Are Agency drivers as bad as this at other places?

[kcrussell25]

Dr Damon:
Hang on fella, I do know a few transport managers but the two who I am more friendly with are actually X drivers and it certainly is not up to them to increase drivers wages.
As for companies investing money to train drivers, I would imagine most do not have spare finance for that. Drivers in the past learned themselves after passing a test (and standards were far higher than now) but attitudes seem to have changed recently. Drivers do not help each other, do not communicate and will not stick up for each other.

I just hope the driver you learned from knew what he was doing and was not teaching bad habits. Just because they have experience does not mean they are doing things correctly.
If you are expecting transport to change and improve you will be sadly disappointed especially when it comes to wages. Drivers (some) have shown they are not capable hence autonomy is coming fast.

I never said it was their decision but that is what it comes down to. As is often discussed on here there are plenty of decent drivers but they won’t work for the money on offer. Pay well you can pick from the best drivers as everyone will want to work for you. Pay low and you wont.

Again company’s say they don’t have the money to train but will pay the repair bills for damaged trucks? Surely training is cheaper? Also encourages some loyalty as the company is investing in you. Regards drivers helping each other I have had several issues talking to other drivers where there is a “language barrier”. Cant help each other then.

I think he knew what he was doing (as far as I can tell) particularly how to approach drops and road craft.

I never said I expect things to improve but the ways are there to do so. Its up to company’s to decide what they want to do. Regards wages I took a pay rise to do this as do many others. I was made redundant from a secure job but many others don’t have that. With no offense intended I don’t think some on here realise how poor employment opportunities are these days. Where older drivers say wages are poor compared to the past for many younger people its more than they can dream of.

Regards automation I was in London Tuesday overtaking a row of parked cars and cars coming the other way didn’t wait after I had pulled out. I got out and politely explained the gap wasn’t big enough for me to get in and get the trailer straight and they needed to move. He did once I explained and the others followed suit once they saw. What would your driverless truck have done?

[truckyboy]

Re: Are Agency drivers as bad as this at other places?
Unread postby Dr Damon » Thu Nov 16, 2017 5:58 pm

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.

Its a well known fact that a lot of EE drivers got their licence by driving a tractor and farm trailer on test, and gaining a class 1…whereas many took the proper route and went via a school and a REAL TEST .Maybe thats where the problem lies…inexperience at its best.

[rjan]

Dr Damon:
As for companies investing money to train drivers, I would imagine most do not have spare finance for that.

But they have the spare finance to afford damage caused by short term hires?

If so, then they’ve made their bed on commercial grounds, and should stop complaining about having to lie in it.

It’s no different from saying you can’t afford to train surgeons, and then complaining that barbers are occasionally mutilating their clients.

If you are expecting transport to change and improve you will be sadly disappointed especially when it comes to wages. Drivers (some) have shown they are not capable hence autonomy is coming fast.

The impetus behind automation is not the quality of work but the fact that machines don’t require wages.

Thus, the drivers primary offence is that he requires a wage, and nothing short of working for free will make him equal with the machine - he could be so highly skilled as to be straddling the cab roofs of two lorries and driving them two astride through a slalom course, and he still wouldn’t be good enough because he’d be expecting a wage from it.

[uktramp]

What a totally boring post and ridiculous observation made by the OP. Who cares, who gives a dam. What difference does it make to you. People who jump on an internet forum moaning and calling other drivers and expect others to join in and say they agree with you. It is really boring and completely ridiculous, what we need is more fridge talk. Refrigeration tales are what people want. Stuff agency drivers and knocking peoples driving skills. Transport industry is on its knees, drivers are ■■■■, move on FFS.

[dr_damon]

kcrussell25:

Dr Damon:
Hang on fella, I do know a few transport managers but the two who I am more friendly with are actually X drivers and it certainly is not up to them to increase drivers wages.
As for companies investing money to train drivers, I would imagine most do not have spare finance for that. Drivers in the past learned themselves after passing a test (and standards were far higher than now) but attitudes seem to have changed recently. Drivers do not help each other, do not communicate and will not stick up for each other.

