPS or Fedex.......... those are about the only other companys I would consider leaving Conway for.

 

I work for Interstate oil here in Sacramento, and love the hell out of it.
But i still get that itch to go OTR :wink:

 

Feeder drivers are the tractor trailer drivers. My center is about 45 miles north of Denver and we have 3 feeder drivers who drive between Loveland and Denver all night moving our package from the hub to our center and back again. That's where I want to go. 2 of our feeders have 31 years in and are waiting til the contract is up in 2 years to retire. Most package drivers don't want to go to feeders, because you have to work nights. That doesn't bother me. Feeders is a lot less physical and they don't get hurt like package drivers do. Most package drivers in their 40's will have some serious injury. Backs, knees, and shoulders are the top three I've seen. If they make it to retirement they are usually pretty banged up.

We just started OTR team drivers too. We used railroads to move our trailers around the country, but they were getting unreliable and we've been moving toward OTR teams. Only current Denver feeder drivers could bid those teams routes. Union rules. That's alright I don't want to be a OTR team driver. I like to work by myself.

I started with UPS in 1990, working part-time while I went to school. I went driving in 1993. It took me 3 1/2 years to go full-time. Waiting time to full-time varies a lot around the country. Right now in Colorado it takes 1-3 years to go full-time. The economy is good here and there is a lot of growth. More growth = more routes. I know in other areas around the country part-timers can wait as much as 10 years to go driving.

Very few drivers quit once they go full-time. If they leave it's because they go to management, get hurt, fired (hard to do), or retire.

 

feeders are big terminals

i can definetly say no i am not happy one bit with my company

my recruiter didn't qualify my paperwork properly, i've done been through training, issued my truck the whole nine - i've been an employee for 7 weeks. i came home and they shut me down. why? because a place i used to work for on my application went bankrupt and is no longer in business and they need to verify i worked there. no problem i say to the lady on the phone i can get you what ever info you need. she called me at 11 am central time and expected for me to be able to drag people i know out of work to a notary and sign a letter stating blah blah blah by 0500. i said no problem i know they'll do it but i don't know if i can do it today. well thats too bad they need the paperwork by 5:00. hardly fair and hardly my fault. i had all the paperwork they needed done by 11 am saturday morning ( today 6/10 ) and i had to incur some serious personal favors to do that but now cause only the weekend crew is there i can't do nothing until monday.

i had been home for THREE days my LAST SCEHEDULED day at home they contact me about this. in all the time i'm on the trainer's truck no problem until now. so now my financial well being is being threatened by someone else screw up and no one on night or weekend crew has the authority to do anything about anything. needless to say i could choke these stupid jerks right now.

there have been other - and costly to me - problems with this company. i have previous driving experience. my dad has been a trucker for 25+ years - so i know quite well how a good company operates and i can say for 100% certainty that this company blows big time. and i am honestly trying to be fair and even handed with what im saying. i know crap happens but all the crap that has happened to my has directly affected my paycheck and all i get on the other end is a big oh well.

i STRONGLY urge anyone looking for a new place to work or looking to get into trucking for the first time to avoid SWIFT at ALL COSTS. i cannot stress enough how serious i am and yea while i may be mad i have every right to be since i've done everything since day 1 that was asked of me in a timely manner. like i said this is only 1 of many issues i could be writing about and i'll say it again AVOID SWIFT AT ALL COSTS.

Thanks for your time, Jeff

 

Sorry to hear about your problems with Swift, but I want this post to be for drivers that are happy with their jobs. Maybe others can see them here and apply. Lots of other places you can post negative stuff about Swift. Please lets hear about good companies only.

 

well then I would recommend you retitle your post there sunshine its quite open to interpretation, and i'm not even trying to be negative them there are just some plain ol facts. my bad.

 

Brown67, keep the thread open. A lot of drivers out here are happy where they are, it's only the bitchers that seem to post.
Being an O/O I don't know if I qualify but I couldn't be happier than who I am with. Just today I got a settlment and called them and said "Hey you screwed ya self", the load was re directed and I went 475 miles less than the initial dispatch. They said "No, that is what we dispatched you for". :-) :-) Plus they throw in a lot of other stuff, $ wise, I don't expect.

 

hey man I wish i had good stuff to say so don't be going and throwing me under the bus dood i went into this with an open mind and my dad's 25+ of wisdom guiding me - his words not mine - "what is wrong with these people". anyhow i didn't mean to post negative here since it didn't really say ONLY GOOD so don't be smack talking me i aint done nuthin to you mr. smartbutt walking eagle