Are Agency drivers as bad as this at other places?

Just finished my night shift, went into the transport office to sign out and debrief, and all everyone is talking about
is the number of accidents we’ve had in the last few weeks involving agency drivers, and some of the subbies.

The accident list, which is pinned up in the drivers room, is the longest I’ve ever seen …anywhere!

All bar one of the 27 accidents in the last 4 weeks have involved agency drivers, and in a few cases, subbies.
Only one incident has involved one of our permanent drivers.

We’ve had;

4 bridge hits…all involving 16ft trailers hitting bridges marked at UNDER 16ft 0ins…all agency drivers

1 Roll away in the yard…which damaged the unit in question and 3 trailers…agency driver

An agency bod reversing into, and destroying a BT phone box near a store

Another agency driver completely destroying someones garden wall…whilst trying to turn around on a housing
estate (he’d apparently got lost!)

Another trailer and forklift truck, both badly damaged…when an agency guy reversed into a stationary FLT at
a store

…and numerous other scrapes and bumps.

This set of agency drivers (most provided by the same Firm) has got to be the worst set of drivers I’ve ever seen anywhere!

On top of the accidents, we’ve had cases in the last few weeks of agency drivers parking up repeatedly in front of the
onsite diesel pumps…and then clocking off and going home…in one case with the unit keys still in his pocket!

Another got to a store, and didn’t know how to operate the tailift. The Forkie at the store had to show him how to use
it

We’ve also had two agency drivers in a week set off with the legs still down, after coupling up…causing damage to
the legs…not to mention lots of peoples hearing!! In addition no less than 5 have “missed the pin”…in just the last
3 weeks alone! …and 4 have dropped trailers to their knees!

A number of these drivers are also unable to reverse into a bay…even after 10 minutes of trying! Either the shunters,
or other drivers are having to do it for them!

I’m not for a minute saying that our permanent drivers are perfect, and have never had any bumps or scrapes. Nor
am I claiming to be a fantastic driver myself…I only passed my Class 1 in May, and sometimes I need several
shunts to reverse into a bay, or a tight space.

But some of these current set of agency drivers are the worst Class 1 drivers I’ve ever seen! I’m not saying they are
all poor, but I really can’t believe that some of them are driving artics at all!

We’ve got around 80 agency drivers and subbies with us until Christmas, then I guess things will revert back to normal,
and it will just be our regular, permanent drivers doing the job…if our units and trailers haven’t all been destroyed
by then!

Are we just unlucky with the temporary agency drivers that we’ve got at the moment? Or have other Firms got similar
problems with their run-up-to-Christmas temporary agency drivers??

Looks like your TM needs to get off his bum and sort it out. It may be that the contracts need revising, or the new drivers need a better induction and some training. Some companies make the agencies liable for the damage their drivers do.

Sadly…

That sounds about right.

For the life of me, I can’t understand why the insurance companies tolerate this regular damage. Unless of course the origional premiums are so profitable that it doesn’t matter.

A firm in Leeds fill up a skip EVERY week with bumpers, mirrors, light clusters, mudgaurds and all sorts of other bits that have been torn off of the fleet.

I’ve worked at firms where there was almost no damage for years. If someone came in with a bent door or something similar, it was chatted about (and the guilty driver had the mickey taken) for weeks afterwards.

Another Leeds firm had 5 roll-overs in one year, all agency men (one was an empty box on a skelly!). After pulling the diesel pump over, the same driver was back in the following night and missed the pin bending the back of the cab out of shape.

I’m as perplexed by this ‘acceptable’ damage as anyone else is.

Yawn

The-Snowman:
Yawn

Indeed, he never seems to tire of posting the same old ■■■■ on every thread.

Having sat in a transport office for a short while I can assure you that permanent drivers are quite capable of all the damage the OP highlighted.
However if we are to believe that agency drivers are worse maybe it’s because it the only place many new drivers can get a start, but agency work is fraught with difficulties that can trip up a new driver, getting used to a different truck, often in the dark, new delivery points with each customer, that the regular drivers know well and know the pitfalls and the best way to get into them or they’ll talk to one of the other drivers who have already been there. Different procedures at each customer add that onto getting to grips with learning the job after having only done a few weeks training for a test and it’s probably a recipe for disaster.

It’s a bit like saying are all ginger haired drivers like this that or the other mate…generalising ■■■■■■■■.
All groups are made up of individuals.
I know many agency drivers that are spot on,.I also know of a couple of clowns, but there are a fair share of employed clowns as well, and I don’t mean working in the circus.

Like we often say…there are drivers…and there are screwdrivers…the good drivers like myself, dont worry if its a new job…if its in the dark or light…if its a new delivery or not…most of mine are anyway, and i never hit anything…because i care about the vehicle i drive, and because i care about other peoples property…if im not sure, or cant see it..i get out and look..why dont others ■■ At my last big company..the agency drivers came up trumps..it was the regulars doing the damage, of course there are accidents ` yet this firm had assesors…who failed drivers before they started…but the firm still employed them…damage a truck severely…no problem…give em another one…thats bad management…and so is whats happened at the ops company…if you like…i will come up there and sort it out.

I’m not excusing atrocious driving, and at the end of the day some of the drivers on the market will be bad drivers, and some firms will be paying such poor wages for short term cover (or have such poor conditions of work and poor vehicles) that the worst drivers are all they can expect to attract.

There are plenty of cowboy firms about that are paying the market rate, but decent guys know who they are and won’t touch them with a bargepole, so the dregs are all they get after an agency has already begged and bribed every decent driver on their books.

But what firms often don’t realise that if you’re taking a new driver on, he’s in an unfamiliar vehicle, with trailers he’s not familiar with, delivering to sometimes challenging places that he’s not familiar with, and he’s dealing with people and processes he’s not familiar with, he might be adjusting to a new start time or shift pattern that he’s not accustomed to, and the risk of collisions is inevitaby higher in the first couple of weeks as a result, just because guys are having to concentrate harder and accustom to new rhythms of work and are more stressed and mentally worn out as a result before they even get to the first drop.

Rjan:
But what firms often don’t realise that if you’re taking a new driver on, he’s in an unfamiliar vehicle, with trailers he’s not familiar with, delivering to sometimes challenging places that he’s not familiar with, and he’s dealing with people and processes he’s not familiar with, he might be adjusting to a new start time or shift pattern that he’s not accustomed to, and the risk of collisions is inevitaby higher in the first couple of weeks as a result, just because guys are having to concentrate harder and accustom to new rhythms of work and are more stressed and mentally worn out as a result before they even get to the first drop.

Firstly new drivers are not only under pressure to make a good impression by trying to do mission impossible regarding the amount of work allocated in a shift,rather than tell the guvnor that he’s having a larf and what doesn’t get done today will get done tomorrow.But also to lie about their experience because if they don’t then they don’t get a job to get the experience.Or for that matter how do they deal with the contradiction of employers calling for and expecting 2 years experience in the case of employed drivers but which then gets blurred in the case of using agencies.Either way it’s a recipe for disaster of inexperienced drivers who are afraid to show it by asking questions that they might need to ask at the point of taking on the actual job and /or telling the guvnor to shove high pressure jobs which mean worrying more about getting all the work done than thinking about doing the job calmly and methodically.All that in a supposed environment of driver shortages.

As for miscoupled trailers as we’ve seen we’ve even got arguments among ‘experienced’ drivers on here about the right way to pick up a trailer.With go under deliberately low then lift seeming to be favourite.So it’s no surprise that many drivers would at least be missing pins or worse.While what chance have new drivers got,when even the basics of what they’ve learn’t during their training gets corrupted in that regard,by erroneous hearsay,before they even leave the yard.

Sounds like the agency know there is no proper induction or training and are sending you the drivers nobody else wants.

A good firm will have a core of competent agency, we have have around 50 mostly EE guys who for the most part are with us 90% of the time over a number of years.

The fault is with the management 100%

Lancsdriver70:
Just finished my night shift, went into the transport office to sign out and debrief, and all everyone is talking about
is the number of accidents we’ve had in the last few weeks involving agency drivers, and some of the subbies.

The accident list, which is pinned up in the drivers room, is the longest I’ve ever seen …anywhere!

All bar one of the 27 accidents in the last 4 weeks have involved agency drivers, and in a few cases, subbies.
Only one incident has involved one of our permanent drivers.

We’ve had;

4 bridge hits…all involving 16ft trailers hitting bridges marked at UNDER 16ft 0ins…all agency drivers

1 Roll away in the yard…which damaged the unit in question and 3 trailers…agency driver

An agency bod reversing into, and destroying a BT phone box near a store

Another agency driver completely destroying someones garden wall…whilst trying to turn around on a housing
estate (he’d apparently got lost!)

Another trailer and forklift truck, both badly damaged…when an agency guy reversed into a stationary FLT at
a store

…and numerous other scrapes and bumps.

This set of agency drivers (most provided by the same Firm) has got to be the worst set of drivers I’ve ever seen anywhere!

On top of the accidents, we’ve had cases in the last few weeks of agency drivers parking up repeatedly in front of the
onsite diesel pumps…and then clocking off and going home…in one case with the unit keys still in his pocket!

Another got to a store, and didn’t know how to operate the tailift. The Forkie at the store had to show him how to use
it

We’ve also had two agency drivers in a week set off with the legs still down, after coupling up…causing damage to
the legs…not to mention lots of peoples hearing!! In addition no less than 5 have “missed the pin”…in just the last
3 weeks alone! …and 4 have dropped trailers to their knees!

A number of these drivers are also unable to reverse into a bay…even after 10 minutes of trying! Either the shunters,
or other drivers are having to do it for them!

I’m not for a minute saying that our permanent drivers are perfect, and have never had any bumps or scrapes. Nor
am I claiming to be a fantastic driver myself…I only passed my Class 1 in May, and sometimes I need several
shunts to reverse into a bay, or a tight space.

But some of these current set of agency drivers are the worst Class 1 drivers I’ve ever seen! I’m not saying they are
all poor, but I really can’t believe that some of them are driving artics at all!

We’ve got around 80 agency drivers and subbies with us until Christmas, then I guess things will revert back to normal,
and it will just be our regular, permanent drivers doing the job…if our units and trailers haven’t all been destroyed
by then!

Are we just unlucky with the temporary agency drivers that we’ve got at the moment? Or have other Firms got similar
problems with their run-up-to-Christmas temporary agency drivers??

I don’t know who you work for pal but do they assess drivers before allowing them to drive for them?

I think you will find drivers, agency or not, good and bad. Some of the clowns on here want to always put agency drivers down for some stupid reason.
They got their licence from the same place as everyone else.
It’s down to the individual driver but TBH there are far too many bad ones around these days. It makes you wonder how they got a licence then again the test being so easy and the modern vehicles so easy to drive everything falls into place.

Limpers…

truckyboy:
i never hit anything…because i care about the vehicle i drive, and because i care about other peoples property…if i`m not sure, or cant see it…i get out and look…why dont others ■■
/quote]

^^^
This
been driving for a very long time and pretty sure of myself…but…blind side reversing and trailer swing is where most damage occurs and if im not 100% sure ill still get out and look first, take chances and its sure to go wrong.
These guys probably take the view its not their property so why care, if they had to pay for the damage they cause it would be an entirely different matter…

See this, it pics me off! Yes there are good and bad drivers, not all new drivers are bad and not all time served are good. Crap like this though is the reason that so many places will not take on new starters. I am new and haven’t had a bump (yet), and I hope not to. I pride myself on my driving record and more so now I am doing it for a living. It sounds to me like the agency is sending in fools OR they are time served and don’t give a flying F because they are here today gone tomorrow. I have come across a fair few in different lines of work. I don’t think it is agency personnel per sey, I think they are bad drivers that are driving for agencies if that makes sense. You have to wonder at a person that is time served and working agency, there will be some genuine reasons, but some will be because they are unable to work in proper jobs.
That’s my 5cents worth any way,
Tommy.

Its not agency drivers as such its ■■■■ poor management wot causes this.

If managers aint arsed about the job, as obviously they arn’t, then like the proverbial stuff that hits the fan that attitude runs downhill until it has infected the entire operation.
Before you know it you’ve ended up where no one cares, this isn’t usually the case on smaller companies because the person risking his or her fortune to operate will keep and eye on the ball and soon as things stat to go wrong, if they want the business to thrive, they take the appropriate action.

I’ve seen this from a drivers point of view, where a diminishing circle of drivers who actually give a crap are systematically demoralised because the equipment in their care, and the job itself, are being knocked down steadily, gradually infecting even the best with same no one cares plague as all the other crap places out there.

So big cheeses, who’s to blame then, at the golf club you can moan about drivers…but who employed them, who’s mismanaging them for you? the managers you employed or promoted, teir upon tier of people where the few that do actually care are taken the ■■■■ out of by the ones just along for the ride, this is rife at all levels within companies.

Ultimately the fault rests with those at the very top, whilst they allow their various dept managers to tag along for the ride, this situation will just get worse as the ever fewer who do care at all levels have the stuffing knocked out of them.

For what its worth the damage done to the lorry i was issued with 5 years ago is about 50/50 agency and permanent staff.

