Call "DIBS" On Parking At Pilot-Flying J

I see where you're coming from Erol, but at a point I think I'll have to disagree with your analogy.

Feeding the driver is a personal expense to maintain the driver, therefore yes that is on the drivers dime.

However, paying for parking (especially when no reasonable alternative is available) is a cost of doing business.

I think we can all agree that it is a good business practice to minimize expenses, that objective must also be balanced with the good business practice of mitigating risk as well. If paying for parking will help to keep the rig, the freight and the driver out of harms way (ie, parking on a ramp) then it is a justifiable expense, just like a toll or scale ticket, part of getting the freight from A to B.

I say you both agree to disagree. Either way, companies do not reimburse you for parking fees. As Errol stated, you may be able to claim it as a work expense on your taxes.

I'm cool with that. :)

I'm certainly not trying yo start an argument or anything (not my style), I'm just curious if there are any carriers who will reimburse for parking?

Once you have been to the problem parking areas a few times you will figure out the alternative spots other than big chain truck stops. I found that paying for parking, for me anyway is more about convenience.

Depending on the time of day and how much time you have to hunt, paying $10 to $20 bucks to be able to park and go to bed as soon as possible is no big deal in my opinion. I am a Linehaul driver now and parking isnt my problem anymore, but in the year and a half I was OTR , I paid for parking maybe 4 times.

I ran the northeast quite a bit and it really wasnt an issue once I knew my way around and was able to trip plan so I could park before the crowd got there. If I couldnt, it was nice to know I could buy a spot if I had to. Even then, some places will fill up even the reserved spots if you arrive at the wrong time of day.

In the grand scheme of things, paying less than $100 a year for my convenience was no big deal. Nothing worse than getting woke up in the middle of the night and being told to move because you parked in an "improvised" parking spot.

My dispatcher and I got along great and he would have found a way to pay me for it if I asked but to me it just wasnt worth the hassle. He usually threw me an extra $50 to $100 just for going up there without complaint anyway so paying to park was no big deal if I had to.