Comments By BC & MJ

When you say "no pay"....who's paying for the gas you used, driving those miles??

RV -- not sure what you are getting at ... but, obviously the carrier pays for the fuel.

My husband and I are new to the trucking industry (3 months), so we are trying to learn what is just part of the game (what we should just adjust to) and what is an issue with the particular carrier, terminal or personnel. The carrier in this instance is Swift Trucking. I am not interested in bashing the company, or personnel ... just want to know if what we are experiencing is consistent with the industry and, if not, maybe some guidance in how to overcome it.

Many times my husband is dispatched to a location to pick up an empty trailer, but when he arrives the location does not have any empty trailers. This has resulted in hours wasted waiting to be dispatched to another location, only to learn they too do not have any empty trailers. Case in point: 2 days ago, he delivered a load and was bobtail; then received a dispatch to pick up a load, but before he could pick that up he had to wait until they could find an empty trailer to take into the site. he waited ALL DAY which ran him out of hours. the next day, they still could not find him a trailer, late in the day, they finally told him to go pick up the load without an empty. The customer told my husband that they didn't care whether he brought in an empty ... so the load, which was supposed to be delivered 2 days ago was going to be late due to dispatch glitch. He pulled the load a little over 100 miles to the receiver, but time was running too short for them to unload before hours ran out again, so he found a truck stop to stay over night. This morning, they tell him to park the load (which was due at the receiver 2 days ago) at the local terminal, go pick up an empty and take it 350 miles south. He gets to the place to pick up the empty ... they don't have one. So there he sits ... clock ticking. He put himself off-duty, but the clock still will run him out of hours before the end of day.

For 3 days he has been going in circles because dispatch insists that he have an empty to take to any customer that has an outgoing load. It has burned up 3 days driving time, no pay. Now he is coming up against a 34 hour reset ... again, no pay.

Help! Is this generally how things work? If not, what would be the best guidance to overcome this frustrating issue?

Thanks y'all! We will most likely get a POB in the same city where our storage unit is located. Also working to go paperless with any mailing that offers such I suppose would be helpful.

Appreciate the responses .. love this forum!

My husband and I are planning to go OTR as a team, and truly embrace the lifestyle ... giving up our apartment. Curious what others do about mail delivery without a home base. PO Box most likely, but not sure where? Thoughts?

Don't ask for anyone's blessing. I'm 53 and doing this for me, because I know I will enjoy it immensely. My 3rd and final career until retirement. . Did my time in office administration, 20 years in Healthcare. . Now onto something new :-)

Now if I can just get parallel parking mastered and get a few small chinks worked out on my double clutching, I'll be good to go test with DOT in the first week of December. Yes, the Kentucky State Police no longer do our testing here.. Vehicle Enforcement does lol.

Lynette -- I logged on to find out if I was the only lady over 50 with NO trucking experience to start a new career ... and found your post. I am just now studying for my permit, the more I learn, the more interested and exciting I get about the possibilities.