Questions for Twilight

1) What's Heartland's Dental Plan? How long is the waiting period?

Wife needs a root canal & crown-- She just started work( to make up for the lack of my income) at Wal-Mart and there is a waiting period.

2) Does orientation in Carlisle, Pa start every Monday & Wednesday?


@ BlueBeetle-

Yes, change scares the heck out of me--- but changes for certain that are going worse scare me even more.

Jill at USF Glen Moore-- reports Heartland OTR drivers coming over there- are reporting only 900-1500 miles a week.
That scares me--- but, then again Jill is a recruiter for Glen Moore

Heartland Regional drivers averaging 2400 miles a week? For 5 days?
__________________________________________________ ___________

I'm in Pa-- got message at 10am that all freight for today is covered- Trucks getting empty between then and closing time will be offered Tomorrows freight.
I'm not empty yet today-- so that puts me waiting for Wednesday freight-
there's no way to get home for My dental appointment 1000 miles in a day.
Maybe they already have me pre-planned on a load that way-- but, I would have thought they would send me that pre-plan info-- if so.

 

Perhaps a Freudian slip or omission?

 

Hmmmmm.................................

 

Answers from Twilight.

Delta Dental. Waiting period is 90 days from first of the next month, but you cannot get the dental plan alone. It's a rider to the whole Blue Cross/Blue Shield medical plan.

Generally, unless we're full up. We keep orientations pretty small these days.

Yep, I'm sure Jill knows exactly how we're doing. :roll: :roll: Next time you talk to her, you might ask her why the Glen Moore drivers coming here are complaining about getting shorted on their paycheck or not getting them at all. :roll: :roll: But no matter really, we don't need to play that game. Jill can say what she wants...it's no skin off my back.

So anyway, if a driver is only averaging 900 to 1500 miles, there's a problem with the driver. The OTR fleet is averaging around 2300 to 2400 right now...ideally, we want the OTR fleet at a 2500 average.

Regional drivers average about 2000 to 2200...again, that's the average and that's typically what our target average is. All regionals are back up in that range again, aside from the Western Regional. Freight is still a little soft out west (for everyone), but we've got some new accounts kicking in that should get it to jump back up there. Last year, that regional was averaging around 2300 to 2400.

 

Don't think I'll be needing to talk to Jill again( except She does have a office in Carlisle)-- got what I needed to know from her.

.42cpm

hazmat required to be "gotten" within 90 days.

singles don't run west

The .42cpm put her 3-5 companies down the decending pay scale

the grace period was nice-- but who only wants to work for someone 90 days..

then she wanted to know if I couldn't get it--- that's when I told her-- If I did "get" it--- I'd be applying shortly--at:

New Century-- 52cpm
Wal-Mart
Fed-EX ground

and the list goes on-
__________________________________________________ _______

90 days from the end of the month of hire-- so, 120 days max.....

what's the premium on all that running for Just a driver & wife?

is there a Vision rider too?

no apu?
no inverters allowed?

 

Well back to the daily news.....


got good news(kinda)-- On the way west back toward my Dentist appointment in Springfield, Mo 11:45am Thursday-

Shaffer managed to get me as far as Edwardsville, IL ( only 200 miles short of the target) will drop early tomorrow.. and see if (we) can hijack- beg-borrow a load running Thru Springfield.... else we are SOL-- also, the deadhead to HOME from Edwardsville tomorrow would be-- 280 miles-
I really don't like that "plan"

a) it's too expensive for my company to bare that burden--fuel prices and all
b) I hate driving that far --for free.
c) then I would have to drive(buy gas) for my own car-- to/back from Springfield--112 miles each way........expensive dentist appointment.


The zone dispatcher for the IL area-- says freight doesn't run that way from her area.......

zone dispatch is like being a ping pong ball --- all they do is bat you across the board-- and where you land -- they don't really care.


Did some communicating today!

Discovered I NOW have a Terminal Manager-- but, since Shaffer/Crete still
isn't 100% merged--- my Fleet Manager will still be taking all my calls.
When I asked if under this new system would my Fleet Manager have more POWER to alter my sitution...i.e. be more "accountable" get stuff fixed like miles, etc-- was told he will still not be under the "operations" wing-- but would continue to be my "mouth piece", spokesperson, driver advocate and would deplomatically work to relay my needs to the various zone dispatchers.
So all that has really changed is-- now instead of 1 driver manager(personal dispatcher)-- I have 9 different dispatchers-- none of whom are now "accountable" for a fixed fleet of trucks-- and therefore-- no longer accountable for Unit productivity and don't stand a snowball's chance of getting to know and keeping track of what "type" of driver I am-
other than a Pain in the A or Easy-Going.
This indicates to me that -- the system is working perfectly as designed and is doing exactly what it was intended to do.

 

Right. No less than 90, no more than 120...90 days from the first of your first FULL month. So, if you starting toward the end of a month, you're looking at closer to 90 days. Start early in the month, and it's closer to 120.

$75 a week for a family plan, covers Delta Dental, Blue Cross 80/20, prescription card, $10,000 in life.

Unfortunately, no.

None in the current fleet. I can't see that remaining that way, though. I imagine we'll be replacing our fleet by early next year at the latest. We have all 9400-I's right now, but International doesn's make them anymore, so we've been testing out different tractors. They've already gone through testing about 10 Pro-Stars. We've got 10 Cascadias on the fleet right now being tested. I know that APU's are part of the consideration, too, but there's a lot up in the air about APU's...the thought being that a lot more states will be banning them in the near future. So I don't have any idea where we will end up on that issue. Something will have to be done because of idling and emissions...I just don't know what that's going to be.

None whatsoever. Too much of a safety and liability issue and we've sifted through the ashes of enough of our equipment in the past to know that is a policy that will always stand.

 

Ok- I just had a long "headborg to hearland" conversation with one of your drivers--- Truck#3XX0 should i report his exact number?

what's about this-- my hair must be above/off the collar?

and no dispatch more than 525 miles per 14 hour period-- but since the log department only allows drivers to log 60.1 mph? that magically works out to 8.735 hours a day driving--- of course this would actually work out to-
2625 max miles in 5 day period( regional )

he does report an average of 2000 miles per week-- home every weekend.

hmmmmm.......

 

Yes, we have a dress code for guys. No long hair, no earrings or jewelry above the collar.

Actually, I think it's 500, but I'm not absolutely certain of that. And yes, it would be wine and roses every day if you could run 500 miles each and every day. Regional guys would be runnin 2500...OTR running 3500...weekly. But that isn't the real world.

Which is right around the target mileage. In the end, it's never been about miles...it's about what you make. We are a short to medium haul company and advertise ourselves as such. Our drivers do well...even the guys that are averaging 2100 miles or so a week and getting home on the weekends.

 

it's not the modern world....just old world

:scratching my head:

If my pay check is determined by .44 cents per MILE I would image it IS very much about MILES!

unless we're talking about making UP the gross weekly figure with lots of
ACCESSORIAL PAY!

.44X 2000= $880.00 gross per week
x 52 weeks
____________________
$45,760 gross per year

a far cry from the advertised $60,000 + a year

.44x2200=$968.00 gross per week

gets you $50,336 a year

I'm trying to break myself from continuing to count on- make my decisions based on "pie in the sky" max "what- if" I got 3200 miles a week.

My new theory is-- control the TIME I "give away"--- there's got to be a magic number--- Break EVEN point-- the amount of miles a company HAS to move a truck to JUSTIFY the REGIONAL OPERATION of the UNIT.
ONLY give the dispatcher 5 days to GET me to that point-- because the way I see this industry going--- minimal is now the norm...the dispatchers reach a goal and their efforts stops.

I've seen the miles a solo driver was considered commonly to produce steady decrease from 4000 to 3500 to 3000 to 2500...

In years to come-- If I were to return to this board--and want 2500 miles a week-- someone will cry-- "that's impossible--it's too unsafe-- You're greedy!"

Yeah, I know-- companies are no longer concerned about the MILES the truck runs in a given week-- just the RATE/Revenue per Mile--- and the shorter runs pay the killer $3-$4 dollars per Mile.