Howdy all. I'm getting ready to leave for the Greyhound terminal here in Knoxville. Hope everything is going good for you and yours.

I'm not taking my MacBook with me just yet, so I don't know when I'll get to post again. I'm supposed to get a load coming through here for my first one (to pick up bedding, CB, etc, etc) so I might get to make a short post Wednesday. I'll let you know how everything goes.

Contrary to what some of you might thing (notice I said some), I'm going to post both the good and the bad that happens to me while at Heartland. I'm not going to sugar-coat it, but I'm not going to be overly harsh either. Most the time, the truth is somewhere in the middle anyway.

So hopefully I will be seeing you all on the road somewhere. I hope sometime in January I will be able to take one of my weekends off in Southeastern Illinois where I am originally from. It is technically out of my region, but only by a few miles really. My region's west border is the IL/IN state line (basically the Wabash until is reaches the Ohio, then the Ohio till it reaches the Mississippi). Southern IN is in the region, so where I'm from in IL isn't far.

Have a good one!

 

Good Luck!

 

Howdy all, I thought I'd drop you a quick note from Atlanta.

Things are going well here. The room isn't too bad. I have been in both better and worse. From my experience for this price hotel, this is about mid-range. Nothing fancy, but it was free (since I had to share a room).

Orientation is going well. I didn't have a copy of my long form DOT physical (and it expires in February) so I have to get my physical tomorrow morning, followed by my driving test. There are 6 of us in here now. There were 7 this morning, but one was sent home because he couldn't get a work release from his doctor for a surgery on his back a couple of years ago. He was my room mate, but a different guys showed up this morning for the class that didn't get a room last night, so they put him with me. We are getting along real well.

Everyone here is super-nice. I've met lots of drivers that have been here lots of years. When we went to dinner today, they loaded up all the drivers in the lounge and paid for their meal. I know that isn't much, but its something.

All the drivers that I've met thus far are pretty happy. Thats all relative though. Several I've met have over 5 years in the company in. They still enjoy working here, even with all the mistakes they make, they know it works out in the long run.

I'm not making any judgements about the company and dispatch as a whole until I've been in a truck for a while, but right now its going pretty good.

Hope to see you all out there on the highways and biways sometime in the near future.

 

Yeah, I was wondering if anyone one would dare discuss the "HOLD" Money policy at Heartland. Yes, they THREATEN you at orientation about going home during the week( at/on day prior to payday) about them "making an error on that paycheck-- an error that works out to be $1.00 per mile for every mile between your hometown and the nearest yard.
I was home twice during my 4 month trip through purgatory. It never happended to me-- I was looking for $220 bucks worth of "payroll error"-- but never happened-- so I chalked it up to "discouraging" the slaves from taking hometime during the week... after all, it's illegal . Funny, how there's that old "double standard" there again--- you must be honest, and do everything legal--- but we'll threaten you with an illegal practice. Even tell you-- you'll never get management or anyone in payroll to admit they are "holding" money back.

 

Been over a week... where's our Update? How goes the new Heartland adventures?

 

Sorry its been so long. I didn't take my computer with me, so I had no way to update while on the road. This is going to be short cause I just got in.

After orientation, they didn't have a load for me until Thursday about noon. They did put me up in the motel for the extra night though.

First load was from Atlanta to Pikeville and Paintsville, KY. 408 paid miles. Two live unloads Friday. It turned out this was the only load I got emptied before midnight that Friday.

As soon as I was empty I had a pickup in Kimper, KY (D&H), took it to Columbus and dropped on the yard. (I also forgot my notebook in the truck, so all I have is my weeks end total milage.)

From Columbus pickup on the yard going to Berwick, PA. On this trip my truck gets to acting up. Take it to a TA (this is on Saturday) and they can do nothing with it. I take it on to Berwick. Drop, no empties, but I can't drive 55 bobtailed so I'm broke down till Monday when the nearest Cummins dealer is open. Come to find out it was an EGR back pressure sensor going out. Sat from Saturday Midnight till 4:30 PM on Monday for that. Did get breakdown pay, but it was next to nothing.

Then I go from where ever in PA I got worked on to Milesburg to the TA to relay a load to the Scranton, PA Petro. Ended up being about 230 miles I think both ways, but my FM kicked in a little extra money from the Heartland Cares account.

From Scranton deadhead to Avon, OH (Cleveland) to pick up and deliver in Hagerstown, MD.

Hagerstown deadhead to Martinsburg, WV to FedEx, take it to Bedford, VA (Roanoke).

Switch trailers at the Roanoke TA for a loaded going to the Kingsport yard, switch for an empty for my reload Monday morning in Loudon, TN.

Because of pay cut off, the last thing I'll get paid for this week will be the transfer from Roanoke to Kingsport, but I got 2016 paid miles (keep in mind I was broke down virtually two days).

Next week is going to start with a bang. I'm picking up Monday morning or Sunday night in Loudon, TN going to somewhere in PA, 618 paid miles away (plus 120 something from Kingsport to Loundon deadhead).

I told my FM I would work last weekend since my family wasn't here anyway. I also told him I'd work through Christmas as long as I could be home over the weekend. My little boy is 2, he doesn't know what day Christmas is, so it'll work out.

I'll probably write more tomorrow. I'm pretty tired right now and need a good shower and meal... I've got a lot of things to cover, some good, some bad, mostly a wait-and-see type deal though. I'll say more tomorrow when I can think of everything I need to cover.

 

Not lookin for some drama are we brother HB?

 

Here's a few things from my first week and a half:

They shouldn't be called heartless going down the road, they ought to be gutless. The truck of mine is the ultimate gutless wonder. I took 44000# from Columbus to Berwick. Before my EGR sensor went out I couldn't hardly get over the hills on the turnpike.

People seem generally nice when you call for one thing or another. My dispatcher seems like a good guy (I've talked to a couple other drivers that run out of Kingsport and they seem to like him). I've only had one guy be half way snippy with me and that was a night breakdown guy. They all seem nice enough. Of course, I tell them my truck # every time I call, so they might see that I'm new and don't know what in the world is going down sometimes. It could change as I've been there longer, but I hope not.

Breakdown pay stinks. I was down from Saturday Midnight (Sunday morning) to Monday at 4:30 PM, and they gave me $75. Yeah, seventy-five dollars. Whoopee!

The interior of the trucks aren't as bad as I imagined. I figured I'd get in and their would be a mattress and nothing else. There are two TV cabinets (that need doors or curtains or something, a place to hang up clothes, a place to hang your towel (which is handy), a refrigerator cabinet (which needs some shelves or something to make it easier to use if you don't have a fridge), and two large shelves above the head and foot of the bed. One of these works real well for a library if you are so inclined (which I am). Rubber matted floors (no surprise). The seat isn't bad, but my right arm rest is broken. It hangs down too low and won't adjust. I'm sure there is nothing they can do about it until I get a different truck. I'd say overall the interior doesn't lack storage space, it just needs to be organized differently to make it more usable. Its kind of awkward how its set up.

The truck does ride pretty decent. Pulling spring ride trailers doesn't help of course, but the ride is o.k. Now that its been worked on it runs and drives good.

I did do some sitting, but that is to be expected. Of course I sat the most when I was broke down (and I already had a preplan when I broke down...). Then I sat for a few hours in Scranton after I relayed a load. I sat the most (other than the breakdown) in Hagerstown, MD. I got to the truck stop at 7 PM on Wednesday, and didn't move again until 11 PM Thursday. That was bad... It was a load going closer toward my house (they claimed it was the only thing they could find out of that area) but it was still a long time sitting.

There are things that could be better, some could be worse. So far I'm happy with the way things are going, but we'll see. Sorry if I disappointed you by not getting in a fist fight with my dispatcher my first week or something, but there is no high drama here. In fact, I haven't even met my dispatcher face to face yet.

I hope to be on here next weekend with some more news. I'll let you know how week 2 goes.

 

I heard some not too good things about Heartland from the regional guys out of Jacksonville. I hope that it works out better for you a little farther north.

 

The Borg do not require Drama...only reports.. updates... data to be assimilated by the collective here at CAD

of course, if there were to Be....Drama.... please give us the dirt..the juicy stuff....:clap::clap::clap: