robinhood_1984:
I’d be more than happy with a guaranteed day rate of X amount of dollars per day and a mileage bonus on top of that to encourage drivers not to become bone idle time wasters like we see in the UK these days. Pay the driver enough of a guaranteed minimum so that if he sits around all day through no fault of his own it doesn’t hammer his wages and it encourages the company to run things efficiently rather than just picking the load with the biggest dollar sign next to it on face value. Then pay a mileage bonus that is hefty enough to make it worth while to crack on with the job, but not have it so high at the detriment of the day rate that its the only way to make the job pay. I think if OTR drivers in Canada went to purely hourly pay they’d end up being as productive as an American driver tossing it off in truckstops all day, and that would just be embarrassing.
Now we disagree, not in philosophy, but in practical terms.
The set up out here DOES allow for maximum efficiency from the trucks and drivers, you may not think so as you see and experience trucks sitting waiting for loads or spending countless hours at a loading dock.
But think about it, or even use your own experience. The truck will still do its 12000miles that month, so the company will still gets its money out of it.
It may be sat waiting for a load or waiting at a warehouse to get loaded or unloaded, but it ain’t costing them a penny, they know the driver will go as hard as necessary to make up for the lost time as he also needs those 12000miles each month.
Now let’s compare that with my experience at Paul Brandt, we got waiting time and paid layover, we also got “dark money” for night runs.
They could afford waiting time as one, it was very rare and two, it was passed on to the customer, as was the night work premium. So it never affected their bottom line.
But and this is a huge but, not every company has the work that they had, some companies have no choice as their customers will not pay anything other than a simple freight rate and that’s it.
The multinationals are by far the worst in this respect. So what’s a trucking company to do? Turn down work for a blue chip client? Work that is regular, work that is (under the current system) profitable, work that has a guarantee that they will get their invoice paid in full and on time. Any company director turning that kind of work down would be mad.
The only way this industry is ever going to change is if it is forced to change and the only way I see that happening is by the introduction of elogs and very strict enforcement of the HOS regulations with severe penalties for infringements.
Think of VOSA on steroids with a turbo, but with guns too!!!
So be careful what you wish for, the unintended consequences could make you a lot worse off than you are now.
Now I’ll throw a spanner in the works, I reckon it’s fine as it is. Yes there are a load of crap jobs out there, but us moaning about them is just the same as an Eastern European driver moving to Britain and crying that he can’t get a job on the tankers or car transporters with top money and top conditions.
It took me a lot longer to get a decent top of the tree job in Britain than it did in Canada and even though I had 20yrs experience when I got here, I was still a rookie, so effectively starting from the bottom and working my way up, earning my stripes in the process.
I really think we should all take that into account before we ■■■■ and moan about how bad it is over here…
