JB Hunt??
 

My husband is considering going to work for JB Hunt. He currently has a good job driving a truck where he is home every night but we don't have insurance, which is the reason for considering JB Hunt.

The recruiter to him he has a dedicated account for him that will get him home every weekend and 1 day during the week for about 12 hours. Average miles would be 2500-2900. He also told him that I can ride along with him from day 1 at no cost. Everything the recruiter told him sounded just like what we are looking for. I'm a little nervous because I know recruiters get paid by well, recruiting. I have also heard that JB Hunt is bad about sending people to orientation then sending them right back home without a job. We can't take a chance on that because he will be quitting a good job (just no insurance) and possibly get sent home. I don't think they would do this because he has a perfect driving record, no tickets or accidents at all! But its still not a chance we are willing to take.

So what I am wondering is if recruiters at JB Hunt are known for telling you what you want to hear just so you will come to work for them? Also does anyone have any idea how much JB Hunt charges for medical insurance for a family of 4? Any and all comments or suggestions are welcome. I would love to hear the good and the bad with this company before we commit.

Thanks

Re: JB Hunt??
 

Ok im a recruiter over here and Ive been here for a long time. I think I can help you. Tell me what dedicated run your recruiter told you about and I will tell you everything I know about it. I dont know what the hometime and miles are on that run unless you tell me what it is.
First thing i see wrong is....Yes on most dedicated lanes you can ride with him. But its not free. It costs 22 bucks a month to insure you. As far as getting sent home from orientation.. yes people get sent home. 98% of the time its because of one of 3 reasons. Medical, Criminal record or Driving record. 2% of the time its because of failed drug tests. All of those things you personally should know about those before orientaion. I guess many drivers think they will squeeze by. Just doesnt happen.
As far as medical insurance....Every state is a little different and everyones situation is a little different. We have many different plans and two different providers you can choose from....Blue Cross and Aetna. You will have the same insurance I do, and I can tell you how much mine costs. Im on the aetna plan and I have a wife and 3 kids. Mine runs 63 a week. We have great insurance. Yours should cost around that...maybe a little less....maybe a little more. Like i said, depends on the state, and which plan you choose. Insurance kicks in after 60 days.

Thanks for the response! The dedicated customer is Alcoa hauling vinyl siding out of Denison, Texas.

I'm very happy to know the reasons for being sent home during orientation. I guess we have nothing to worry about there. No criminal history, no tickets or accidents and passing a drug test will be no problem...

Thanks so much for your time answering my question and easing my fears it is greatly apprecipated!

Ok i know that job very well.
Im going to send you a PM about that job. We are not allowed to post detailed job info on message boards because our competitors might see that and undecut us.

Well that sucks! I was hoping we would get to hear the scoop... So was the recruiter that talked to stircrazy full of it or what??? Seems like good miles if it is true. Sheepdancer you can at least tell us that much!

Longsnowsm

lol......you know I cant bad mouth my fellow co-workers....Im pretty sure that the recruiter they were talking to was pretty new at this. I have the advantage of having worked here for so long so I know a lot more details about the jobs. Our database of jobs changes every day and there are about 400-500 different dedicated jobs that can be on there at any time. It takes some time to learn the details of every job. Its not that he was trying to mislead them or anything.....he just made a few mistakes. But he was pretty close in the description of the job. Pay was right, hometime was right or pretty close to being right....miles were just a little high. But like i told her, the only thing we know over here is the average miles of a job. Just because the average weekly miles are 2400- 2500 doesnt mean that a good driver cant average more. Average drivers get average miles, above average drivers get above average miles and yes, below average drivers will get below average miles.

With all that said, Yes, it is a pretty good dedicated job. As a recruiter I get feedback from drivers i hire and that i put on jobs. Ive put a few drivers in that job and never had them call me back and complain about it.

That's cool. I just wanted to hear your take on this. I like to see how recruiters are going to respond on stuff like this... Your stock/credibility here really is built on how straight up you are with us, and if drivers come back here and say you shot straight with them.

