My Christmas Gift From Swift
Topic 21503 | Page 1
My DM told me that they would do whatever was necessary to get me home for Christmas "even if that means bobtailing you from North Carolina to Alabama". Thankfully I got a load and got here yesterday, but yes you are absolutely correct. They get the most internet flak of any company, but contrary to what people say, they don't actually hate their drivers. They honestly do care about us and it's nice. Glad you made it home for Christmas!
Bobtail:
"Bobtailing" means you are driving a tractor without a trailer attached.
Dm:
Dispatcher, Fleet Manager, Driver Manager
The primary person a driver communicates with at his/her company. A dispatcher can play many roles, depending on the company's structure. Dispatchers may assign freight, file requests for home time, relay messages between the driver and management, inform customer service of any delays, change appointment times, and report information to the load planners.
They deadheaded me 186 miles, to be home. PLUS, the load planner added the miles into my current dispatch!
Swift takes care of us.
Deadhead:
To drive with an empty trailer. After delivering your load you will deadhead to a shipper to pick up your next load.
They deadheaded me 186 miles, to be home. PLUS, the load planner added the miles into my current dispatch!
Swift takes care of us.
Now that's a nice present. Merry Christmas to my fellow Swifties.
Deadhead:
To drive with an empty trailer. After delivering your load you will deadhead to a shipper to pick up your next load.
I got dead headed home as well. Was in a pickle because I need a b service. They said just go home and we will take care of it when you come back. Glad to hear you guys made it home too.
That is awesome they did that for all of you. All big companies seem to get bagged on and never seem to get credit for the great things they do. Merry Christmas ya'll
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Spent the last day and a half trying to get a load home for Christmas home time to be with the wife and kids. It was super important to me since I spent my first 5 weeks solo without coming home. I was working surge for Target and the planner there tried to get me a load home but kept sending me preplans that I didn't have the hours to run ( I was on recap and only had like 9 hours available) with each plan he sent me I had to call back and go over it and he agreed and had to remove the plan. Finally we decided it was best to call my home terminal and have them switch me back to otr to see if there was something nearby to get me home. I shut down last night waiting on a plan and woke up with nothing. So I drove to the Target dc to drop my empty and got on the phone. Long story short they couldn't find me anything going from Columbus back towards Detroit so they greenlighted me to bobtail all the way home. Couldn't believe they did that considering that ultimately cost Swift the money for fuel. Swift catches a lot of flak in the trucking community but they've certainly done right me and I'm very appreciative. Got back to my home terminal at about 10am this morning and get to wake up Christmas morning with my family and couldn't be happier. Thanks Swift!
Merry Christmas to all! :)
Bobtail:
"Bobtailing" means you are driving a tractor without a trailer attached.
Terminal:
A facility where trucking companies operate out of, or their "home base" if you will. A lot of major companies have multiple terminals around the country which usually consist of the main office building, a drop lot for trailers, and sometimes a repair shop and wash facilities.
OTR:
Over The Road
OTR driving normally means you'll be hauling freight to various customers throughout your company's hauling region. It often entails being gone from home for two to three weeks at a time.