Can't Arrive Early

For this load I'm delivering right now, the trip instructions said not to arrive more than 15 minutes early. That wouldn't normally be too much of an issue, but this is Montebello, CA, where there are no truckstops or street parking and the closest Swift terminal is 45 miles away. And traffic is usually not great so you can't count on being able to go a certain speed the whole time.

I got here about 45 minutes early and just drove around the block for about 15 minutes. I didn't send the "arrived" macro until 15ish minutes before the appointment time. But I had to use up drive time for that, and before I arrived the first time I was worried I was going to run into traffic and arrive late.

What do you guys do in this situation? I don't like chancing being late, but I think this might be one of those places that you get a service failure if you arrive too early.

Ive had a couple of those. My QC message just said, DO NOT ARRIVE TOO EARLY or you will get a service failure! WTF IS TOO EARLY? 15 minutes? 1 hour? 1 day? I had a place to park 5 minutes from the Receiver. Waited an hour and showed up right on time. Not another Truck in sight on the property! I wish they would clarify "Too Early". At least they gave you a whopping 15 minute window! That is pure Silliness in my book!

Sounds like when I deliver to Home Depot stores. But that'should in Maine and not CA so i'very never had trouble timing it right.

Do you really only get a 15 minute window to arrive 'on time', or are you just trying to be as early as possible?

OK, time to figure out how to turn off auto complete.

Ive had a couple of those. My QC message just said, DO NOT ARRIVE TOO EARLY or you will get a service failure! WTF IS TOO EARLY? 15 minutes? 1 hour? 1 day? I had a place to park 5 minutes from the Receiver. Waited an hour and showed up right on time. Not another Truck in sight on the property! I wish they would clarify "Too Early". At least they gave you a whopping 15 minute window! That is pure Silliness in my book!

Well, I don't think they should give a service failure for it, but it did make sense at this one. They keep a strict schedule and there's like no room on the property or the street.

What I do at places like Walmart is arrive, send the macro, then leave til it's closer to the appt time. If I time it wrong by accident, I'm still covered. But if they give you a service failure for arriving too early then you cant really do that, ya know? They didn't specifically say anything about a service failure this time, but I know other times that they have.

Ive had a couple of those. My QC message just said, DO NOT ARRIVE TOO EARLY or you will get a service failure! WTF IS TOO EARLY? 15 minutes? 1 hour? 1 day? I had a place to park 5 minutes from the Receiver. Waited an hour and showed up right on time. Not another Truck in sight on the property! I wish they would clarify "Too Early". At least they gave you a whopping 15 minute window! That is pure Silliness in my book!

Well, I don't think they should give a service failure for it, but it did make sense at this one. They keep a strict schedule and there's like no room on the property or the street.

What I do at places like Walmart is arrive, send the macro, then leave til it's closer to the appt time. If I time it wrong by accident, I'm still covered. But if they give you a service failure for arriving too early then you cant really do that, ya know? They didn't specifically say anything about a service failure this time, but I know other times that they have.

Omg.. Service failure for too early.. I'd be fired. I'm gonna be about 30 hrs early for this load. Gonna run that sucker in and try to get rid of it.

I had on this week on Denver.. Not.more than 30 min early... And another in KS maybe.... I drove real slow... At might of course ahhaa. I once parked in a lot 2/miles away for 6hrs but didn't send depart call. Might dispatch messaged me "did I get to rec". Uh... Nooooo and I woke me you jerk hahahh

Not sure how it works with vans but typically in flatbed they don't mind us being early. If the qc specifically says don't be early I'll call and smooth talk whoever answers lol

Not sure how it works with vans but typically in flatbed they don't mind us being early. If the qc specifically says don't be early I'll call and smooth talk whoever answers lol

Typically that's what I'd do, but it's different with these "don't arrive early" things. An older driver I met at one of the terminals who allegedly had been working here for like 20 years said he called ahead and delivered early at one of these places and he got some heated phone calls from Swift afterward haha. I think he said it wasn't in the load notes at that point so he didn't know any better, but after that they put it in the load notes and started giving service failures for arriving early.

It's not super likely but it could have actually been the same place I delivered to yesterday. His delivery was delivering beer cans in CA with a 15 minute delivery window, which is exactly what I did yesterday. Who knows.

Omg.. Service failure for too early.. I'd be fired

I was fired for this once. We had a customer that was getting in trouble with the local fire marshall for having trucks parked on the road. So the customer told all of the trucking companies not to show up more than 15 minutes early. Well drivers at my company were still showing up early and the customer threatened to cut back our loads. We were getting like 16 a day, they cut it back to 8, and were threatening to cut us out completely. This made it all the way to the head honchos at the top.

Well the head honchos made a strict mandate that said all drivers must be warned ahead of time about this place both over the Qualcomm and over the phone. They said the next time this happens both the dispatcher and the driver would be fired.

So here I know nothing about this. I get a load that picks up at the place and the only instructions say "Do not arrive early" - that's it. Well what's that mean, right? They tell us if you're late twice in a six month period you can be fired. But then it says I also can not be early. So I figure I'll make sure I arrive maybe 20 - 30 minutes early. I mean, how precise are we talking about here, right?

So I roll in like 25 minutes early and there's no other trucks there. Everyone is happy to see me, they load me right up, and off I go. The next morning I get a message to come to the terminal where the terminal manager and operations manager, both of whom I know well after being at the company for years, have this morose look on their faces and proceed to tell me the story and tell me I'm fired.

