Today I got a call from Stevens,but they won't hire me because I'm in the middle of a lawsuit over the colon puncture thing.
Anyway I was talking to this driver outta Georgia and asked him a few questions.He said his brother drives from Stevens and made darn good money,got tons of miles and life was great!
Until he went for the lease/purchase gig.
Then they broke it off in him and he gets 500-700 miles each week,just enough to make the truck payment.Forget about him and his family surving.
Is this common for companies to do or is this poor guy just fluke.
I know about the lease/fleece/purchase from reading other post here and talking to drivers face to face.
Just curious that's all.

 

It's an all too common, sad, sad story.

 

If you got a call from Stevens, you better run, not walk, as fast as you can in the opposite direction.

 

Many of the lease purchase programs are out there for the company to make money and the driver to rent a job. There are a few out there that the intent is for the driver to pay the truck off and keep running for the company. Those few will allow you to get a loan and take the truck with you and have no baloon. The total that you pay for the truck should be the same as it would be off the lot plus a reasonable interst rate. The same that you would get if you were on your own. $103,000 for a $43,000 truck is FLESE PURCHASE. $81,000 for a $65,000 is 8% over 3 years and if you pay it earlier it should be less or longer more.

 

How come? They can't be all that bad can they?
Even for a company driver?

 

If you want to drive, either drive company or get your own truck (NOT leased!!) because that's the only way to bring home some money. Even as a company driver there are companies out there that work for some people and not for others. It's all about personal preferences, how hard do you want to run, how many miles can they actually give you etc. Believe me, my hubby and I leased and I wished we never had! Thank God we had a good tax person who could prove we ran our 'business' at a loss and got money back, because if not we would have had to pay a lot of taxes of money we never saw in our pocket; it mostly went to the company of whom we were leasing (Prime). Being out here a few years and talking to many people proved to me leasing is something you need to run away for and very fast! The only one making the money is the company leasing the trucks to whomever wants to lease them from them.

 

I used to find it strange years ago but not anymore that people still do the lease thing. I hear and have even asked drivers why they are on a lease or want to lease and all say they have heard all the horror stories but just figured it wouldn't be that way with them as they were good money managers.

And yes Stevens even as a company driver should be avoided unless for some strange reason that is the only company that will hire you. Want to know why? Do a search here and ask other drivers.

 

I drive for Stevens.
Have for 14 yrs.
Avg- 3000 miles a week.
$0.44 a mile
Go home when i want.
3 weeks paid vacation a year
Never been stiffed on payroll.
I drive solo. Never trained.
It is a training company. Go in with a bad attitude, expecting to start out at the top, YOU WILL BE DISAPPOINTED.
Do some driver's have problem's. Sure!
Some of the newbie's i have talked to have jumped into this job without ever taking into consideration what OTR trucking involves.
If you have Kid's/a family, an OTR job is the last thing you should consider.
Too many people have heard this is a fast way to make big bucks.
Is Steven's the best, not by a long shot.
Is it the worst. HARDLY.
A lot of the complaint's you hear from former driver's, is their perspective, and probably is far from the whole truth.
I see it everytime i go in our driver's lounge at the yard. Driver's complaining about no miles. Yet they are not at the dispatch window checking out what is available. They seem to think the only acceptable load has to be 3500 miles.
That 600 mile load leads to another load and so on.
As for lease/purchase. It is a misnomer. THERE AIN'T NO PURCHASE.
Want to be your own boss, have your own truck. GO OUT AND BUY YOU ONE.
A lot of people have gone through Steven's training. Are the all sucessful?
NO.
But there are a lot of guy's who got their start there, and i run into a lot of them out on the road, driving for a company the found and enjoy working for.
Thought you would like hearing from someone who is driving for STEVEN's and does enjoy their job

 

Thanks for all y'all's replies.
I drove once,a long time ago-1977.
Then I got hitched and wifeypoo and I talked about it.
I looked into a lease/fleece deal with a company no longer around.....ICL
Incorporated Carriers Ltd. out of Irving,Texas.
I think they were paying around 11 cents per mile in 1978.
So we did the math and I would have been paying them for the privledge of driving their junk at the end of the week.(I know....my spelling really sux tonight) :lol:
Now the kids grown and gone and after 25 years working for the same company going no where it's time to move on.

 

That is one of the big reasons why people get suckered into these lease deals. They do not sit down and do the math themselves. Instead they rely on the extremely fuzzy math the company tosses at them.