I just hope the driver you learned from knew what he was doing and was not teaching bad habits. Just because they have experience does not mean they are doing things correctly.
If you are expecting transport to change and improve you will be sadly disappointed especially when it comes to wages. Drivers (some) have shown they are not capable hence autonomy is coming fast.

I never said it was their decision but that is what it comes down to. As is often discussed on here there are plenty of decent drivers but they won’t work for the money on offer. Pay well you can pick from the best drivers as everyone will want to work for you. Pay low and you wont.

Again company’s say they don’t have the money to train but will pay the repair bills for damaged trucks? Surely training is cheaper? Also encourages some loyalty as the company is investing in you. Regards drivers helping each other I have had several issues talking to other drivers where there is a “language barrier”. Cant help each other then.

I think he knew what he was doing (as far as I can tell) particularly how to approach drops and road craft.

I never said I expect things to improve but the ways are there to do so. Its up to company’s to decide what they want to do. Regards wages I took a pay rise to do this as do many others. I was made redundant from a secure job but many others don’t have that. With no offense intended I don’t think some on here realise how poor employment opportunities are these days. Where older drivers say wages are poor compared to the past for many younger people its more than they can dream of.

Regards automation I was in London Tuesday overtaking a row of parked cars and cars coming the other way didn’t wait after I had pulled out. I got out and politely explained the gap wasn’t big enough for me to get in and get the trailer straight and they needed to move. He did once I explained and the others followed suit once they saw. What would your driverless truck have done?

Maybe there are a lot of decent drivers but from what I hear and see they are incredibly hard to find.The well paid jobs are the hardest to get in to because they are normally taken by decent drivers who do not leave.
I certainly realise how employment has changed over the years and am glad I do not have the problems that younger people have but if you are good at what you do,reliable,smart and have a good attitude you can still do well. It just takes time and patience.
In my opinion attitudes from a lot now a days are deplorable.

Regarding automation all I will say is the scenario you gave will not have to be dealt with with autonomous vehicles but believe it or not computers and robots can make better decisions than humans a lot of the time.

[dr_damon]

Rjan:

Dr Damon:
As for companies investing money to train drivers, I would imagine most do not have spare finance for that.

But they have the spare finance to afford damage caused by short term hires?

If so, then they’ve made their bed on commercial grounds, and should stop complaining about having to lie in it.

It’s no different from saying you can’t afford to train surgeons, and then complaining that barbers are occasionally mutilating their clients.

If you are expecting transport to change and improve you will be sadly disappointed especially when it comes to wages. Drivers (some) have shown they are not capable hence autonomy is coming fast.

The impetus behind automation is not the quality of work but the fact that machines don’t require wages.

Thus, the drivers primary offence is that he requires a wage, and nothing short of working for free will make him equal with the machine - he could be so highly skilled as to be straddling the cab roofs of two lorries and driving them two astride through a slalom course, and he still wouldn’t be good enough because he’d be expecting a wage from it.

I hear what you are saying but transport companies expect drivers with a vocational licence to be able to drive. Possibly they may need to train a driver for something more specialised but normally they just want a driver with a licence to be able to do the job to a decent standard.
Some can but a lot cannot.

I think you will find something fully automated will give better quality than any human simply because humans lack concentration, make mistakes and have bad attitudes.
Robots and computers will be more or less perfect I am sorry to say.

[rjan]

Dr Damon:
I hear what you are saying but transport companies expect drivers with a vocational licence to be able to drive. Possibly they may need to train a driver for something more specialised but normally they just want a driver with a licence to be able to do the job to a decent standard.
Some can but a lot cannot.

But most drivers can drive to a decent standard. What employers want is for every driver to be above average on skill, below average on wages, below average on rest requirements, and to have had experience of every difficult maneouver in the country.

Even perfectly good drivers, with enough stress, with enough sleep deprivation, and with enough hours into the working day, and given some crazy blind-side reverse in a place they’ve never been, in a vehicle that they don’t normally drive, will make mistakes on occasion.

Just as a computer would if you impaired it’s power supply, let it’s mechanical parts wear, muddied it’s sensors, or changed the dimensions of the vehicle to which it was accustomed.

I think you will find something fully automated will give better quality than any human simply because humans lack concentration, make mistakes and have bad attitudes.
Robots and computers will be more or less perfect I am sorry to say.

But as I say, that is not what makes them attractive - it is the lack of wages which is the key.

Every autonomous vehicle will have sensors around 360 degrees of the vehicle. Most drivers have to do without anything like it, but if companies did fit them (making the cab into something resembling a flight simulator) I would guess the amount of damage caused by maneouvering would reduce - the reason they don’t is because of how much the sensors cost (and how much routine maintenance they require), which will be the minimum specification for an autonomous vehicle.

And if you think a human has a bad attitude, you should see what an automated vehicle is like. They won’t even do a walk around check when directly instructed to do so, or drive forward on a slippery surface letting the wheels skid moderately until traction is gained (but stopping if they are moving sideways into an adjacent obstacle).

In fact, in most reasonably difficult maneouvers, I would expect that an autonomous vehicle would refuse to carry them out, because it will involve crossing kerbs, or rough ground, or will involve opening a gate, or realising that a gate is not sufficiently open.

Or because articulated vehicles have a slightly different “sweep” in each direction, it will reverse millimeter perfect into a position from which it cannot get out again. Or it will not realise that a pothole or even surface will cause the entire vehicle to lurch sideways and hit something above-ground that, on a purely 2-dimensional analysis of the maneouvering area, cannot be predicted.

The simple fact is, what autonomous vehicles will do is impose iron discipline on warehouses to make their yards extremely regular, and all these 19th century warehouses that are getting artics into bays designed for vans, will just be put out of business, or forced to accept human drivers to do what the computer cannot be trusted to do.

In other words, what autonomous vehicles will do, is force the investment into the built environment that will make it easy for both human and computer alike to maneouver - but which currently bosses prefer not to invest in, instead moaning about all their damage, and dreaming of a computer that simply replaces their drivers like-for-like in the cab but does everything better.

It’s like after the war when farmers were told to belt up and start improving productivity. Those that wouldn’t, or couldn’t, sink the required money into machinery and groundworks and all the other things required, were forced to sell up to those that could. That is what will happen with haulage - the one man bands and the tiny warehouses will be demolished, and the entire lot will be taken over by the big boys, who can afford to rebuild yards and warehouses and invest in all the other equipment necessary to make them automatable.

And it will be paid for by eliminating the wages of drivers and small company directors, just as in farming where investment was paid for by the elimination of agricultural labour and the rent claims of small farm owners.

[shandy123]

@rjan
Great post!

[truckman020]

Harry Monk:
One agency driver at our place over-ran the pin which smashed the deflector off so he was given a replacement unit which he promptly reversed into a barrier which knocked an air tank off, all on the same shift.

I’m not slagging agency drivers off, I’m agency myself. My nickname at the firm I work for is “The bloke who isn’t Polish”.

one of the companies I worked for had an agency in for the day,couldn’t speak a word of English and when he jumped in the 18 tonner he jumped in on the nearside thinking it was a left ■■■■■■,exit one agency driver after 10 min

[tommytanker]

truckman020:

Harry Monk:
One agency driver at our place over-ran the pin which smashed the deflector off so he was given a replacement unit which he promptly reversed into a barrier which knocked an air tank off, all on the same shift.

I’m not slagging agency drivers off, I’m agency myself. My nickname at the firm I work for is “The bloke who isn’t Polish”.

one of the companies I worked for had an agency in for the day,couldn’t speak a word of English and when he jumped in the 18 tonner he jumped in on the nearside thinking it was a left ■■■■■■,exit one agency driver after 10 min

As a former employer, if I was to be sent a prospective employee who couldn’t speak the language, I would be sending the agency a dear John too! That is truely shocking.
Tommy.

