Will I Get Fired?

I am a Schneider driver and have been driving for 4 months. I hit a parking rail in a lot going less than 5 mph. It tore off the side of my plastic bumper and my steering wheel is crooked now. The truck drives fine and everything but I am nervous they will fire me. Taking it to the company shop tomorrow to see if they can fix it. This is the first time I have hit anything also.

Welcome to the Trucking Truth site, Phil! Glad you are here with us.

As a rookie driver, companies expect things like this to happen to their newly minted employees. Did you report it?

I would think you may get some additional training, and at the worst, go back out with a trainer for a few days.

Own it, admit it, learn from it! Everyone makes tactical errors.

Hello, I agree with PackRat, report it and own it, if you haven't already. I found that with Werner, as long as you reported it, owned it, and were 100% honest, they would work with you, as long as it wasn't a regular occurrence..... Companies half expect drivers to have the occasional "oops, I messed up" moments...

Now if it was something major, like you rolled your truck with a fully loaded trailer, worth millions, well, I am sure that would be something else....

Phil, while none of us can guarantee you'll NOT get booted out, you'll notice that Chris and PackRat aren't too worried for you. Me neither. For my first accident, I backed in a way that my trailer door (opened to back into a dock) tore a hole in a warehouse wall. (And that wasn't my last one!)

Pictures taken, duly reported. I had to go to a terminal and talk with the Safety Officer, and take a one day course in Close Quarter maneuvering.

The most important thing for you is to use this accident as a learning experience. Become an expert in that situation and you'll know for sure what to do next time.

And remember the old saw:

Dust yerse'f off, git back on the horse ya fell off of, an' ride some more.

Getting it fixed right now. They've made it less of a deal than I thought they would have so far. Sounds like it's common for drivers to have little incidents once in a while. Makes sense. I have drove 30000 miles so far in 4 months which is twice what the average person drives in a personal vehicle. I just will have to be more careful for now on. I was kind of daydreaming a bit when it happened.

I was kind of daydreaming a bit when it happened.

See what that got you? Not good. You need 100% focus at all times.

Schneider is very forgiving while you're still new and learning the ropes. Just make sure you learn from your mistakes, and prove it. They will also most likely bring you in for some extra training as that's common for these type of accidents, if they do; it normally only last about an hour or two and you'll go over what happened, go for a drive to show you're a safe driver, and things like that.

I actually had a buddy who had two(or three?) preventable accidents while at Schneider, two were parking lot accidents due to not turning wide enough and another is where he hit a pickup truck that tried to go past him during his turn, the officer who responded to the call said the pickup was at fault, but Schneider did not see it that way since we are professional drivers and could've been prevented if he was scanning his mirrors. He never got fired after all this, and decided to leave and go somewhere else. This all happened within his first 10 months.

You need 100% focus at all times.

It is impossible to be 100% focused at all times due human nature, drivers get distracted for all kind of reasons outside of texting and driving for example, such as something catching your eye, reading billboards, etc and we all know how fast things can go south in the matter of seconds.

I suppose it does depend on the situation, since you should be very focused when in areas with a lot of traffic, tight turns, and things like that.

You need 100% focus at all times.

It is impossible to be 100% focused at all times due human nature, drivers get distracted for all kind of reasons outside of texting and driving for example, such as something catching your eye, reading billboards, etc and we all know how fast things can go south in the matter of seconds.

I suppose it does depend on the situation, since you should be very focused when in areas with a lot of traffic, tight turns, and things like that.

Yeah, well I've maintained this ethic every day and haven't run into anything yet, Jamie. How about you?

You need 100% focus at all times.

It is impossible to be 100% focused at all times due human nature, drivers get distracted for all kind of reasons outside of texting and driving for example, such as something catching your eye, reading billboards, etc and we all know how fast things can go south in the matter of seconds.

I suppose it does depend on the situation, since you should be very focused when in areas with a lot of traffic, tight turns, and things like that.

Yeah, well I've maintained this ethic every day and haven't run into anything yet, Jamie. How about you?

I've had two incidents early on and learned from them, but my above statement still stands. It's just simply impossible to be 100% focused all the time, just because you haven't hit anything doesn't make the statement any less valid.