So I was curious how you would handle this and how the drivers rate their experience with you. So far so good, it looks like you have helped several here on the board. I would really like to hear from some of the drivers here that have gone with JB based on your recommendation provide their feedback.

Too bad your not allowed to tell us about some of the jobs that come up and what you know about them. It might make it easier for some of the drivers considering their options to look at JB more seriously. BOL

Longsnowsm

How do you know when a JB Hunt recruiter is lying?

His lips are moving! :D

Wow, that joke is not funny. Still. :roll:

So far I don't have any reason to believe Sheepdancer has lied to any of us so I will cut him some slack.

JB has a bad reputation for a reason, so it is an uphill battle for Sheepdancer to help change that image. JB might offer decent pay rates, but they still pay HHG, and there still appears to be too many folks reporting on this board that they don't get miles. So still some pretty big strikes against the company.

So I will just keep watching, listening, and seeing if Sheepdancer can change some of that and if things are possibly getting better at JB.

Longsnowsm

Actually Sheepdancer has been a tremendous help. He has answered alot of questions I have had. He also told me about some things that my husbands recruiter may have been wrong about. Although I'm not saying my husbands recruiter necessarily lied to him, he may have just been mistaken on a few issues. I really feel Sheepdancer is being honest with me and although we have only sent a few messages to each other. I would feel comfortable with recommending him to anyone considering employment with JB Hunt.

I drove for JB Hunt for about a year and the only reason I left them was my dispatcher could not get me home on time. Being from Louisiana it was difficult for them to route me home and dispatch did not have a clue how to make it happen. The equipment problems I had with them was once again a Junior dispatcher not knowing how to do his job.

That being said, I was OTR and never had problems getting miles. My paychecks were always good with the exception of one or two! I spoke with alot of JB'ers on the road and at the terminals and without exception the ones that were getting miles were never late on loads, no accidents no tickets and very business like.

The ones who were not getting miles were sitting at the terminal bitching about equipment, telling me every one is late once in a while, saying that my dispatcher has no control of me etc. etc. etc.

I would have no problem going back to JB Hunt. Any company is what you make of it. Work hard play hard and you will be rewarded.

Lol...thanks guys.

Honestly I dont really recruit too many people out here. Im just out here for fun like everyone else. Most the time out here I get drivers who have talked to other recruiters and want a 2nd opinion or just want to know more about a job. I wont try to steal them away from that recruiter. That doesnt mean I wont help someone get on from out here....lol. I like money.
But really the law of averages are against me. If im out here long enough and recruit enough people....eventually someone I hire will not do well over here and come out here and call me a dirty lying recruiter. Did I really lie to them? I would hope my reputation would tell you no. But who you believe, would be up to you. I really dont worry about it.
Being called a liar is just part of the job...
I can tell you that I have been on many message boards and There was one hire I had a few years back that ended up doing really bad over here. He spent the next few months on a personal mission against me and JB. I knew his story, I knew why he failed. I can tell you it was 100% his fault. But honestly it didnt bother me at all. Its just human nature to place the blame of personal failure on someone else. I just let him rant. Even negative attention is good advertising.

Man its late....Im going to bed, I have to work tomorrow...lol
Y'all have a good night and drive safe!

we dont pay hhg rates....we pay rand mcnally. Just to clear that up...lol Personally, Im convinced that if all companies went to Practical Miles, you would still have just as many people complaining that its not HUB miles.
A little trucking urban legend that needs to be cleared up. Companys that pay HHG, Rand Mcnally or even Practical miles arent ripping off the driver and keeping any of the extra money from customers. If we are paying you rand McNally miles...its because we are charging the customer rand mcnally miles. Now think about this. If you were a customer and needed some freight hauled....both offered 2.00 a mile but one offered you the shorter rand McNally miles....which one would you choose to do business with? We live in a free country where the free market rules. Say you got 30 big trucking companies to all get together and pay hub miles....there would always be 30 other trucking companies who would charge and pay the shorter miles to get more of the business. The companies offering the customers lower miles and charging less money would grow...the companies offering longer miles and charging more money would lose business. A company that offers hub miles but doesnt have the freight doesnt do anyone any good. And when it comes down to it....we are all in this business for one reason....The CUSTOMERS
Without them, none of us would have jobs.....so naturally, what the customer wants comes first. Customers want the shorter miles. Its just the way things are.