Well I'm thinking they're joking, right? Been driving like 12 years, been with the company like 5 years, totally spotless safety and service record, run harder than anyone. You don't just fire a guy with my history for showing up 25 minutes early instead of 15 minutes early, right?

Wrong. I was fired.

Well I told them no one gave me a time frame. It said "don't be early" but never said how early is early. They asked, "Didn't your dispatcher call you?" I said, "No, why would he call me?" Then their eyes lit up and they were like, "Maybe we can do something about this"

So I'm not kidding, I went through six different interviews that day to beg for my job back. Started with dispatcher's boss, then head of dispatch, then operations manager, then terminal manager, then one other guy I can't remember his title, then finally got on a conference call with the Head of East Coast Operations for the company. This is like the 5th guy in command under the owners of US Xpress, a company with over 5,000 trucks. Talked to him for like 15 minutes with everyone else that interviewed me in the room. After the interview they asked me to leave the room so they could talk.

Ten minutes later they brought me back in and said I could keep my job.

That entire affair took like 4 hours. It was one of the strangest days in all of my years of trucking. One of the top performing drivers in the entire fleet for a number of years and I have to beg everyone in the company from my dispatcher's boss almost all the way up to the owners themselves to let me keep my job.

But see, you have to understand that in this business you have to learn to be humble because drivers have no authority and get very little respect from anyone. Because of my record they gave me the privilege of begging for my job back but even as a top performing driver for many years I didn't even get the benefit of the doubt when the situation happened. They didn't even ask before firing me, they just said "Fire the next driver and dispatcher that does this."

Turns out my dispatcher did lose his job and didn't get it back. I was told he even had several family members that were higher up and had worked there for years but they couldn't get him his job back after that.

So when I tell you guys to be humble, act professional, and expect your career to hit some bumps in the road from time to time it comes from many years of experience in this industry. When I went through those interviews I never once raised my voice, I never once got defensive, and I never once pointed any fingers at anyone for mistreating me. I simply made a list of points I wanted to make and brought that list with me to every interview and stated my case plainly. Each person sent me up the ladder to the next until I got high enough that someone was able to make the call and let me keep my job.

That's trucking!

Omg.. Service failure for too early.. I'd be fired

I was fired for this once. We had a customer that was getting in trouble with the local fire marshall for having trucks parked on the road. So the customer told all of the trucking companies not to show up more than 15 minutes early. Well drivers at my company were still showing up early and the customer threatened to cut back our loads. We were getting like 16 a day, they cut it back to 8, and were threatening to cut us out completely. This made it all the way to the head honchos at the top.

Well the head honchos made a strict mandate that said all drivers must be warned ahead of time about this place both over the Qualcomm and over the phone. They said the next time this happens both the dispatcher and the driver would be fired.

So here I know nothing about this. I get a load that picks up at the place and the only instructions say "Do not arrive early" - that's it. Well what's that mean, right? They tell us if you're late twice in a six month period you can be fired. But then it says I also can not be early. So I figure I'll make sure I arrive maybe 20 - 30 minutes early. I mean, how precise are we talking about here, right?

So I roll in like 25 minutes early and there's no other trucks there. Everyone is happy to see me, they load me right up, and off I go. The next morning I get a message to come to the terminal where the terminal manager and operations manager, both of whom I know well after being at the company for years, have this morose look on their faces and proceed to tell me the story and tell me I'm fired.

Well I'm thinking they're joking, right? Been driving like 12 years, been with the company like 5 years, totally spotless safety and service record, run harder than anyone. You don't just fire a guy with my history for showing up 25 minutes early instead of 15 minutes early, right?

Wrong. I was fired.

Well I told them no one gave me a time frame. It said "don't be early" but never said how early is early. They asked, "Didn't your dispatcher call you?" I said, "No, why would he call me?" Then their eyes lit up and they were like, "Maybe we can do something about this"

So I'm not kidding, I went through six different interviews that day to beg for my job back. Started with dispatcher's boss, then head of dispatch, then operations manager, then terminal manager, then one other guy I can't remember his title, then finally got on a conference call with the Head of East Coast Operations for the company. This is like the 5th guy in command under the owners of US Xpress, a company with over 5,000 trucks. Talked to him for like 15 minutes with everyone else that interviewed me in the room. After the interview they asked me to leave the room so they could talk.

Ten minutes later they brought me back in and said I could keep my job.

That entire affair took like 4 hours. It was one of the strangest days in all of my years of trucking. One of the top performing drivers in the entire fleet for a number of years and I have to beg everyone in the company from my dispatcher's boss almost all the way up to the owners themselves to let me keep my job.

But see, you have to understand that in this business you have to learn to be humble because drivers have no authority and get very little respect from anyone. Because of my record they gave me the privilege of begging for my job back but even as a top performing driver for many years I didn't even get the benefit of the doubt when the situation happened. They didn't even ask before firing me, they just said "Fire the next driver and dispatcher that does this."

Turns out my dispatcher did lose his job and didn't get it back. I was told he even had several family members that were higher up and had worked there for years but they couldn't get him his job back after that.

So when I tell you guys to be humble, act professional, and expect your career to hit some bumps in the road from time to time it comes from many years of experience in this industry. When I went through those interviews I never once raised my voice, I never once got defensive, and I never once pointed any fingers at anyone for mistreating me. I simply made a list of points I wanted to make and brought that list with me to every interview and stated my case plainly. Each person sent me up the ladder to the next until I got high enough that someone was able to make the call and let me keep my job.

That's trucking!

Damn, holy crap Brett haha. That's crazy. I was hoping you would come on here and tell your story. I remembered you saying something about this before.