Big Truck How long out before home time?
- Thread starter JerryK
- Start date
They already have.
As the tires spin, let the story begin. As the fuel burns, the expedite world turns. Every mile we drive! Every delivery we strive! Reading stories is how we survive!
Listen up and I'll tell a story. About an expediter growing old. Some would strive for fame and glory. Others like OVM are not that bold! lol
A good story about how I once got a cargo van load out of Laredo for 1.50 per mile. Yes it's true. I used a set of cell phone signal jammers so that no one's dispatch could get a hold of their drivers to bid on loads. After multiple tries to get bids, said load board finally awarded the load to me. Then I deactivated the cell phone jammers and went about my day. You better pray some ex-cia operative doesn't get into this business lol or there will be cell phone jammers and tricks used to get the good loads! How about that one for a story.
Reading this ongoing train wreck hits too close to home.
Last guy I drove for, Sprinter Van, we made money, no real issues.
So I agreed to drive truck and flatbed trailer. Suddenly, legal went out the window. I’m not talking about a DOT approved sleeper, I mean no logs, wanted me to run weigh stations, constantly over loaded, ugh.
I had to quit, he was on pace to have me arrested at any time.
He went from having 4 drivers to 0 in a matter of 3 months.
Last guy I drove for, Sprinter Van, we made money, no real issues.
So I agreed to drive truck and flatbed trailer. Suddenly, legal went out the window. I’m not talking about a DOT approved sleeper, I mean no logs, wanted me to run weigh stations, constantly over loaded, ugh.
I had to quit, he was on pace to have me arrested at any time.
He went from having 4 drivers to 0 in a matter of 3 months.
Dude.....this is the most entertaining thread I think I've ever read on here.
Andy, how's your working capital and credit? Why dont you just buy a sprinter van, get a driver, get on with a dispatch that knows what they are doing and can tell you exactly what you'll need to do, and build up from there? Or better yet drive it yourself and learn first hand. Spend your free time learning about DOT regulated truck ownership, and then get into ST or TTs once you know about the industry a little?
Before you buy it have a solid game plan on every little detail. What maintenance will I need to do and how often? How will I pay my drivers? How will I set things up so I keep drivers? Do I have enough money to cover major repairs, or will I once my warranty runs out? What all will my warranty cover and not cover? What insurance will I need and what company would be best (best to get on with a company that has group insurance)? Do I have everything figured out for bookkeeping? What will the procedure be if a driver breaks down at 3am and I'm sleeping? Etc
Andy, how's your working capital and credit? Why dont you just buy a sprinter van, get a driver, get on with a dispatch that knows what they are doing and can tell you exactly what you'll need to do, and build up from there? Or better yet drive it yourself and learn first hand. Spend your free time learning about DOT regulated truck ownership, and then get into ST or TTs once you know about the industry a little?
Before you buy it have a solid game plan on every little detail. What maintenance will I need to do and how often? How will I pay my drivers? How will I set things up so I keep drivers? Do I have enough money to cover major repairs, or will I once my warranty runs out? What all will my warranty cover and not cover? What insurance will I need and what company would be best (best to get on with a company that has group insurance)? Do I have everything figured out for bookkeeping? What will the procedure be if a driver breaks down at 3am and I'm sleeping? Etc
I really hope not. Sounds like he's negative $5000 at least at this point. Like a month in. With no truck down payment. With no insurance payment. Jesus.
Yes... Like the Engergizer bunny we're STILL going and going and going ;-)
There was not really alot interesting to report these last 3 weeks BUT that was ONLY because the driver and dispatcher kept me in the dark regarding get this ..... The 2nd lease truck getting stuck under a hotel canopy !! UGH
Yes, same driver who damaged the other lease truck by hitting a low branch did this too.....Hmmm maybe I have a low forehead for letting him continue to drive ? Anyways he owes big time ...
it was about $4K damage to a Hotel "canopy" and damage to the truck roof for ??$.
I tried NOT to turn this in to the Company's insurance because of the previous roof damage (not much more than a month ago) by trying the possible loop hole that maybe a commercial establishment should have posted the height of the canopy to keep this from happening (ironically the TALL canopy (no way to hit it unless you are super tall) was marked with the height but the low one wasn't (the one that got hit / stuck under requiring a tow truck to boot...and some engineer type person was by too to evaluate the hotel's damages).
Anyways, per the lawyer (We have a legal service where we pay about $20 per month to get legal questions answered, paperwork reviewed and even defense representation for lots of different things), had it been a low point on a public road or public area then yes we could have blamed the lack of markings and may not have had to pay for it BUT since this was on private property it was not mandated to be height marked (I'll drop the bug in the insurance company's ear about that too so THEY can double check things too ... maybe my $20 lawyer service is feeding me a line so they don't have to do more work ? ....who knows anything's possible but they probably don't have a lot of motivation for $20 / month if they have to provide actual services rather than just answering the occasional simple question or two...I keep them busy tho !
With these more horrible things happening and the company's insurance guy pulling his hair out over losses and possible cancellation of insurance I DID look into the $35 / Day truck damage insurance the lease company offers to basically cover damage to the truck (yes, $35 per day IS expensive BUT I was going to make the driver pay for it since it's their driving causing the issues) and if the $35/day covered the truck we would hopefully not have any more claims to report to our insurance co ( FWIW they charge and additional $25/day if you want liability and not just PD for the truck).
In reading the fine print though (NOT only the front and back of the insurance papers BUT on the edge as well !! ........OK just seeing of you're still awake reading all this) and talking with the leasing agent the $35/ day plan covers all damage to the truck EXCEPT the box itself ( WTF !! ) .....Anyways, We did not get the coverage because of that clause.
This Monday, in an effort to minimize hits to the company's truck insurance (and because the lease company agreed to it), we'll be putting the lease in the driver's name (our cheap corporate lease rates would be given to the driver as a courtesy since they are effectively driving our loads and if the company loses insurance we effectively (legally) can't run anything so THAT cannot happen under any circumstances) and making them get the commercial insurance for themselves (in their name) and making the lease company and our company additional named insureds in case everybody gets sued because we still need protection "just in case"
In theory, by doing the above, the driver can have accidents at will and NOT have it come back to haunt our insurance (of course the infractions / accidents may still count against the company's DOT and MC ratings I think since they would still have to use our authority (I am looking into getting a second MC and DOT to "lend" to drivers so they don't mess ours up the one we have any more than it already is (we're almost a year in with MC number so I think THAT helps in and of itself for getting jobs (of course too many safety dings may hurt that too).
We plan on starting up another OTR truck this week ( the man is a Class A driver, older (36), no accidents and knows how to do logs etc....WOW almost too good to be true huh ? I wonder what his issues are?.... I seem to be able to pick them right? ;-O
The saga continues BUT I really am looking forward to things getting calmer (This write up doesn't even include the near fist fight over driver pay today but we ended on a good note without actual blood shed so that's good)....
Hmmmm come to think of it I STILL need ELD for the one OTR driver now (and more log book training (he does not fill out the stuff on the side of the logs for total hours ... sigh...) and I did get the truck a trucker GPS BUT that may be a moot point if the driver's license has been suspended because we forgot to pay the NY fine for not having a correct log book from before....when he got put in time out (out of service) about 30 days ago... by now).
Anybody know if another state (NY) can cause a non cdl driver in anther state (VA in this case) to get their license suspended for not paying fines to them (their fines ? NY) ?
Thanks and I hope you are having an easier time out there than us ! ;-O
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HI,
I was actually looking for you before because I read some of your posts where you were looking to do a lot of driving (I was going to solicit you... hmmm I hope that sounds OK...) but anyways, then I saw you are working in truck with a sleeper so I figured we almost cannot compete with that ! (we have to do hotels, air b&b or if you want to rough it.... the Motel International (truck that is ;-O) but pay is reasonable or at least I'm still trying to get that fine honed...
I thought about sprinter van for a bit (actually the company has 1 but it needs a little rear end work (drove back from PA it seemed fine but there was always a "clunk" when accelerating or decelerating ....Turns out the carrier has some bolt holes that got elongated over time making for slack and the clunk ....the mobile mechanic has not had time it fix it yet).
The reason we did the box truck rather than sprinter for starters OTR is because , well the sprinter is still down (aforementioned issue) for now and at the time Amazon Cut rates so much (no profit and even a loss if we kept running at that rate (only because we drove in from far away to do the runs) we had a box truck and driver we needed to make some $$ with and the dispatcher had been communicating with us for a couple months so that seemed to be the solution for our extra truck and driver (put him OTR).
Based on the projected $$ and the fact that the driver was ultra reliable (showed up on time always and willing work 7 days a week (actually he did 7 days a week for about 4 straight months and had previously done OTR informally (no logs etc) we figured "what the heck go for it !" .
The dispatcher was helpful (got or is getting the company set up with factoring, gave some basics of log booking (although he simply provided us with "hours of service" sheets (not formal log books which we or rather the driver got at a truck stop after being pulled over by the man and cited for log book issues), gave advice how to get $$ OTR etc...he's been fairly helpful overall but some advice was not 100% spot on (him saying hour sheets are OK VS the reality that we should be on ELD technically by law...Most of our OTR "training" came from reading posts here on this forum so good job and thanks everybody! )....
The dispatcher is a little expensive (20 %) but truthfully if he keeps everything straight ( getting jobs, following up with the drivers. handling invoicing etc and keeping the truck rolling) so what ? At that point if we want more $$ just get more trucks and drivers ! (I'd love to be eventually hands off and have a fleet say the size of J B hunt or so ....for starters at least!) .
As far as OTR trucks , We simply lease them (driver happier a with shiny new truck that they can tear up !...OK that was bad ...hopefully NOT tear up) because then if the truck engine or something gets messed up / goes wrong in the middle of nowhere I don't have to stress about a high priced tow to a shop that wants to ream an out of state company).
Also leasing, while expensive, does also relieve me of the worries of preventive maintenance and routine maintenance (I still worry about local stuff but we got through the worse of getting stuff "right" so now it's just lube and oil for a bit....).
FWIW the last lease truck we used was due for an oil change and other services (DOT insp etc) and the lease company kept bugging me to have the driver get the maintenance done ....of course that would have caused us to miss a half day of driving so I guess it was good timing that truck had an accident and ended up under a hotel canopy at the same time (I guess if you have to have an accident have it when the truck was going to have to be down for preventative maintenance also! (you have to look at the bright side of things and keep positive or the little things will bring you down ! ;-)
I've driven most things short of a Tractor trailer and it's always been my thinking not to get into something I couldn't or wouldn't want to do myself but my thinking on that has changed over the years to more or less.... If I think we can do it and it has a reasonable chance to make $$ (of course a little investigating is helpful) go for it and learn by doing ....
I figure after a few more straights we may try our first road tractor (I always wanted to try one of those and most load boards / brokers are geared towards them anyways (in addition, I know a few CDL A guys)..... sometimes I feel like a big kid .... Watch out ice roads (and maybe we'll get some Bearing Sea gold in the spring!). ;-)
I do respect you trying to build a fleet as i would like to do the same thing but I think you are jumping the gun a little with your planning. Look at all the problems you have had so far. Plan for the worst and hope for the best. Idk about what the Amazon rates or whatever for sprinter vans are but the rates are definately enough to make a profit from the normal expediting companies. Nothing to get rich from but it's something to start and get your foot in the door. The dispatch you have seems a little bit sketchy to be honest, especially not knowing big deals like the eld mandate.
As for leasing the truck, in anything business you have to ask how is this benefiting the other person? They are a company making money just by leasing the truck to you. They are charging you hopefully enough to make a profit in the worst case scenario. So While it seems easier to not have the worry, you're losing money in the long term, and if you wanna start a fleet you need to think in long term. Owning trucks not only will increase your bottom line but make you more invested in the driver.
Now, as far as no sleeper, like others have said you're going to significantly eat into your profit by paying for hotels. Nobody wants to rough it. You shouldn't want your drivers to rough it. The driver is your number 1 priority in terms of success. You're going to have an endless revolving door of drivers lasting 1-8 weeks depending on how dumb they are before they realise they are getting f****d. All that time in between looking for a new driver is time you are losing money. No, not just not making money, losing money.
If you don't wanna buy a traditional straight truck with a sleeper you can look into a "Texas style sleeper". Basically you get a regular 26' straight truck and convert the front 6' or so into a DOT approved sleeper. There are companies that will do this for about 10k. Compare that to the like $400 you will be spending on hotels a week and it pays for itself in 6 months.
A revolving door, just like the big boys. He may make it after all.