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Old School, you always bully me.

The rookie at the Mega Carrier will make between $40-60k first year.

The rookie with the LTL Carrier will make $60-90k first year.

But go ahead and discredit me, and rather than encourage others to follow the path they desire to take in this industry, or give them other options that maybe they’ve not thought about, let’s just feed them all to the OTR MegaCarriers.

For a man with so much experience in this career field, I’m surprised that you don’t understand that LTL money is better than Mega Carrier money.

Money is the only reason I’m out here working. Money is the only reason a lot of people are out here working. You’re mad because I chose to better my financial situation? Mad because I didn’t make my wife and kids live out in the street while I was out here in the truck? Mad because I had two vehicles repo’d first year trucking and thought I should have stayed at that same company that never paid well?

You judge me because I worked at a few companies without ever thinking about my home-life situation. I guess you’re single. Maybe you’ve never had a wife and kids? If you do, then you should understand my reasons. Then again, I don’t answer to you.

And you waited six hours for me to clarify all of this to you? Some of us are out here working on a Sunday, thought you’d figure that one out since were in the same career field.

Guys, you took the information wrong. I did not mean it was okay for a rookie to START out driving tankers. What I meant was that if this driver wants to EVENTUALLY drive tankers, then by all means, go ahead. The point y’all missed was this:

I understand that some drivers only want to pull this or that, and the thought of pulling doubles, especially placards hazmat, scares some people. Be careful not to rush into anything too soon. I made that mistake in the beginning.

But it’s all good. Some folks want to drive in the heavy haul division, but you guys don’t honestly think anyone would tell a newbie to do that, do you?

Johnathon, have you ever considered LTL? Old Dominion, Estes, ABF? Well, it’s much higher pay than the average company, plus retirement and benefits. If you have no desire to become an O/O, you may want to become an LTL company driver.

I work at Estes Express. I’ve bumped into a few “rookie” drivers who went through the Estes Driving Program, and they’re super happy. Of course, you’ll need hazmat, doubles/triples, and tanker endorsements. You only have to run a forklift 90 days at Estes to get into the program. Get paid the entire time. I think forklift drivers make $17/hr. Plus, you’ll work 50-55 hours per week.

Old Dominion and ABF may put you straight into the program immediately. I’m not sure. I know you’d enjoy the all drop-and-hook, paid all miles from terminal-to-terminal Estes route. But to each their own.

You can struggle to make ends meet at a MegaCarrier, or you can be make great money and enjoy what you do at the LTL company. Plus, they have local positions you could get into after the program and never have to go over the road, unless you volunteer.

Food for thought.

God Bless, Chris

Thanks for your service! Fellow vet here, and I’d like to say that this is a good career. I’m not sure how much research you’ve done on tankers, flatbed, dry van, reefer, etc., but have you ever considered LTL? These are companies that pull two and three trailers at once, usually two or three 28’ “pup” trailers.

You can start a good career with companies like Estes, Old Dominion, ABF, etc. You can be home every night, or you can be home every week (depending on which driver position you take). The salary is high ($70-125k/yr), and they’ve got retirement and health, dental, vision benefits.

The best part, they train. You apply for Estes (for example), and you’ll operate a forklift for three months. After that, you’re eligible to go to their school. It’s approximately four weeks with a driver (city & Linehaul), and two weeks in the school. They pay for the school, and they’ll pay you while you’re being trained. You will not have to pay anything back, only commit to this one company for two years. You will need your Tanker, Doubles/Triples, and Hazmat endorsements.

Of course, if your desire is to pull tankers, no problem. I understand that some drivers only want to pull this or that, and the thought of pulling doubles, especially placards hazmat, scares some people. Be careful not to rush into anything too soon. I made that mistake in the beginning.

God Bless, Chris

I was with one company who expected you to run on the one-hour PC when you were loaded. Usually, this was due to bad planning on the company’s part. Now we have signs in terminals throughout the country that state to only use Personal Conveyance for bobtailing to/fro lodging and meals.

Oldschool, while I greatly appreciate your honesty, I think you read too much into my initial post. If anyone called the recruiter for Ozark, I am sure they'd get the same information. After all, I'm only sharing information about this company. Nothing more. Nothing less.

Yes, I began with a big company and was excited about my new career change. Sure, I said many positive things. Then the negative things were said.

Now, I'm only giving a short review from my own perspective of another company as a driver. I stated, "I've not found anything to complain about. But when you stay at some place long enough, no matter the company, you'll eventually find something to complain about." That's true of any and every industry, not just trucking.

Have you ever heard of someone complaining about their company? How about other drivers on the road? How about their equipment? My point is, people complain.

Now, I'm not saying that I will find a genuine complaint, but that it is possible that something may happen in the future that will cause me to complain. You know what, that's just a part of life.

As for Ozark, I'm happy with the pay. I guess I'll take your advice and not post anything further on this site until I've reached my two year mark. No problem. Seems a few of you are still ill toward me because I decided to team drive despite the many negative things that were said about team driving. Thats okay, too.

Be safe out on the road.

The trucks? Freightliner Cascadias with 10-speed manual transmissions (they say they want 20% of their fleet to be automatics for their city drivers, but that could always change). The trucks are equipped with 1,500W inverters and APUs. They want their idle to be less than 10% for each driver (unless your APU doesn't work). The trucks are governed at 68 mph.

If there are ever any issues with your truck, call the shop and they'll have you take it somewhere, come and get it and bring you another truck, or they'll take care of it the next time you're in one of the terminals. It all depends on the issue. (One driver broke his drive axle, and they brought him another truck on their wrecker, then took the other one back to their shop.)

The pay for a company driver ranges from 34cpm to 46cpm, based on experience. With 6-months experience, you can make 39cpm.

The average miles for the regional driver is 2,100-2,200 and home every weekend. 2,500+ miles for the OTR driver. After coming off hometime (first 3 days of pay period was spent at home), I received 2,113 miles in the remaining 4 days of the pay period (took home $675 for that week). The following week, I ran 3,360 miles.

You have options when it comes to your hometime. If you're out 8-10 days, you get 2 days off. If you're out 14 days, you get 3 days off. If you're out 21 days, you get 5 days off. If you're out 28 days, you get 7 days off. So far, they've been getting me home when I've requested to be home, and they've never called asking me to come off hometime early.

They've got benefits like many other companies that you pay weekly.

They don't have a driving school, but they'll hire entry level drivers (anyone with less than 3 months experience). If you have your Class A CDL, they will train you.

E-logs. Currently, they have two different models of the Qualcomm. The MCP100 (which is not as nice as the MCP200), and the newest model (unsure of the model number). They are currently in the process of installing the newest model in all of their trucks, but they claim they can only receive about 35 of them at once. So it may take a little while before all the trucks have it. Either way, it's a Qualcomm.

So far, I've hauled freight for FedEx, Remington Arms, Cabela's, International Paper, Georgia Pacific, Walmart, and a few others.

This is just a quick review for the short time I've been with the company. So far, I have nothing to complain about. They've not made me sit for hours on end waiting for loads, and I've never had to pick up the phone and request loads to run. I update the ETA/PTA, and the loads come automatically.

Another positive note, if you run into some kind of issue out here on the road and you have to call the office, they'll keep you on the phone until the issue is resolved. Some companies will tell you they'll work on it and hang up, never calling you back. That's not how Ozark rolls.

The terminals have free washers and dryers, free showers, gym, tv rooms with large recliners, and a company store.

If this is a company that any of you have had questions about, or if someone is thinking of calling them for a job, I hope I've given you enough information to help in your decision-making. I've been with them Since October 1, 2016, and I've not found anything to complain about. But when you stay at some place long enough, no matter the company, you'll eventually find something to complain about.

Be safe. Be courteous.

I remember replying to you, but I guess my response never got to you. Sorry, man.

Ok, maybe I come off on this website as a complete idiot. I apologize. Devan, I apologize for the way I've read your comments. G-town, I did reply to that comment from three weeks ago, telling you I've taken your advice.

Now, the entire reason I waited on my DM, is that my DM is the one who said to me that he would get me a truck. How was I to know that he was lying?

You didn't think I would like teaming from the beginning, you were right. If my teammate had actually learned how to do his job, just as I was trained to do, and wasn't as lazy as he was, I might have liked it. But I've told you all my reasons for going solo already.

Yes, I did offer my codriver the truck, through my DM - before I was told to keep it three times. So when I was told to go home and give my truck to my codriver, you can bet I was a little upset. Why did I not have a truck assignment that Friday when I was suppose to go home?

When I say that my DM forced me to go on hometime, I'm not lying. "You don't know how this business works" seems to be the only thing I hear from nearly everyone. Yes, I don't know everything, and I know that I don't know everything, but why has this thread gone from its original subject to "why are you changing companies?"

This is my career. I came for insight on this job, but it's alright if you want to talk about other things.

Sure, I started with Swift in April, but I can change companies if I am able to, which is what I'm doing. If you are able to go to another company, and that company is a good fit for yoy, why not stay with that company for 20-30 years? "You need at least one year of experience." So because I leave one company, and choose another once within my first year, you think I'm going to continue doing that?

So I stay with this company six or seven months... my year of experience is achieved. And then what? More doors open if I want to switch companies, again? I don't see the problem with what I'm doing here, neither did I ask for advice on switching companies within my first year. I clearly asked about one job, and it seems that all I'm getting is hate.

I apologize to you all if I've offended you, as that is not my intention. Thank you all for the feedback and honesty, though.

Proactive? Yeah. I recall people on this site being mad at me for being proactive. Then being proactive about my DM getting me a truck when he shouldn't have pulled me out of the truck I was already in? Dude, every time you comment on my posts, you're pro company office personnel, and anti-driver. That's how you keep coming off. How am I suppose to be proactive other than calling my DM? Of course, you tell me to go over his head, but from military experience, you don't skip chain of command to be "proactive". You let your supervisor do his job.

So when I called Monday, he told me he would take care of it. Am I to assume he won't do his job? No. So I call him Wednesday, and that's when he finally does his job and then I'm just waiting to hear back. Now, had I not heard anything back on Wednesday afternoon, I would have definitely talked with him about it again Thursday, and then would have made mention of my intentions of going over his head. That would have been a more professional approach.

Just my 2 cents. Why don't you call the terminal manager if your DM is not doing anything to get you a truck? What terminal are you out of? Also your comment about all these people with Schneider are happy is quite laughable because no matter what company it is there is plenty of people that hate it there. This is what changed my view as a whole on the company thing. Not trying to say Swift works for everyone because that is a lie however my performance is on me and not what logo is on the side of my truck.

As a side note your DM probably just sends a message to the truck assignment people and thats it. He/she has a millions things to do and a lot of drivers to take care of that sometimes you need to be proactive. I have had to do that when people were taking to long to get stuff for me done. You have to take initiative and get **** done!