Question:
I drive for a smaller company (400 cars) which claims to be "different" from other caring companies.
For the past week I seem to have slipped onto the "regional" board (8 loads ranging from 65 to 576 miles) and I was heading for our drop yard in the Chicago area when circumstances (not to be confused with pizz poor planning) and bad weather conspired to shut me down early; I couldn't get to Chicago prior to running out of my 14 hour day.
While "enjoying" my Hardee-burger (won't make the "best burger" list), I got a pre-plan for my next load; a load that required a p/u in Chicago at 6 P.M. on Saturday and a delivery on the east cost NLT 11 p.m. Sunday. The total distance was about 925 miles and included running US-30 through Indiana and Ohio (to Mansfield). Considering that I was scheduled to deliver in Chicago at 9 a.m., it was obvious that the only way I could deliver the pre-planned load would be to make my delivery and go to the sleeper berth for all day Saturday. The only flaw in that scenario was that I would be going to the sleeper berth after a good night's sleep and would be awake all day.
So, I informed the "Fleet Manager" (not to be confused with "Keyboard Jockey") who assigned me the "pre-plan" that I would not be able to keep the proposed schedule.
He, of course, pointed out that it was a "legal" load.
I countered with "there's a difference between legal and safe"
His answer was, and I quote:
All transit is based on legal run time. Will take you off load. Cannot promise we will be able to move you this weekend and am unsure about layover. Take care and be safe.
My reply to that nonsense was:
Move me to (nearby drop yard) and relay this load; if you can't "move me" because I refuse to operate unsafely, I can't work for you.
Several BS phone calls ensued with the bottom line being that I'd complete my run to the Chicago drop yard (it was a relay to get another driver home) and that I wouldn't be left sitting there all weekend.
So, after relaying the load this morning, I was assigned another load. Pickup in Chicago Saturday morning, deliver at 11 p.m. Sunday night at a location 480 miles away: two days, 480 miles, no way to reset hours.
I've been with these nitwits about 3 months, stay out 6-8 weeks, have never been late with a p/u or delivery and am averaging over 2,800 miles per week (considerably higher than "normal"). The odds of my remaining with these nitwits beyond the time it takes to make this delivery and get back to my point of hire is not very good.

Answer:

nitwit companies right off the top of my head that this would apply to.
Then again I can think of 3 or 400 companies you can apply this too.
I will always be a mutter carer at heart.

Answer:

I can think of 3 or 400 companies you can apply this too
No doubt about it.
According to J.J. Keller, the cost to a company when it loses a driver in his first year of employment (with that company), is over $9,000.
For me, I'm two phone calls and an application away from another job; my potential loss in income in changing jobs is considerably less than what I'd lose by allowing myself to be jacked around by ego-maniac "Fleet Managers".

Answer:

wouldnt be based out of MN by any chance and run reefers, flatbeds, and dry vans would it?
I will always be a mutter carer at heart.

Answer:

you've only been with them for 3 months, you are still the newbie with them. learn from this situation and make adjustments the next time you see it coming.
it's only one weekend, if it happens on a more frequent basis than you have a reason to complain.
but since you are barely out of probation, take it easy and show them how important you are to them, in the end hopefully it will work out for you.
good luck

Answer:

I had my car leased to them, and one winter two years ago, they attempted to send me from Houston to upstate New York- when a nasty blizzard and sub-zero temperatures were taking place! I politely told them "Thanks, but I'm not interested in going up there due to weather problems". They tried to convince me that the weather was fine up there, and I replied "I know better than to believe that, as I monitor the weather via the Internet, Weather Channel, and by friends that are traveling in different areas and see it firsthand!". They have some real geniuses working in their dispatch office!
"If we keep electing the same lousy candidates into office, we'll always have a lousy government!
ASE Certified Master Diesel Technician who found a love for the road!
No liability for information posted, which are my opinions based on personal expreiences.

Answer:

Originally
According to J.J. Keller, the cost to a company when it loses a driver in his first year of employment (with that company), is over $9,000.

They ought to charge that to the moron responsible for causing the driver to leave...

For me, I'm two phone calls and an application away from another job; my potential loss in income in changing jobs is considerably less than what I'd lose by allowing myself to be jacked around by ego-maniac "Fleet Managers".
I've concluded that the only way to get a job where you don't have to deal with idiot dispatchers is to get a job that doesn't require dspatchers period.
@#*!%$^@!

Answer:

"a load that required a p/u in Chicago at 6 P.M. on Saturday and a delivery on the east cost NLT 11 p.m. Sunday. The total distance was about 925 miles"
=======
29 hours for about a 17 hour ride.
afternoon nap and loaded by 8pm,cruise to 2am,sleep untill noon and take it on into receiver.
I left CT. a bunch of times around 6pm on saterday night and would be in Mishawaka(South Bend)IN around 8pm sunday night.On the back roads in IN/OH with 45,000lbs of them huge paper rolls.
What are you going to do when they tell you to pickup at 6pm and be 600 miles down the road by 6am???
Maybe you should have wrote the FMCSA about this HOS crap
I'm not knocking you driver,just because a load like that would fit my way of running,don't mean everyone is the same and that should have been taken into consideration with the HOS,because whatever they came up with,some desk jockey is going to punch the numbers in their computer and make deliveries according to whats legal.You probably would have arrived at the receiver and found out it didn't really matter if you got there at 11pm

Answer:

I left CT. a bunch of times around 6pm on saterday night and would be in Mishawaka(South Bend)IN around 8pm sunday night.On the back roads in IN/OH with 45,000lbs of them huge paper rolls.
Sure. It wasn’t a question of being physically capable of delivering the load. I could have picked it up, ran for a few hours, got 7 hours of sleep and ran it the rest of the way with a couple of rest breaks in route. No big deal. Unfortunately, even though doing that would have been perfectly safe, it wouldn’t have been legal.
The only “legal” way of trying to deliver the load on time was to go to the sleeper berth after delivering Saturday morning, run the load until O dark thirty, sit for 10 hours, and then try to run it the rest of the way. If I had stretched the log book, I could have got to Beaver Dam, OH before I ran out of hours. After a 10 hour break, I’d have 11 hours to drive and about 660 miles to go, about 200 of that in Ohio. Was it possible to have made it on time? Sure. I would have had to bend the log book again but I certainly could have made it. Legally? No. Safely? No.
What are you going to do when they tell you to pickup at 6pm and be 600 miles down the road by 6am???
It will depend on the circumstances but if I don’t believe that I can run the load and deliver on time SAFELY, then I will do the same thing as I did in this case.
As I mentioned, ”I'm two phone calls and an application away from another job; my potential loss in income in changing jobs is considerably less than what I'd lose by allowing myself to be jacked around by ego-maniac "Fleet Managers".”

Answer:

All drivers, and employees in general in the U.S., are just disposable tools, so there is no reason to stay with any particular company; the government and their owners will provide replacement tools at taxpayer expense for those who aren't passive enough.
Immigration policy will simply be revamped and adapted to prevent companies from having to upgrade their management skills.
___________________________
Humans are amazing creatures. "With all the things you can train them to do, I've been considering getting one."-Stoney

Answer:

deliver 9am saterday/pickup 6pm(11 hour break)at least in the log book
"I could have got to Beaver Dam, OH before I ran out of hours"
I don't get why you would be out of hours less than 5 hours down the road
Why couldn't you run the 85 miles over to I-71 and shut it down
Than you would be within 11 hours of your delivery
Last edited by zigzag on Sun Jan 25, 2004 6:39 am; edited 1 time in total

Answer:

I don't get why you would be out of hours less than 5 hours down the road
I should have been a bit more clear. The pickup was about an hour west of the drop yard so the time from the drop yard to Beaver Dam (where I sit now) was closer to 7 hours than five.
The rest of the answer was in my original post:
”I was heading for our drop yard in the Chicago area when circumstances (not to be confused with pizz poor planning) and bad weather conspired to shut me down early; I couldn't get to Chicago prior to running out of my 14 hour day.”
”Considering that I was scheduled to deliver in Chicago at 9 a.m., it was obvious that the only way I could deliver the pre-planned load would be to make my delivery and go to the sleeper berth for all day Saturday.”
The “pizz poor planning” was on the part of the company. I picked up a load that required blocking that the shipper wasn’t prepared to do and required that the company hire a local contractor to do the job. The company didn’t make any preparation for this scenario, even though they had had a similar load earlier in the week and knew what would be required, so I spent a number of hours at the shipper waiting for the contractor. As a result, my 14 hours would have run out before I could get to Chicago.
In addition, I was running in the early part of a snow storm and though the roads weren’t real bad (for us northerners), it didn’t make lot of sense to drive in crap when I could take my break and drive on better roads in the early a.m.. It wasn’t until several hours after I had stopped for the night/day, and my 14 hours had run out, that dispatch provided me with the pre-plan information.
Obviously, I could have spent all day Saturday on line two, even though it was highly unlikely that I would have gotten any sleep, and then ran from 7 p.m. until 6 a.m. Sunday morning. That would have put me around the PA border. After a 10 hour break, I would then have 7 hours to run the final 460 miles. Could I have done it? Maybe. Could I have done it safely? Nope. If I had been late, whose fault would it have been? Mine. As a result, I threw the ball back to dispatch to either reschedule the load or to give it to someone else. They did that and decided to take a shot at screwing me while they were at it.

Answer:

"Different strokes for different folks"----We are all not the same. And the quicker dispatchers learn each driver the better dispatcher he becomes. The problem with dispatchers they havent and dont want to learn each "personality" of their drivers.
I hate being compared to other people!!!!! When God made me, He made an individual!!! What one driver will or can do, I might not. The way one driver runs, might not suit me!
During my career of jobs, one being a dispatcher for three years and having over 100 union men under my supervision, I learned that "sugar can catch more flies than vinegar" And a dispatcher might screw a driver, but that dispatcher better realize that that driver can sit there behind the wheel for hour after hour and think of ways to "get even" and a smart driver "can get even".
Only a dumb driver allows a dispatcher to take advantage of him.
Just a grouchy old man.
"The average dog is a nicer person than the average person"-Andy Rooney

Answer:

{A Dispatcher's Revenge}
This is interesting.
We had a newer driver out in CA, he was always cry babying and whining. Dispatch set him up with a load, CA to NJ. He cried and cried, I don't want to go to NJ. So dispatch set him up the next day, CA to PQ.
He whined and cried about "he doesn't do Canada".
Well, dispatch heard enough of his BS, whining and crying. That driver sat out there in CA for the next 8 days with no layover pay.
The driver Quit when he finally got back to FL.
The dispatchers here don't want to hear whining and crying about where the driver "wants" to run.
I would imagine that driver went to work for one of the big freight companies. They'll hold his hand, use a little tissue to wipe his snotty little nose, give him a group hug, etc etc.