Valsdad,
Your brother worked for ComTrans. A division of North American.
Tau trucking companies had been advertising hiring 21 years olds
to drive truck. The day I turned 21, I called them, got their
packets later that week. ComTrans and Schneider.
Read the Comtrans stuff
Lease to own, from the people who controlled my income?
I couldn't even pick my truck. Got stuck in an old one, "with the future
opportunity to upgrade".
I smelled the rat, and went with Schneider.
Eventually ComTrans was put out of business due to their practices.
Sken,
Crystal definitely has some fire with the smoke.
Never been a container hauler from ports, but I've sure done
enough time to have experienced everything she says, except the
crooked lease agreements. Research Prime Trucking, for that info.
And they are a big "legitimate" outfit. Imagine the mob outfits at ports.
Standard trip planning values,
2 hours for any load/unload,
1 hour for drop and hook trailer
1/2 hour for pretrip
1/2 hour to fuel.
These standards are used to calculate if one can meet the requirements
for pickup and delivery of an offered load.
I often would do a load a day as a long haul guy.
So, unload+reload+fuel and pretrip.
5 hours unpaid. In the plan.
It takes at least an hour to load anything.
I have spent as much as 2 days waiting. (Not often. But up to 8 isn't uncommon) No layover pay until it hit 24 hours.
Grocery warehouses are horrible 4-8 hours to unload are common.
A hand unload paid $50 (1990s) and was planned at 4 hours. That would be quick. Due to dock requirements and procedures.
Hand unload or not, you had to get the freight out of the trailer, with
a manual or motorized pallet lift. Often, you had to take a layer(plus)
of product off each skid and stack it on others to meet their skid size
requirements. We had to touch 70 or 80% before we got paid. So this was
usually free.
Not sure how this has all changed in 20 years.
But,
My hours of service laws were 10 hours driving, or,
15 hours combined driving/work, then an 8 hour break.
And we logged it on paper with a pen. And lied like hell.
Today, it's 11 hours driving, 10 hour break.
But there are 2 critical wrinkles.
If you drive an electronic engine truck, you are pretty well mandated
to use electronic logging.
There is a 14 hour window to work in.
Once you do any work, or drive, a 14 hour clock starts.
You have the potential to drive 11 hours, but within 14.
So if you unload then load at 4 hours, that used your time and you
now only have 10. Fuel and pretrip down to 9.
Get screwed at a dock?
In my trucking days, we lied on the logbook. Shifted time and the
wasted time was shown as off duty or sleep time. We lost sleep,
But kept clocking paying miles.
I mentioned the electronic logs?
You slept at a delivery costumer last night,
And they wake you, tell you to back into door number 3.
When you release your brakes and move,
that 14 hour clock just started. And there is nothing you can do about it.
The 14 hour rule and the E-logs have been causing problems
in the industry for a few years. I really don't think any of the
desk drivers that made these rules had any idea how much we
got screwed with, or how much we lied in our logs.
Went on here, but..
With paper logs if you got sleepy, and had time on the load,
you pulled over and took a nap. Didn't log it. You waited untill
later and put that time with the 4 or 5 hours you were down that night.
Now, if you get the afternoon nods, (or 4am) you can't nap.
That 14 hour clock is ticking. When it is up. You gotta
shut down, or you are in violation. And it's recorded, reported, and
you can't do Jack crap about that.
Truck accidents are up.
Despite these regulations?
Or because of them?
