Hello all, first off I am a young guy (26) currently working in a factory, now I am paid around £1200 a month for some pretty hard work, that with poor management, stress, threats from them etc etc has made me search for another career, now I generally like working alone and also like driving so this brought me to here,
I have a few questions though, I was looking at a Class 2 license, first I have to go for my medical?
now 3 years ago I passed my driving test and my eyesight (long distance) is not great, it was good enough for the car test but for a HGV license I think I would struggle, should I book an eyetest and get glasses before I go for my medical or will they advise me themselves? will it mean I have to wear glasses for normal driving too?
second thing is I have read a lot on here and mostly people are writing that you must be prepared to work sometimes 2x15 hour shifts and 3x12 shifts, is this common? I will be honest I don’t really want to work silly hours or night shift or even weekends, I am thinking this may be a problem for some companies and especially hard for a new driver,
is it common for people to get jobs working mon-friday 8-9 hours etc? I am just getting as much information as possible before I pay all the money that’s required for the training etc, I have applied for another factory job at a popular car company, they are opening a new factory in 6 months or so, I got through to the next stage but there are more stages, plus no contract straight away, you need to work for around 3-5 years before you get one but the money is good at just under £2000 a month,
I will be honest I don’t really want to work in another factory but in my situation I am trying to balance home life/free time with work and I don’t fancy working 60 hours a week as a driver for £2000 a month when I can work 40 hours and go for this factory job.
If you think you need glasses get glasses first. No point paying for a medical to fail and then pay for another once you’ve got glasses sorted.
If you need glasses your licence will have a 01 restriction marked on the back meaning yes you’ll be expected to wear them at all times when driving.
“3x15 hour shifts and 2x13 shifts, is this common?” - Yes it’s common. It’s the max and some firms will expect it.
“I don’t really want to work silly hours or night shift or even weekends.” - Driving probably isn’t for you.
“Is it common for people to get jobs working mon-friday 8-9 hours etc?” - Maybe if you drive a bin lorry for the council. That’s about it.
“I am trying to balance home life/free time with work and I don’t fancy working 60 hours a week as a driver.” - Driving probably isn’t for you.
Seems from your op you don’t actually want to drive because you want to drive. You want to drive because you’re under the impression it’ll be an easy job.
Even if your firm doesn’t expect you to max your hours out each week, long days will still happen. My first day was 14 hours long simply because we were late leaving depot (due to a last minute drop being put on) and then had to reroute to avoid a motorway accident which just added onto the day.
In terms of work/life balance I’ve found thus far (week 4 of driving btw) that you really can’t plan anything for in the week. Pretty much work home by 4ish asleep early and up at 3am. That said I don’t work Sundays and one in four Saturdays. Which is better than my last job. So I’m seeing more of the wife and kid and can actually go and do things with them.
Money is good but you work hard for every penny. I’m doing multi drop work, much of class 2 is. I like it but it’s physical work.
Lorry driving, at least class 2, isn’t an easy meal ticket.
The hours you describe are not uncommon. There are, however, exceptions but good luck with finding them. Maybe look towards skips as they don’t normally max their hours. The main difficulty is that, if you take out your dislike for long hours, you could easily earn an extra grand a month.
Go into this with your eyes wide open. Be prepared to work long hours to get a start. And then start looking for the more comfy numbers.
All the best with it - - and if you’re serious about going for it, check out the Christmas Offer at the top of the threads.
Building site deliveries tend to be day work 7-5 as is steel. Of course if your last drop at 16:30 is 120 miles from base you won’t finish at 5 but there is a lot of local work.
Saint gobain regularly advertise across all of their different divisions for cat c drivers to do local deliveries with the selling point that the hours are regular ie 8-5 or something like that.
Money is ■■■■ mind you but there you go.
Can imagine 2k for factory work involves some pretty mental shifts?
As a new pass I work five days a week, average shift is 10 hours however it’s not unusual to work 14 hours some days. My weekly take home pay is roughly £700 a week after tax and NI. If I wanted to tramp I could earn £150 a week more which to me isn’t worth it as I like to get home.
That’s class 1 work though. When I did class 2 I was taking home under £1,300 per month doing more hours (working against WTD) and the amount of work I did on class 2 is not comparable to class 1 as all I do now is sign paperwork and couple up to a trailer. Whereas on class 2, it would be loading yourself up, strapping down and doing multiple drops.
Some people love class 2 work because they say the days fly by as your active but I hated it. I have huge respect for anybody doing multi drop class 2 work as they work their balls off for at times poor pay.
As for start times it depends on your industry. For example a day shift is from early hours in the morning to mid afternoon and a night shift could be from 4, 5, 6pm to a similar time in the morning.
You should book yourself in for an eye test if you struggle seeing long distance and yes if you do require glasses to drive the DVLA will put a 01 code on your license making it a legal requirement for you to wear glasses whilst driving.
Around the M25 where i am it all depends on the type of work you do, food deliveries and supermarkets form a lot of the work that requires unsociable hours and weekends, they are the ones constantly looking for drivers but also paying better rates.
There are a lot of haulage/multi drop jobs that are mon - fri 6am starts, average day 10 hours, that is usually what i go for as i dont like doing weekends either, most companies pay overtime after 9/10 hours so long days can be worth doing sometimes.
Realistically if you can get 2k a month for a factory job take it cos it will be a lot less hassle that driving for the same money and you will probably get 3 months shift pattern so you will always know what you are doing…
