Instructor Announced 1st Time EVER Newbie Hiring @ UPS & J.B. Hunt!

One thing people in school don't realize is all the things needed to learn out here at the same time. You have to learn to use your Elogs and Elog devise. There is trip planning, navigating, backing, learning to handle a truck and loaded trailer that grosses over 70,000 pounds most days. And so much more. Driving an average of 500 miles per day is very different in a truck than a car. There is nothing easy about this at first. Most mornings my first thought is "where am I?".

One thing I know about UPS is because it's union, all positions are bid for and the one with the most seniority gets the job. Low man on the totem pole gets the bottom. They are most likely wanting line haul drivers, pulling doubles from point A to point B, swapping and driving back. I wouldn't want to start that way.

As far as JBH you are taking load from a DC to a store. not as easy as you think. Getting from the interstate to the store can be a challenge. Getting to the dock area can be a challenge through or around the parking lot. The dock area could be tight.

Starting over the road means more time on the interstate and less time in cities. It's easier to gain the experience you need that way. At CFI we deliver to three customer's stores. All are tighter backs. At one of the customers, we drop hook. It goes like this, arrive with loaded trailer, drop it out of the way, hook to empty in the door and move it out of the way, drop it and hook to the loaded trailer, back loaded trailer into the door, drop loaded trailer, hook to empty, sweep it out, check it out and roll. To me cranking landing gear is the hardest part of my job. I'll take a live load/unload any day. Of the other two, one is always in a strip mall and the other is usually a stand alone store.

The union part is enough for me to say no thanks

The union part is enough for me to say no thanks

They're the best paying jobs in the industry and they have full benefits, so I don't think anyone will be upset that you'll be leaving an extra job open for them.

The union part is enough for me to say no thanks

They're the best paying jobs in the industry and they have full benefits, so I don't think anyone will be upset that you'll be leaving an extra job open for them.

I've seen unions screw their members over too many times.

One example was American Axle. The union went on strike to negotiate. Went to the table numerous times. Finally management said this is the last offer, we will have no choice but to close the plant if we can't reach an agreement. Union rejected the offer, plant closed. Union leader was leterally crying on TV, saying I can't believe they shut down.

Another was a friend whose company was being sold. Union didn't fight anything, rolled over to whatever management offered, gave up a ton of benefits and seniority.

I've also seen unions fight (successfully) to keep people in their job that should have been fired on the spot.

Guy that walked off the job for a week, no call, nothing. Showed up after a week like nothing happened.

Guy that simply refused to do his job.

That is just the top two that come to mind.

Not a fan of unions.

My uncle is a ups feeder driver. He does line haul pulling doubles on a 600+ mile round trip Monday through friday. He is at the top of the pay scale there. He grosses over 100k a year and yes with team driving he could get near those numbers you posted as I've seen his pay stubs. With that being said, he's also been there since before I was born and I'm 28. So I wouldn't say the instructors were entirely lying but definitely not telling you everything about those jobs. I think that unions can be a good thing in the trucking industry, and I'd gladly work there if I could.

Let's be honest, union jobs in trucking nowadays are few and far between. UPS being one of the few standouts. The teamsters are pretty much nothing more than an apparition of what they once were.

I'm not the biggest fan of unions myself; however, as Brett stated they are some of the best paid jobs with the best benefits. Plus with a union as you gain seniority your pay goes up. The downside, newbies get hosed. They get the crappiest paying positions. They have to beg for scraps when it comes to nice runs. However, you tough it out for a few years and life starts looking pretty good.

As a side note, a lot of LTL companies, even the non union ones, use seniority and job boards. Ryder's trucking fleet also uses seniority and bidding on runs. Although Ryder is a little less forgiving. You take time off and someone covers your run. It is theirs now if they want to keep it until the next bidding period. I personally know someone who drove for Ryder for years.

To be fair, some of my personal feelings about unions comes from when I lived in Phila, and they were tossing non union roofers off roofs, things like that. Organized crime had a firm hold in unions there, at least in the 80s.

And in Niagara Falls a while back, there was a bombing incident, where they bombed someone's house. I think it was a witness for a trial, but I don't remember now, it has been about 10 years.

I thought I had typed in my post that I didn't know anything about the Teamsters, but I don't see it, looking back. Not sure what happened. But just because I personally don't like them, doesn't mean others might have a great experience, and more power to them. It just isn't for me.

Money isn't everything. I like money as much as the next person, but there is more to life than just accumulating wealth.

I run linehaul now and we use a bid, I am on the " extra board" this being my first full time year I am on pace for 70k plus and I'm not even working as much as I can. If I had time left on my 70 I could run 6 days if I wanted but I like having 2 days off. Our top drivers are earning over 100k, some are around 120k or so, my trainer said he has made over 100k for the last 10 years.

So if you don't mind being at the bottom like I am until better runs open up linehual isnt a bad gig.

Personally, I think most of this conversation misses the point entirely. Marc came in here with the impression that a green horn rookie like himself might be pulling down a potential salary of 175,000 dollars. In fact he was already making plans to buy a newer Motorhome. The point to me is that he needs to realize that's not going to happen.

It was irresponsible for the instructor to throw that out there, and he should know that.