Take this job and love it

You’d think trucking companies would be falling over themselves finding innovative ways to retain their staff. But ask most drivers–both company and owner-operators–and they’ll still have their beefs over being dissed by the company in some way. Add a 13-hour day behind the wheel with plenty of time to stew, and soon what might have been a minor problem blossoms into something huge–at least in the driver’s mind.

Today’s Trucking interviewed a few different drivers from around the country looking for some of their gripes, which we then passed along to trucking human-resources specialist George Iacono at Global Driver Services, and Ray Haight, president of MacKinnon Transport, a member of the Canada’s 50 Best Managed Companies list, for their suggestions. The verdict? With a little tact and not too much money, the problems could have been avoided.
All driver names have been changed.

By Duff McCutcheon
1 Trailer
trash
Joe’s a 25-year veteran owner-operator working for a for-hire carrier. He averages around 3,300 miles per week.
He had left Vancouver with a load for Edmonton. When he unloaded and picked up another trailer bound for Regina, he found that the trailer hadn’t been properly checked out–the lights were damaged and he couldn’t slide the axle on the trailer, a b-train. “I lost two hours trying to find a mechanic to work on it,” he says.
He was planning on getting into Regina for 8:00 a.m., picking up another trailer and heading on home outside of Winnipeg. “I drove all night to get there for 8:00 a.m., but the other people running team from Vancouver, who had left a couple of hours after me, still weren’t there. I went by Edmonton and they went by Calgary and ran through a lot of bad weather. They never made it in until 9:00 p.m., so I was stuck there, unpaid. Thirteen hours of wasted time.”

George Iacono: Regarding the first problem–the faulty trailer–Iacono says it’s probable that the previous driver hadn’t done a proper post-trip inspection, “and that falls back on driver training.

“We see this all the time. We’ll check the vehicle inspection sheet and the driver won’t have done anything. He unhooks and goes home. Meanwhile, the trailer’s got two flat tires and no brakes. In this guy’s case, if the previous driver had found the problems then it could have been worked on in the meantime and been ready for Joe.”

As for the 13-hour unpaid layover in Regina, Iacono blames that on operational issues. Why was there no communication between the two drivers? “If there was some kind of unexpected delay, there’s not much they can do about it. But if it was a totally unexpected event, this guy should be compensated for his lost time and the company should examine their compensation policy. On the flipside, maybe he needed sleep time and should only be entitled to five hours compensation-there are lots of factors to consider but he’s got to be paid for some lost time.”

2 Hogtown bound
and down
This time around, Joe’s been planning on being in Toronto on a certain weekend for a personal matter. He’d given his dispatchers one months’ notice about the upcoming event and reminded them weekly as the date approached.

As the date nears, he’s given a load from Winnipeg to Toronto that would have been perfect. Unfortunately, he’s switched to a Phoenix-bound run at the last minute. “I tell them to make sure they bring me back to Toronto and they ensure me they will. I go to Phoenix, and then they tell me to take a load to California, with another load to Toronto. I thought, ‘well, it’s going to be tight, but my wife’s with me and I can make it.’ When I get to California, they put the Toronto-bound load on the truck in front of me and refuse to switch the load. They sent me to Vancouver instead and I never did make it to Toronto.”

Ray Haight: MacKinnon asks for a minimum of seven days’ notice of drivers seeking time off and they will adjust their dispatch accordingly to accommodate such requests.

He says if they have two drivers going into the same area and someone’s going to be there ahead of the guy who’s asked for something, then “we’ll talk to them and say, ‘hey, we’re going to have to dispatch out of order because we’ve got one week’s worth of notice, this situation exists and this guy has to be back.’ Some drivers are going to get upset, but we explain to them that when they need a favour, then we’ll ask the other person to be accommodating. That’s just the way it is, these people have home lives and if you expect to hang on to your workforce, you have to respect that.”

3 Lost on
Broadway
A one-time systems analyst for a major electronics firm, Kevin came to trucking a little later in life. He’s been working for three years as a company driver for a for-hire fleet.

Kevin’s still a little green. Dispatch sends him down to Jersey City, N.J. with a load bound for a firm on “Broadway.” Unfortunately, as Kevin learns, Jersey City has more than a few Broadways.
“I was in an old part of the city and the roads were made before trucks got big–it’s almost physically impossible to drive down there,” says Kev. “I was looking for a ‘Broadway’ and my map tells me there’s about five of them in the city. I’m driving around in circles and trying to get help with directions from dispatch. Unfortunately, they pretty much just ignored me and left me to find my own way.

“I ended up going to a bus roundabout to ask directions from the bus driver. The whole bus ended up helping me out. Between the driver and the passengers, they figured out the route for me. So I got there, but with no help from dispatch.”