I realize it is a catch 22, but I also realize that neither the company or the driver is getting paid for work they are doing. If it is truely as difficult to get drivers, and companies to haul freight(you know the shortage we keep hearing about) then it would seem that the costs can be passed to the customer for the cost of doing business.

You can be known as the cheap freight hauler, or you can be known as the reliable, dependable, customer oriented hauler that gets the job done and the customer keeps using them because they are dealing with a known entity. There appears to be more than enough freight to go around and if any company wants to eat away at the margins by hauling the cheap stuff, or the stuff that pays you for 90% of the work you do then so be it.

IMHO, I personally would rather work for a company that pays me for the work that I do. IE there is more incentive for me to do more if the reward is there. So JB really isn't on my list for companies just because I oppose those that feel it is OK to work for free and pass that character flaw(poor business model) onto me as the driver. Driving is long, hard work, that keeps the drivers away from family, friends, and home for far too long for anyone to be out here driving for free. So my shopping list only has companies that are practical miles or hub miles. YMMV

Sheepdancer, I do like what I see you doing to help folks here. Your right is appears to be about an 80/20 rule. 80% will be happy and content, and 20% will whine and complain no matter what. I too have talked to JB drivers that are happy so I know it isn't all sour grapes and angry unhappy drivers out there.

Longsnowsm

I work for Watkins Shepard and they pay routed Hub Miles. They do specialize in LTL furniture and carpet. (Limiting the competition)

I think the HHG miles started as a standard BOL rate back in the ICC/PUC days when trucking was regulated. Then when the industry was deregulated this method was still the standard. So an inertia for change is defiantly there. However, the free market includes more factors than just customers .. the pressure to compensate drivers is another factor. Getting the freight contacts is one part of the equation (Swift got lots of freight contracts but had great difficulty providing service) -- the second part is moving the freight at a minimum risk. Right now that takes skilled qualified drivers. Certain companies have changed they compensation packages realizing this fact. Watkins Shepard is one of them.

I happen to think this is a great way to compensate the driver. There is an expected mileage (the routed part) but if you have to deviate because of weather, construction, fuel compliance, detours, etc. and you can justify it . then you are paid the hub miles that you justify. Now if you wonder off to visit aunt suzzy . well you will be charged 1.05 mile for the deviation.

No urban legend .. HHG pays %10 - %20 less than hub. It all depends on the zip codes. Now if company 'A' pays .40 per mile HHG and company 'B' pays .35 per hub mile you might be hard pressed to understand the difference. (%10 makes the .36 normalized factor against a .35 factor making the HHG and HUB virtually equal. Using 20% and you have .32 CPM normalized against .35 CPM making Hub much better) The good news is that truckers are a pretty smart bunch. :wink:

Everything I have read indicates practical miles also comes out anywhere from 5%-15% better than the HHG. Anyway you slice it the company and the driver are not getting paid in full for the services rendered. So like Crackaces mentioned... Unless the company like JB pays a rate high enough to offset the miles not paid I wouldn't be interested in JB. There are several companies out there paying good rates, practical miles, and have good reps for taking care of drivers.

I just like seeing that Sheepdancer is on top of the JB questions, and looks to be looking out for folks. That makes an impact on what people think about JB when you have someone on his own time out here answering questions. TWO THUMBS UP!

CA,
I like that Watkins Shepard does the routed hub miles. What I don't care for is the low CPM. Last time I checked they were only paying .30 cpm. Is that still the case? If they would bump the pay I would seriously consider them. I talked to Clint a long time back about WS, and I was very interested until I discovered the pay wasn't all that terrific. If my info is old then I apologize. :cry:

Longsnowsm