Comments By Jason

Get as much backing time on the pad as you can. Five days on the road and trainer wont let me do any. Her job is to prep me for passing cdl exam...no more. Not until TNT will i get any practical backing experience. Kinda bummed.

Still plenty of other stuff to pick up. Springfield to Columbus, OH to Salem, VA to Mt Sterling KY and now to GA in last 3 days. Driving backroads through mtns was a bit nerve wracking pulling a full load. Lots of practice using the Jake break.

Hell of a time to hit Atlanta...Superbowl on Sunday...so the nasty traffic will be that much worse!

Enjoy the room while you can, space heater in the truck crapped out last night after we parked in our reserved spot. Woke up 2am with ice forming inside the cab...30F. Freightliners don't idle...ugh, so to use dash heater someone has to pump the accelerator every few min.

Starting to head south today, hopefully last of the negative temps... (-6 w/o wind atm)

Don’t cram too much....minimum 2 weeks between permit and test attempt.

20+ hours riding greyhound will test patience of a Saint. Means to an end...doesn't change reality that it sucks.

Argument could be made that Prime’s motto equates to “Hurry up and wait”. You’ll find out soon enough.

I lucked out. Picked up by a PSD trainer today. Her current trainee is testing tomorrow but we’ll be hitting the road Monday morning. Got some hours on Qualcomm while helping other student review. Learned straight back and L/R offset...and how to fix a botched attempt. Definitely a well defined formula on the pad, curious to see how it works in the field.

There are still 60+ waiting for trainers...some even from class before ours. Impressive really...about 350+ students for first 3 weeks in January.

Hi-Val was first.

One of them mentioned ‘rollover’ as the “unforgivable #5”; but they never spell out what the first 4 are. I image discussing Hi-Val loads is one of them. What the other 3 are is a mystery. I’ll ask one of the Sim people tomorrow.

Patrick- make sure you bring additional contact info for your last employers. HR info specifically if you can get it. At least a handful of us (In my group) got calls from our Recruiters late today that they are having trouble verifying our employment history. !?!?!?!?!

Mind blowing that they have waited so long...I put in my app and paid my fee mid-December! I’m a sim test away from finishing the orientation and now when I have the least resource to assist them... they are asking? Whatever they have asked for; bring extra. What’s good and complete before you get on the bus isn’t really.

I get Rainy’s point of doing things in stages; but getting my last boss to fax Prime an employment verification letter would have been real easy when I was still employed there. Trying to get it less than 8 hours after I’ve already moved on... not so much.

You are going to have to put your video aspirations on hold and/or heavily censor it. One of the CBT (computer based training) that you have to complete is an agreement that everything Prime shares/teaches is proprietary and meant for only their employees/trainees. Head’s up.

Actually I think there’s some blame at both ends on the background check. “Supposedly” (and I know this b/c he was my room-mate) he was honest about the Felony on his application but his date was off by a few weeks. Well whether it’s 3 years 10 months or 11... it’s still within 5 years. Looks more like Prime Recruiter rushed to fill a seat without getting approval or running the minimal check before giving the guy a bus ticket!

Don’t want to hijack your thread. Looks like they’ll have the Main Lab fixed by next week. They were putting down new carpet today so you’ll have fewer hiccups.

I got my permit and license transferred today and CBT’s are done. Just 2 hour sessions for Sim lab everyday for the rest of the week. No chance of getting to the pad or other until this weekend.

Day 2 about to begin. Lost two people yesterday. Bad background check discovered after he’d made the bus trip (which really sucks by the way... to arrive only to be told to leave) and someone else tried to cheat the drug screen. It’s been a little crazy. Last week major water break forced Prime to relocate the entire hotel for two days. The break was under C4 which is the main computer lab... so we’re all limited to a dozen PC’s for CBT... for 90+ that’s rough. Thankfully a few of us have our own. I managed to get drug test, physical, and file review done. Not everyone was so lucky.

Permit test, CBTs, and Simulation training today. Haven’t met the author of this post yet; not knowingly. I’m in Group 2; D Sim group. (Because C-4 is unavailable...they had to split us up; next biggest classroom only holds 55).