robroy:
Mick…,.I don’t know this guy,.I’m just taking what he says on face value, and assuming his version of events is true, in the spirit of a forum discussion, that is all…
Maybe you know more about him than I do, who knows.My ‘too careful’ comment was when somebody is nervous they tend to over compensate on things, whilst missing others.
. For instance, they are maybe trying to avoid backing their trailer into something behind them,. and concentrating too bloody much on the arse end of the trailer, ,.and missing the obstacle on the blind side of their unit, which is about to catch the near side step, which if they were not so flustered they would have seen , it’s a nerves thing,.especially with a lad who is inexperienced.
Personally I’ve never been bothered with nerves myself, in ‘‘my world’’ as you put it, but a young inexperienced driver, already in bother may just be like that,.everybody is different mate.As for the vision of driver carnage you illustrate, I fully understand your point,. I’ve employed drivers myself that costed me a mint,.and dropped them like hot potatoes, but tbf he scraped a wall panel whilst reversing,.I still say the ‘crime’ was not reporting it,.rather than the actual occurrence.
I just think that if what he says is genuine, he should not be written off for a minor scrape, with a couple of misdemeanors thrown in the mix which were not technically his fault…again according to him, but only he knows the truth.There are FAR too many drivers of the type you describe, those are the ones who will never make proper drivers as long as they have that proverbial orifice.
He stated in his OP that he had no idea he’d collided with the building. Then his manager (or someone who claims to have heard his manager) said that they have CCTV evidence of him hitting the building not once, but twice 
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Too many people here are viewing this as a driver vs. management thing, which is perhaps to be expected on a forum for drivers as most like to be seen to be giving the illusion that us drivers should “stick together” no matter what and management automatically = the enemy. People should view the account for what it is : he’s had 6 collisions in a short time period. Whichever way you look at it I don’t think anyone can honestly say that is an acceptable driving record, irrespective of which party is alleged to have been at fault. And it’s worth noting that these are only the collisions that are known about . How many more has he had during this period? By his own admission, he had completely no idea that he’d collided with the building, TWICE!
In my experience of sitting on both sides of the fence, drivers who claim to have no knowledge of fresh damage or how it came about are either liars or extremely [zb] drivers who have zero awareness of their surroundings or vehicle dimensions. Even a small scrape on a wall as you’re turning would provide feedback feel from the driving seat - a small sudden jolt as the truck makes contact, or the resistance needing a sudden increase in revs to pull through it, and those are in addition to the (likeky) loud screeching noise as the truck body drags against the wall. Either way, whether they are just liars or just [zb] drivers, you don’t want them on your payroll if you value your business and your equipment.
The “inexperienced” argument only works up to a point. One or two minor incidents - okay, the kid needs some babysitting on how to do the job properly so we’ll give him some. If the kid continues to [zb] up then hard lines, you’ve had ample chances to get your ■■■■ together so time for you to be on your way and go use some other company as your training ground. For him to still be there after 6 incidents tells me that the company has been more than lenient and it’s 5 more chances than we’d have given him (plus a lot of other firms).