Haight was not so sympathetic to this particular complaint, noting that the onus is on the trucker to get decent directions before entering a city for the first time. “I have problems with this one,” he says. “You’re a truck driver, figure it out. When I was driving, I used to find the closest truck stop to the town I was going into, stop, call the place and find out how to get there. If not, find a local on the CB and get directions. I hear this one a lot and it bugs me. Getting directions is part of the job.”
Iacono disagreed: “Wouldn’t it be nice if the guy got to Jersey City and looked in his folder and found a nice map telling him exactly where to go? Wouldn’t that be easier for everybody? Go on mapquest.com and get a map. Or have a previous driver make up a delivery card. It’s all basic.”

4 The well-cooked book
After too many frustrations with companies that he figured didn’t care for drivers, Nathan actually decided to get off the road to work as a driver trainer. Here’s one of the reasons why.

“At one particular firm where I was working as a company driver, it was constantly push, push, push. I can recall at least half-a-dozen occasions where I was doing 6,600 kms in six days, 7,300 kms in seven days–well in excess of the logbook. I would talk to the safety guy and ask him how I was supposed to log 7,300 kms in seven days and he would tell me ‘don’t hand in your log book.’

“One time I started out early one Monday morning, leaving at 2:30 a.m. to be in Cleveland, OH for 8:00 a.m. From there I go to Columbus and then on to Port Hope, Ont., and back into Toronto. I ended up screwing around in Toronto for half the day trying to get a reload, and finally get one by Tuesday afternoon. Then they tell me to run back to the yard, drop a trailer there, run back to Tilsonburg to pick up a load, and then on to Dallas on Tuesday night. Dallas in itself is an honest week’s work for driving truck. Anywhere in Texas–go down, reload, come home and you’re done for the week. You shouldn’t have to be doing anything else over and above that in that timeframe. Those are 7,300 km in seven-day trips–how are you supposed to log them?”
With a well-earned reputation for safety, Haight’s MacKinnon Transport does not look kindly at dispatchers or drivers who put freight above logbooks. He says his company has a progressive discipline policy that involves verbal warnings, written warnings, time off, and ultimately termination if hours-of-service infractions persist. “We also measure out-of-service infractions back to each one of our operations people. They need to make sure they don’t dispatch a truck with four hours left on their HOS schedule on a six-hour trip. They’re going to be in a world of trouble if we catch them doing that. You don’t put people in situations where their safety is jeopardized–there’s no load of freight that’s worth that. Someone’s load is going to be four hours late? Big deal. There’s no risk reward to that.”

5 Age before
booty
Arnie’s a longtime trucker whose biggest beef is that newbies just entering the company are making the same as veteran drivers.
“The thing that bothered me most about one particular company was that I was busting my tail out on the road for four days at a stretch to bring home $1,000 a week. Meanwhile, some guys with the same company had cozy gigs hauling into Toronto, Windsor, or Peterborough that enabled them to be home every night, and they’re making the same money. And some of these guys were junior to me in terms of seniority.”
Iacono suggests that Arnie’s company reevaluate their compensation structure. He says that these days, a driving job that gets a person home every night is clearly a perk. “Plus, it’s been a tradition in the business that the more miles you turn, the more money you make. With any company we deal with, the biggest earners are the highway guys, which makes sense. You could argue that the local stuff is harder work because you’re driving in city traffic and backing in and out of docks all day. But, with longhaul, you are doing a lot of miles, there’s more chance of accidents and your lifestyle is terrible–you should be compensated accordingly.”

Haight said the situation is not uncommon in the industry, including his own firm. He says some his highest earners are on the short board, with routes within a 600-mile radius. “It’s all about lifestyle. If you want to do short or long, we can accommodate both. Those short guys, they’re doing about the same miles. They’re stopping and picking up twice a day and the other guys are doing it four times a month.”

Haight is more sympathetic about the seniority issue and says the industry in general has not done a good job of recognizing longterm drivers. “If someone can start and earn as much as someone who’s been with the company for 20 years, there’s something clearly wrong with that.”

To help remedy the situation, Haight says MacKinnon Transport has begun paying owner-operators that have accident free years a per-mile premium. “It’s not a lot, but it adds up and it’s a recognition for their tenure and safe driving.” He says he hopes to do something similar for company drivers.

The fix? It’s in.
Of course none of the problems were insurmountable. In a lot of these stories, dispatch gets tarred as the bad guy, but as Iacono points out, dispatch is often a reflection of the company. “If management is just focused on getting the delivery done, then that’s how dispatch is going to operate,” he says. “There’s one private carrier we deal with, we put new drivers in there and they can’t believe how nice dispatch is to them. They’re just a little fleet, the pay is middle of the road, but because they have good runs, good equipment, and good dispatchers, they have very little turnover.”
Jim Nelson, a human resources specialist at MacKinnon Transport agrees: He says when companies just focus on moving freight, and drivers get treated like machines, you run into these situations. He says a basic fix is to build relationships between dispatch and drivers. “In our situation, we assign dispatchers to specific lanes that we run, and they get to know the drivers on those routes. Based on that we try and create a relationship between them so the driver isn’t just another blip on the screen. Your turnover rate will tell you how well you’re managing.
“It’s about mutual respect,” Nelson adds. “It’s taking the time to treat our drivers and owner-ops like people and not machines. We want our people to stay for a long period of time and not just focus on getting the load delivered.”