Well....by the end of April I will have had one years driving experience with Swift. I couldn't have picked a worse winter to start my driving career I know. Since starting with Swift I have had my ups and downs with they way they do things but kept with them for that all important first year under your belt. OTR has been a blast and I'm now doing Canada on a regular basis which gets me home every weekend. I have to admit to missing getting around and seeing America.....but I will give Canada a run for a while longer before making a decision to move on to another company. Swift are a good company to start out with and I have been given the miles to run to make a decent living.....So why do I want to move on. I guess I have around ten to fifteen years left of a driving/working career. (I'm 56 years old).....I'm new to trucking with just the one year experience and I guess I want to see if there are any better companies out there. I am seriously thinking of going to Conway and back to OTR.....as in all these things I'm still doing the research....asking their drivers...looking at how good their trucks and trailers are....etc, etc. I don't mind running the miles or doing the work....no problem there....but with my next move I hope to be staying with a company for more than just the year. I have to prove myself again I know and it will take time to do that, but I just don't feel settled at Swift....any thoughts or comments as always please let me know......as a side note.....I'm also looking at flatbed....you appear to get more miles doing that kind of work..
One thing to know about LTL (less than truckload) companies Fedex,UPS,Conway and the others......They have strict time schedules,sometimes so tight is beyond reason, that most be kept because of there guarantee they give their customers. That is the main reason those drivers take the risk they do with driving so fast in the worst weather conditions.
Refers to carriers that make a lot of smaller pickups and deliveries for multiple customers as opposed to hauling one big load of freight for one customer. This type of hauling is normally done by companies with terminals scattered throughout the country where freight is sorted before being moved on to its destination.
LTL carriers include:
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.
Thanks Guyjax, duly noted about Conway....I knew about UPS and Fedex, but not Conway with their own strict time schedules.
Man, every FedEx driver I have seen is insane. They drive so fast. Weave in and out of traffic. It is a wonder those drivers don't have a million tickets each. Wonder what the CSA is on these companies.
The CSA is a Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) initiative to improve large truck and bus safety and ultimately reduce crashes, injuries, and fatalities that are related to commercial motor vehicle
Thanks Guyjax, duly noted about Conway....I knew about UPS and Fedex, but not Conway with their own strict time schedules.
Its nuts sometimes. Conway is not near as bad though. I like Conway but in todays economy the biggest thing that companies can promise to set themselves apart for other companies doing the same thing is pricing and FASTER on time delivery.
A lot of my loads our for these companies.Fedex and UPS are nuts with the amount of time they allow for each trip. Conway gives more of a realistic delivery time which I sometimes like but no matter which company I talk about there are reasons behind their madness which is why a lot of LTL otr are team trucks.
Now I am not saying that the companies force you to do anything unsafe. They don't. What everyone sees out on the open road is what the drivers do. NOT THE COMPANIES.
You have to realise that your are dealing with customer contracts that are worth a lot of money. These companies are promising 2-3 days on time delivery and if the load is late someone has to take the blame for it. So pretty much if the road is open you are moving no matter the time of year.
Chains for the tires take on a different way of looking at weather. For the average driver chains are for getting out of a bad area and to safe parking. For these highly time sensitive contract companies chains take on the meaning of "The road is open and chains are there to help you get through the bad area to the next good area so you can continue to run down the road." If the road is open you are expected to do your job and drive down the road.
Again let me stress these: now I am not saying that the companies force you to do anything unsafe. They don't. What everyone sees out on the open road is what the drivers do. NOT THE COMPANIES.
Now for what makes trucking so hard for people to understand why its not as rosy as some people think it is before getting into trucking...
Most companies think themselves as far above the rest of the companies out there and they are the best at what they do. They promise this to their customers. They expect their drivers to make sure this happens and if it do not happen then well they want to know why. These LTL companies are basically the High Performance side of the postal service. The Postal Motto of : "Neither snow, nor rain, nor heat, nor gloom of night, stays these couriers from the swift completion of their appointed rounds" holds very true with these companies and really expect nothing less out of their drivers even if it does add a ton of stress to the job.
Refers to carriers that make a lot of smaller pickups and deliveries for multiple customers as opposed to hauling one big load of freight for one customer. This type of hauling is normally done by companies with terminals scattered throughout the country where freight is sorted before being moved on to its destination.
LTL carriers include:
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.
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Well....by the end of April I will have had one years driving experience with Swift. I couldn't have picked a worse winter to start my driving career I know. Since starting with Swift I have had my ups and downs with they way they do things but kept with them for that all important first year under your belt. OTR has been a blast and I'm now doing Canada on a regular basis which gets me home every weekend. I have to admit to missing getting around and seeing America.....but I will give Canada a run for a while longer before making a decision to move on to another company. Swift are a good company to start out with and I have been given the miles to run to make a decent living.....So why do I want to move on. I guess I have around ten to fifteen years left of a driving/working career. (I'm 56 years old).....I'm new to trucking with just the one year experience and I guess I want to see if there are any better companies out there. I am seriously thinking of going to Conway and back to OTR.....as in all these things I'm still doing the research....asking their drivers...looking at how good their trucks and trailers are....etc, etc. I don't mind running the miles or doing the work....no problem there....but with my next move I hope to be staying with a company for more than just the year. I have to prove myself again I know and it will take time to do that, but I just don't feel settled at Swift....any thoughts or comments as always please let me know......as a side note.....I'm also looking at flatbed....you appear to get more miles doing that kind of work..
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.
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.