Juddian:
Its not agency drivers as such its ■■■■ poor management wot causes this.

If managers aint arsed about the job, as obviously they arn’t, then like the proverbial stuff that hits the fan that attitude runs downhill until it has infected the entire operation.
Before you know it you’ve ended up where no one cares, this isn’t usually the case on smaller companies because the person risking his or her fortune to operate will keep and eye on the ball and soon as things stat to go wrong, if they want the business to thrive, they take the appropriate action.

I’ve seen this from a drivers point of view, where a diminishing circle of drivers who actually give a crap are systematically demoralised because the equipment in their care, and the job itself, are being knocked down steadily, gradually infecting even the best with same no one cares plague as all the other crap places out there.

So big cheeses, who’s to blame then, at the golf club you can moan about drivers…but who employed them, who’s mismanaging them for you? the managers you employed or promoted, teir upon tier of people where the few that do actually care are taken the ■■■■ out of by the ones just along for the ride, this is rife at all levels within companies.

Ultimately the fault rests with those at the very top, whilst they allow their various dept managers to tag along for the ride, this situation will just get worse as the ever fewer who do care at all levels have the stuffing knocked out of them.

For what its worth the damage done to the lorry i was issued with 5 years ago is about 50/50 agency and permanent staff.

I am glad you are looking on the bright side!

Juddian:
Its not agency drivers as such its ■■■■ poor management wot causes this.

If managers aint arsed about the job, as obviously they arn’t, then like the proverbial stuff that hits the fan that attitude runs downhill until it has infected the entire operation.
Before you know it you’ve ended up where no one cares, this isn’t usually the case on smaller companies because the person risking his or her fortune to operate will keep and eye on the ball and soon as things stat to go wrong, if they want the business to thrive, they take the appropriate action.

I’ve seen this from a drivers point of view, where a diminishing circle of drivers who actually give a crap are systematically demoralised because the equipment in their care, and the job itself, are being knocked down steadily, gradually infecting even the best with same no one cares plague as all the other crap places out there.

So big cheeses, who’s to blame then, at the golf club you can moan about drivers…but who employed them, who’s mismanaging them for you? the managers you employed or promoted, teir upon tier of people where the few that do actually care are taken the ■■■■ out of by the ones just along for the ride, this is rife at all levels within companies.

Ultimately the fault rests with those at the very top, whilst they allow their various dept managers to tag along for the ride, this situation will just get worse as the ever fewer who do care at all levels have the stuffing knocked out of them.

For what its worth the damage done to the lorry i was issued with 5 years ago is about 50/50 agency and permanent staff.

Sometimes you talk sense, however this time you talk ■■■■. Nothing to do with top men, the standard of driver and driving standards have been falling for years.
LGV test far too easy and any muppet can pass. Same with cars etc. Until that changes we will get appalling driving standards.

Dr Damon:

Juddian:
Its not agency drivers as such its ■■■■ poor management wot causes this.

If managers aint arsed about the job, as obviously they arn’t, then like the proverbial stuff that hits the fan that attitude runs downhill until it has infected the entire operation.
Before you know it you’ve ended up where no one cares, this isn’t usually the case on smaller companies because the person risking his or her fortune to operate will keep and eye on the ball and soon as things stat to go wrong, if they want the business to thrive, they take the appropriate action.

I’ve seen this from a drivers point of view, where a diminishing circle of drivers who actually give a crap are systematically demoralised because the equipment in their care, and the job itself, are being knocked down steadily, gradually infecting even the best with same no one cares plague as all the other crap places out there.

So big cheeses, who’s to blame then, at the golf club you can moan about drivers…but who employed them, who’s mismanaging them for you? the managers you employed or promoted, teir upon tier of people where the few that do actually care are taken the ■■■■ out of by the ones just along for the ride, this is rife at all levels within companies.

Ultimately the fault rests with those at the very top, whilst they allow their various dept managers to tag along for the ride, this situation will just get worse as the ever fewer who do care at all levels have the stuffing knocked out of them.

For what its worth the damage done to the lorry i was issued with 5 years ago is about 50/50 agency and permanent staff.

Sometimes you talk sense, however this time you talk [zb]. Nothing to do with top men, the standard of driver and driving standards have been falling for years.
LGV test far too easy and any muppet can pass. Same with cars etc. Until that changes we will get appalling driving standards.

I think juddian’s point is whilst “any muppet” can get a licence it doesn’t mean you have to employ them.

That or invest some training in them rather than be surprised and moan when they do damage