[kcrussell25]

Dr Damon:

kcrussell25:

Dr Damon:
Hang on fella, I do know a few transport managers but the two who I am more friendly with are actually X drivers and it certainly is not up to them to increase drivers wages.
As for companies investing money to train drivers, I would imagine most do not have spare finance for that. Drivers in the past learned themselves after passing a test (and standards were far higher than now) but attitudes seem to have changed recently. Drivers do not help each other, do not communicate and will not stick up for each other.

I just hope the driver you learned from knew what he was doing and was not teaching bad habits. Just because they have experience does not mean they are doing things correctly.
If you are expecting transport to change and improve you will be sadly disappointed especially when it comes to wages. Drivers (some) have shown they are not capable hence autonomy is coming fast.

I never said it was their decision but that is what it comes down to. As is often discussed on here there are plenty of decent drivers but they won’t work for the money on offer. Pay well you can pick from the best drivers as everyone will want to work for you. Pay low and you wont.

Again company’s say they don’t have the money to train but will pay the repair bills for damaged trucks? Surely training is cheaper? Also encourages some loyalty as the company is investing in you. Regards drivers helping each other I have had several issues talking to other drivers where there is a “language barrier”. Cant help each other then.

I think he knew what he was doing (as far as I can tell) particularly how to approach drops and road craft.

I never said I expect things to improve but the ways are there to do so. Its up to company’s to decide what they want to do. Regards wages I took a pay rise to do this as do many others. I was made redundant from a secure job but many others don’t have that. With no offense intended I don’t think some on here realise how poor employment opportunities are these days. Where older drivers say wages are poor compared to the past for many younger people its more than they can dream of.

Regards automation I was in London Tuesday overtaking a row of parked cars and cars coming the other way didn’t wait after I had pulled out. I got out and politely explained the gap wasn’t big enough for me to get in and get the trailer straight and they needed to move. He did once I explained and the others followed suit once they saw. What would your driverless truck have done?

Maybe there are a lot of decent drivers but from what I hear and see they are incredibly hard to find.The well paid jobs are the hardest to get in to because they are normally taken by decent drivers who do not leave.
I certainly realise how employment has changed over the years and am glad I do not have the problems that younger people have but if you are good at what you do,reliable,smart and have a good attitude you can still do well. It just takes time and patience.
In my opinion attitudes from a lot now a days are deplorable.

Regarding automation all I will say is the scenario you gave will not have to be dealt with with autonomous vehicles but believe it or not computers and robots can make better decisions than humans a lot of the time.

So why won’t this situation arise? Lorries going to given their own dedicated roads to avoid the interaction? Good luck with that in cities, especially London.

Or is it based on your assumption that all vehicles will be autonomous and avoid each other that way? That’s going to be a lot of years away.

I really can’t see how it will be avoided but am looking forward to the explanation in your expert opinion. Also your response to the points rjan raised

[dr_damon]

But most drivers can drive to a decent standard.

Now you post some sensible stuff but how do you come up with that silly comment? You must drive on different roads fella. Standards are appalling from an awful lot of LGV drivers these days.
You are biased and deluded to think otherwise.
And it’s not only their driving that is crap it’s their general attitude.

[dr_damon]

kcrussell25:

Dr Damon:

kcrussell25:

Dr Damon:
Hang on fella, I do know a few transport managers but the two who I am more friendly with are actually X drivers and it certainly is not up to them to increase drivers wages.
As for companies investing money to train drivers, I would imagine most do not have spare finance for that. Drivers in the past learned themselves after passing a test (and standards were far higher than now) but attitudes seem to have changed recently. Drivers do not help each other, do not communicate and will not stick up for each other.

I just hope the driver you learned from knew what he was doing and was not teaching bad habits. Just because they have experience does not mean they are doing things correctly.
If you are expecting transport to change and improve you will be sadly disappointed especially when it comes to wages. Drivers (some) have shown they are not capable hence autonomy is coming fast.

I never said it was their decision but that is what it comes down to. As is often discussed on here there are plenty of decent drivers but they won’t work for the money on offer. Pay well you can pick from the best drivers as everyone will want to work for you. Pay low and you wont.

Again company’s say they don’t have the money to train but will pay the repair bills for damaged trucks? Surely training is cheaper? Also encourages some loyalty as the company is investing in you. Regards drivers helping each other I have had several issues talking to other drivers where there is a “language barrier”. Cant help each other then.

I think he knew what he was doing (as far as I can tell) particularly how to approach drops and road craft.

I never said I expect things to improve but the ways are there to do so. Its up to company’s to decide what they want to do. Regards wages I took a pay rise to do this as do many others. I was made redundant from a secure job but many others don’t have that. With no offense intended I don’t think some on here realise how poor employment opportunities are these days. Where older drivers say wages are poor compared to the past for many younger people its more than they can dream of.

Regards automation I was in London Tuesday overtaking a row of parked cars and cars coming the other way didn’t wait after I had pulled out. I got out and politely explained the gap wasn’t big enough for me to get in and get the trailer straight and they needed to move. He did once I explained and the others followed suit once they saw. What would your driverless truck have done?

Maybe there are a lot of decent drivers but from what I hear and see they are incredibly hard to find.The well paid jobs are the hardest to get in to because they are normally taken by decent drivers who do not leave.
I certainly realise how employment has changed over the years and am glad I do not have the problems that younger people have but if you are good at what you do,reliable,smart and have a good attitude you can still do well. It just takes time and patience.
In my opinion attitudes from a lot now a days are deplorable.

Regarding automation all I will say is the scenario you gave will not have to be dealt with with autonomous vehicles but believe it or not computers and robots can make better decisions than humans a lot of the time.

So why won’t this situation arise? Lorries going to given their own dedicated roads to avoid the interaction? Good luck with that in cities, especially London.

Or is it based on your assumption that all vehicles will be autonomous and avoid each other that way? That’s going to be a lot of years away.

I really can’t see how it will be avoided but am looking forward to the explanation in your expert opinion. Also your response to the points rjan raised

It’s fairly obvious I am not going to convince you or some others on here but I can assure you there are plenty changes ahead.

[raymundo]

I agree and it will either rain or get dark before morning …

[wiretwister]

nytimes.com/2017/11/13/busi … rucks.html

Drivers would go off to work in offices and might spend their day driving trucks through the last few miles of several different routes in several different cities before heading home for dinner.

“One driver can drive 10 to 30 trucks per day,” Mr. Seltz-Axmacher said.

Pitch to Drivers

Given that trucks are likely to need drivers for some time, it’s no wonder that self-driving companies are almost universally pitching themselves as a friendly partner instead of a job killer. “You increase productivity, but also make the job more attractive,” Mr. Rodrigues said.

And it’s true: Trucking is a brutal job. Drivers endure long, tedious stretches where they are inactive but have to stay focused, and they spend weeks at a time away from home. For those and other reasons, the industry’s biggest problem has been the scarcity and turnover of drivers, making it hard to keep up with shipping demand.

“We see this as a solution to the driver shortage and being able to redeploy them to the jobs they actually want,” said Chris Nordh, senior director of advanced vehicle technologies at Ryder.

Given that this is referring to US operators, the differences between US and UK infrastructure, few will really doubt it is coming. But how many drivers, who can empathise with the challenges mentioned in the quote, really find the alternative employment roles in transport/logistics very attractive? would you want to sit in an office and remotely pilot many vehicles in the run in/out from major road junctions. May be that will be appealing to the playstation generation, not for me but I have fewer years than finger on one hand before I retire and may yet finish before that.

[sand_fisher]

Dr Damon:

Rjan:

Dr Damon:
As for companies investing money to train drivers, I would imagine most do not have spare finance for that.

But they have the spare finance to afford damage caused by short term hires?

If so, then they’ve made their bed on commercial grounds, and should stop complaining about having to lie in it.

It’s no different from saying you can’t afford to train surgeons, and then complaining that barbers are occasionally mutilating their clients.

If you are expecting transport to change and improve you will be sadly disappointed especially when it comes to wages. Drivers (some) have shown they are not capable hence autonomy is coming fast.

The impetus behind automation is not the quality of work but the fact that machines don’t require wages.

Thus, the drivers primary offence is that he requires a wage, and nothing short of working for free will make him equal with the machine - he could be so highly skilled as to be straddling the cab roofs of two lorries and driving them two astride through a slalom course, and he still wouldn’t be good enough because he’d be expecting a wage from it.

I hear what you are saying but transport companies expect drivers with a vocational licence to be able to drive. Possibly they may need to train a driver for something more specialised but normally they just want a driver with a licence to be able to do the job to a decent standard.
Some can but a lot cannot.

I think you will find something fully automated will give better quality than any human simply because humans lack concentration, make mistakes and have bad attitudes.
Robots and computers will be more or less perfect I am sorry to say.

Only as good as the people who programme them.

[mike68]

I will say one thing about the mishaps I witness, they are a never ending source of entertainment, we do £500,000 a year on damage at my depot so entertainment is never far away, the management don’t seem to care brand new units and trailers wrecked within weeks from new.

One of our fitters is always keen to tell me of the latest mis hap or as he calls them “agricultural excursions” on one occasion he asked me if I owned a log burner I replied no, he suggested I call in on my way out to view his latest exhibit, turns out the “driver” got lost panicked, tried to do a U turn on a country road and crashed, the truck in question had a piece of tree about 10 inches in diameter poking out of the rad, the thing that tickled him most was the recovery driver having to use a saw to free the truck from the tree.

The stupidity ratio seems to be 60 percent employed 40 percent limpers.

[winseer]

Carryfast:

Winseer:
Even the “must have two years experience” seems to be being relaxed these days.

How does anyone get the ‘two years experience’ without doing the job first to get it ?.

How many companies with fleets run some kind of a “Footworkers to Drivers” programme?

“Warehouse to Wheels” they call it where I work.

I got my licence after working at RM for 3 years prior to that on the trains as a bag sorter.

It’s a bit silly expecting someone to take a 1-2 week HGV driving course straight from only having driven cars and vans - and then chuck them in the deep end expecting the raw recruit to know everything about trucks, trucking, and TM mis-management all at once and on day one.

[carryfast]

Winseer:

Carryfast:

Winseer:
Even the “must have two years experience” seems to be being relaxed these days.

How does anyone get the ‘two years experience’ without doing the job first to get it ?.

How many companies with fleets run some kind of a “Footworkers to Drivers” programme?

“Warehouse to Wheels” they call it where I work.

I got my licence after working at RM for 3 years prior to that on the trains as a bag sorter.

It’s a bit silly expecting someone to take a 1-2 week HGV driving course straight from only having driven cars and vans - and then chuck them in the deep end expecting the raw recruit to know everything about trucks, trucking, and TM mis-management all at once and on day one.

I guess the two years ‘experience’ in question means two years driving experience not warehouse work experience. and the only way that anyone is going to get that experience is by doing the job of a driver.In which case we all had to start by being chucked in at the deep end at the start of our ‘driving’ careers to a greater or lesser degree.Then it’s just a matter of a bit of luck and plenty of common sense and sometimes some,or a lot of,helpful advice.

[the_maoster]

Winseer:
How many companies with fleets run some kind of a “Footworkers to Drivers” programme?

“Warehouse to Wheels” they call it where I work.:

They do that where I work. Not from some altruistic reasoning but rather as some “way forward” that a suit at head office has decided is his pet project.

The latest candidate is four weeks in from passing his test and is quite frankly appalling. He’s still not deemed safe enough to be unleashed on the public alone so consequently our traffic office is wringing its hands in despair at having to pay two wages for one vehicle to do a days work. Of course sooner or later they’re gonna have to bite the bullet and hope that he doesn’t kill a headline causing amount of members of the public.