My Trucking Days Are Over!

UK PROFESSIONAL DRIVERS FORUMS THE UK PROFESSIONAL DRIVERS FORUM (INTERACTIVE)
141

commonrail:
Not there yet.
I have to drive all the way from Wellingborough.
Regarding the camera thread…
People who damage stuff get the sack here.
Same as people who leave the interior in a mess.

Sounds like you’re in a good job.
It’s only a rumour of course, but it’s said they put a picture of a bed on tacho’s for us oldies so we could escape the chaos into oblivion for 45 minutes now and again. Cameras? A bod can’t even snore in peace without someone watching them and wondering why they’re not moving (working).

142

Like I say…my next drop will probably be 4hours min.
I’ll be using the time to research clotches,as I intend hardening my geraniums off,this year.
And finalising the colour of my new sports car.

143

commonrail:
Like I say…my next drop will probably be 4hours min.
I’ll be using the time to research clotches,as I intend hardening my geraniums off,this year.
And finalising the colour of my new sports car.

Oh my, hardening geraniums and a sports car. I could afford that earlier in my HGV life, but I think HGV drivers in sports cars are a bit of a rarity nowadays? Don’t tell them that on here, you’ll have them comparing their Lamborghinis with each other. :laughing:

Joking aside, I looked for the same type job and conditions that I left before I came back years later and soon realized things had changed, but not for the better. I was older too and my priority now was getting through a 12 - 15 hour shift with all the physical effort required without burning myself out. From un/loading and dragging back heavy curtains three to four times a shift to trying to do a 14 foot high frisbee with straps and drops in the middle of London … It’s not for me.

Give me a regular same place contract run with a living wage instead of one I’m just about meant to exist on and I’d be working now, but I quickly realised those days are gone. Agencies, umbrella schemes, greedy bosses … I’ll leave the so-called ‘grafters’ and younger ones to it. :slight_smile:

144

There IS some dross about.
I’ll grant you that.

145

commonrail:
There IS some dross about.
I’ll grant you that.

That’s an understatement, but listening to this lot on here you’d think they’d won the lottery! Capitalism is 2000 years old, a life of playing music and sleeping … :unamused: I’ve no regrets; passed in 1988, drove intermittently over the years, but it’s now a waste of time. I renewed my licence in 2019 and it expires next week as I turn 66. I won’t bother renewing it this time as it’s not worth the time, cost or effort. Driving is not going to get any better in the time I can still work; it’s a dying industry and whatever comes out of it I think the old days are now well and truly over. Times change and the world moves on …

146

BYE.

147

Dear Grandpa,

Congratulations on working out that the job, in general, is crap.

Some people have driving jobs with good pay and conditions. Some enjoy their work, some don’t.
Some people have driving jobs with poorer pay or conditions. Some enjoy their work, some don’t.

Some stay in bad jobs due to lack of brains/motivation/choice etc.
Some are unemployable anywhere else.

Some companies have a shortage of drivers. This is because they are the worst paying jobs, with the worst conditions. Generally these are the large faceless plc logistics companies that dominate the landscape.

These plc type companies are also the types with the money and influence to lobby parliament over issues to suit their agenda. Their agenda in this case being a supply of cheap and unthinking labour.

These companies and their pr consultants also have a voice in the media.

These companies ARE short of drivers. So they tell the government that, and tell the media that. And there you have it… the BBC or similar reports on the govt introducing schemes/measures/support to help the logistics sector. A soundbite here, a clean hi Viz there, and your driver shortage is born.

If the govt or media asked your average small to medium haulier, or own account, the same questions, they would get different answers. But they don’t ask nor do they care.

Pretty sure that of all the decent firms I’ve worked for, none would want or need to have drivers delivered to them direct from prison.

You are right, it is a dying industry. But not dead yet.
The advancement of automation, and the continued growth of monopolies, crushing small business, will continue to change the job and landscape.

Suggest you try another industry, but have the feeling that would not solve your problems

148

Sod me Grandpa but little has changed in the now 45 years i’ve been doing the job despite all the one size fits all deskilling and dumbing down these companies try in order to make the job idiot proof, it always backfires on them :laughing:

There have always been crap jobs, there have always been cream jobs, there have always been specialised jobs, there always will be.
Crap jobs anyone can get on.
Cream jobs you need a dose of luck and/or an introduction or you need nous to walk in and knock on the door and persuade then to take you on, this latter approach can open otherwise dead mans doors.
Specialised jobs can be crap or cream, arguably these are easier to get into than the normal cream because you can start on a crap outfit skill yourself up and then make your move into the cream, often having made contacts within the sector.

■■■■ easy jobs are oversubscribed hence don’t need to pay well, jobs requiring some nous graft effort skill thought discretion loyalty even ingenuity pay better because you’ve already taken whole swathes of the potential workforce (your competitors for the job) out of the equation and better employers appreciate such things.

Not everything in lorry world is as bleak as you’re painting it.
No one starts at the top, the better players simply arn’t going to risk their expensive possibly specialised tackle on unknowns, why would they? similarly if an experienced bod applies but arrives complete with his very own black cloud of doom and gloom why the hell would a decent employer want to consider them, would you want to send miserable buggers in a filthy vehicle (because misery guts has no pride or interest) to your biggest prestigious customers worth £millions every year in orders? and demoralising your existing workforce by the minute? buggered if i would.

It’s the same basically as it was when i started out, you have to find your niche and excel at it and enjoy the fruits for many years, there will always be good jobs going but you have to find them they won’t come looking for you, as one section of our industry fails another sector grows who value skill care and loyalty, earn yourself a reputation as someone can be trusted and relied on and you’ll never need to darken logistics.com doorstep again.

149

DCPCFML:
BYE.

The feeling is mutual. There are numpties in every walk of life. Unfortunately and on this occasion I met a real life genuine one. :laughing:

150

idrive:
Dear Grandpa,

Congratulations on working out that the job, in general, is crap.

Some people have driving jobs with good pay and conditions. Some enjoy their work, some don’t.
Some people have driving jobs with poorer pay or conditions. Some enjoy their work, some don’t.

Some stay in bad jobs due to lack of brains/motivation/choice etc.
Some are unemployable anywhere else.

Some companies have a shortage of drivers. This is because they are the worst paying jobs, with the worst conditions. Generally these are the large faceless plc logistics companies that dominate the landscape.

These plc type companies are also the types with the money and influence to lobby parliament over issues to suit their agenda. Their agenda in this case being a supply of cheap and unthinking labour.

These companies and their pr consultants also have a voice in the media.

These companies ARE short of drivers. So they tell the government that, and tell the media that. And there you have it… the BBC or similar reports on the govt introducing schemes/measures/support to help the logistics sector. A soundbite here, a clean hi Viz there, and your driver shortage is born.

If the govt or media asked your average small to medium haulier, or own account, the same questions, they would get different answers. But they don’t ask nor do they care.

Pretty sure that of all the decent firms I’ve worked for, none would want or need to have drivers delivered to them direct from prison.

You are right, it is a dying industry. But not dead yet.
The advancement of automation, and the continued growth of monopolies, crushing small business, will continue to change the job and landscape.

Suggest you try another industry, but have the feeling that would not solve your problems

‘Congratulations on working out that the job, in general, is crap.’ Not according to the majority here, which is why my posts sound odd.

151

Juddian:
Sod me Grandpa but little has changed in the now 45 years i’ve been doing the job despite all the one size fits all deskilling and dumbing down these companies try in order to make the job idiot proof, it always backfires on them :laughing:

There have always been crap jobs, there have always been cream jobs, there have always been specialised jobs, there always will be.
Crap jobs anyone can get on.
Cream jobs you need a dose of luck and/or an introduction or you need nous to walk in and knock on the door and persuade then to take you on, this latter approach can open otherwise dead mans doors.
Specialised jobs can be crap or cream, arguably these are easier to get into than the normal cream because you can start on a crap outfit skill yourself up and then make your move into the cream, often having made contacts within the sector.

■■■■ easy jobs are oversubscribed hence don’t need to pay well, jobs requiring some nous graft effort skill thought discretion loyalty even ingenuity pay better because you’ve already taken whole swathes of the potential workforce (your competitors for the job) out of the equation and better employers appreciate such things.

Not everything in lorry world is as bleak as you’re painting it.
No one starts at the top, the better players simply arn’t going to risk their expensive possibly specialised tackle on unknowns, why would they? similarly if an experienced bod applies but arrives complete with his very own black cloud of doom and gloom why the hell would a decent employer want to consider them, would you want to send miserable buggers in a filthy vehicle (because misery guts has no pride or interest) to your biggest prestigious customers worth £millions every year in orders? and demoralising your existing workforce by the minute? buggered if i would.

It’s the same basically as it was when i started out, you have to find your niche and excel at it and enjoy the fruits for many years, there will always be good jobs going but you have to find them they won’t come looking for you, as one section of our industry fails another sector grows who value skill care and loyalty, earn yourself a reputation as someone can be trusted and relied on and you’ll never need to darken logistics.com doorstep again.

You’re about the same age as me then and you haven’t seen changes? It would be amazing if there hadn’t been. No Juddian, it wasn’t even the same twenty years ago. The transport industry is in an absolute mess and a reflection of the country and economy in general.

152

Times change, but imagine had someone turned up even 15 years ago and predicted the future. WTDs, CPCs, driver facing cameras, the demise of the unions, stagnant wages, collapsing haulage companies … They’d have been laughed at. Similarly, the drivers who thought Eastern European drivers flooding the market didn’t matter or that competing with European haulage companies was only fair won’t be laughing for much longer, but insist on pretending everything is as it was.

From Blair who tried to spend his way out of a recession and which ended in the biggest economic collapse since the 1930s. This in turn produced ‘Call me Dave’ who with high unemployment and no money gave up and turned Britain into a free for all gig-economy followed by ‘Buffoon Boris’ who now presides over a wrecked economy, with what increasingly resembles corporate fascism with an unhealthy dose of authoritarianism. And nothing’s changed?

Here we sit waiting for the biggest recession since the 1600s to arrive, predicted by every economist and his dog with even the government having to admit it and many of you think everything is rosy and it’s just everyone else that will suffer and the transport industry will sail through it all? When all these lockdowns end, much of Britain will resemble the minimum wage society it’s already heading towards; the ‘new normal.’

There will be no shortage of Mr. Slobovych’s foreign €500pm drivers doing what you’re doing now, plus the British blue-chip corporations will survive, but over the next few years the majority of the British small to medium transport businesses won’t. Yes that includes you in your non-unionised job cheering on a salary that’s already ten years out of date and wondering what all the fuss is about. The same people who walked into the 2008 economic collapse and didn’t even see it coming are now denying there’s a crisis in the transport industry? Maybe if we ignore it, it will go away?

Hey, this is just my opinion, right? No need to get excited. Maybe all the cheap foreign competition will go away, wages will soar and a new generation of drivers will flood the industry replacing the older retiring and/or disillusioned ones? Who knows, but I won’t be holding my breath.

153

Glad that I am nearly retired. Its not just transport or “logistics” that are well and truly stuffed. The people who are going to pay for this shambles clusterflick havent been born yet.

154

Grandpa:
Times change, but imagine had someone turned up even 15 years ago and predicted the future. WTDs, CPCs, driver facing cameras, the demise of the unions, stagnant wages, collapsing haulage companies … They’d have been laughed at. Similarly, the drivers who thought Eastern European drivers flooding the market didn’t matter or that competing with European haulage companies was only fair won’t be laughing for much longer, but insist on pretending everything is as it was.

From Blair who tried to spend his way out of a recession and which ended in the biggest economic collapse since the 1930s. This in turn produced ‘Call me Dave’ who with high unemployment and no money gave up and turned Britain into a free for all gig-economy followed by ‘Buffoon Boris’ who now presides over a wrecked economy, with what increasingly resembles corporate fascism with an unhealthy dose of authoritarianism. And nothing’s changed?

Here we sit waiting for the biggest recession since the 1600s to arrive, predicted by every economist and his dog with even the government having to admit it and many of you think everything is rosy and it’s just everyone else that will suffer and the transport industry will sail through it all? When all these lockdowns end, much of Britain will resemble the minimum wage society it’s already heading towards; the ‘new normal.’

There will be no shortage of Mr. Slobovych’s foreign €500pm drivers doing what you’re doing now, plus the British blue-chip corporations will survive, but over the next few years the majority of the British small to medium transport businesses won’t. Yes that includes you in your non-unionised job cheering on a salary that’s already ten years out of date and wondering what all the fuss is about. The same people who walked into the 2008 economic collapse and didn’t even see it coming are now denying there’s a crisis in the transport industry? Maybe if we ignore it, it will go away?

Hey, this is just my opinion, right? No need to get excited. Maybe all the cheap foreign competition will go away, wages will soar and a new generation of drivers will flood the industry replacing the older retiring and/or disillusioned ones? Who knows, but I won’t be holding my breath.

I can see you having a wonderfully happy retirement… :smiley:

155

alamcculloch:
Glad that I am nearly retired. Its not just transport or “logistics” that are well and truly stuffed. The people who are going to pay for this shambles clusterflick havent been born yet.

Too true. Have we even paid back for the 2008 mess yet? Never seems to be a crisis with MPs, or company directors.

156

switchlogic:

Grandpa:
Times change, but imagine had someone turned up even 15 years ago and predicted the future. WTDs, CPCs, driver facing cameras, the demise of the unions, stagnant wages, collapsing haulage companies … They’d have been laughed at. Similarly, the drivers who thought Eastern European drivers flooding the market didn’t matter or that competing with European haulage companies was only fair won’t be laughing for much longer, but insist on pretending everything is as it was.

From Blair who tried to spend his way out of a recession and which ended in the biggest economic collapse since the 1930s. This in turn produced ‘Call me Dave’ who with high unemployment and no money gave up and turned Britain into a free for all gig-economy followed by ‘Buffoon Boris’ who now presides over a wrecked economy, with what increasingly resembles corporate fascism with an unhealthy dose of authoritarianism. And nothing’s changed?

Here we sit waiting for the biggest recession since the 1600s to arrive, predicted by every economist and his dog with even the government having to admit it and many of you think everything is rosy and it’s just everyone else that will suffer and the transport industry will sail through it all? When all these lockdowns end, much of Britain will resemble the minimum wage society it’s already heading towards; the ‘new normal.’

There will be no shortage of Mr. Slobovych’s foreign €500pm drivers doing what you’re doing now, plus the British blue-chip corporations will survive, but over the next few years the majority of the British small to medium transport businesses won’t. Yes that includes you in your non-unionised job cheering on a salary that’s already ten years out of date and wondering what all the fuss is about. The same people who walked into the 2008 economic collapse and didn’t even see it coming are now denying there’s a crisis in the transport industry? Maybe if we ignore it, it will go away?

Hey, this is just my opinion, right? No need to get excited. Maybe all the cheap foreign competition will go away, wages will soar and a new generation of drivers will flood the industry replacing the older retiring and/or disillusioned ones? Who knows, but I won’t be holding my breath.

I can see you having a wonderfully happy retirement… :smiley:

Grandpa is retiring next week and I don’t want to hear any Bolshie talk. I want you all to go that extra mile and make sure my pension is paid. As the tune players and easy job merchants do those vehicle checks every morning, I want them all to pause for a few seconds and say to themselves, ‘Grandpa, we’re doing this for you.’ Equally, I shall of course think of them as I roll over in bed and have an extra hour or several of zeds. :laughing:

157

Well, referring to yourself in the third person isn’t prententious…at all*.

*Yes I get the irony in me saying that. :smiley:

158

switchlogic:
Well, referring to yourself in the third person isn’t prententious…at all*.

*Yes I get the irony in me saying that. :smiley:

It’s called satire.

Tis not in my nature to envy my fellow limper HGV multi-droppers for the price of a packet of cigarettes an hour, as I claim my free bus pass and concessionary travel entitlement. Grandpa will arrive in off-peak style, whether previously in a DAF, or currently muzzled in a Rugby Stagecoach omnibus.
My ‘phone does not accept incoming calls from gobby planners and although it may sound rather harsh to the ‘grafters’ among us, I couldn’t really care less whether a director can pay this month’s mortgage, or not. Minus the current stress and physical labour required, Grandpa would re-join the Yorkie Bar world of trucking, but only if it pays a living wage and not the Micky Mouse ones now on offer.

On our last legs multi-drop haulage companies, waste disposal contractors and recruiters offering a ‘fantastic opportunity’ need not apply. They may however help me across the road as befits my new found status of ‘elderly’ person. :slight_smile: