I thought I’d resurrect this thread as some newbies at our place have been told fairy stories about how much bonus they can earn.
They weren’t aware of the crafty sods who give you a good earning day, followed by a crap one to bring your total load score down though…
I’ve had to come off the road to earn what they’ve been promised.
The sensible system for a bonus would be to rate drivers on how much it costs to employ them.
Those who look after their tractor, drive economically, hit the window times, work optimum amounts of overtime, and most of all - don’t prang anything get a decent bonus.
Maybe a “start at 1000” system with deductions for being off-route, getting done by the old bill, workshop repairs, etc. might work best.
Bonus payments based on purely time and loads leads to corner-cutting and of course the blue-eyed boys will be picking up all the plummy runs that score the best bonuses. 
I get paid a salary.
some days are long,others are shorter. The jobs i get given,get done. If the day needs to br a 15,so be it,
At the end of the week i know exactly what i have earned
My employer pays it’s drivers a bonus scheme based on a target number of loads. Each load you do is worth say a 0.4 and you earn bonus for everything above 4 standard loads (about £8 if you reach 5.0). The management say the scheme is legal because you lose weeks bonus if you are caught by Police/cameras etc. I thought any bonus scheme that encourages speeding was illegal? Company say ours is legal because they don’t tell us to speed, even though it’s obvious that’s what’s going on.
Is it really worth it for 8 quid?
they might not tell you too but they expect you too same thing mate so i would tend to agree with you 
There is a Mickey Mouse (arguable) get-out clause in the wording of the relevant Article regarding “encourages to infringe/road safety” or something such similar.
Found it -
Article 10
- A transport undertaking shall not give drivers it employs
or who are put at its disposal any payment, even in the form
of a bonus or wage supplement, related to distances travelled
and/or the amount of goods carried if that payment is of such
a kind as to endanger road safety and/or encourages
infringement of this Regulation
I think it would fall to a third party (Judge or some other allegedly sensible independent person) to make a the decision as to whether “the payment is of such a kind”
pete-b:
Is it really worth it for 8 quid?
Haha! That’s exactly why I stick to 40 and 50! Got caught 6 years ago TM told me I’d had my bonus of £60 taken off because of it. He also said because of I’d only earned about £30 this week I “owed” £30 which would be deducted off next weeks or until the total was £60. I checked my load scores for the next 6 months making sure I never earned more than the base target. It must’ve cost them more than if they’d just overlooked the offence!
There are obviously many drivers that are paid in this way, especially tipper drivers, whether bulk or otherwise. Likewise for ready mix concrete.
any kind of bonus wether its load based or not should be banned its about time we got paid for the hours we do, bonus schenes usually work in the employers favour never yours ! i was offerd a job last week basic was an insult and if you ever managed to work the bonus out you never mind earned it you would be doing very well its just another way to pay you less when theres not much going on or your held up regardless if its your fault or not needless to say i turned it down if we all took that attidude you never no it migh just change if we want to be paid as profesional drivers we need to start having some self worth
i thought payin drivers on load bonus was banned years ago? Last job i had was hours and bonus but you never had to speed or do anything dangerous to get it.
The parcel carriers expect their drivers to deliver a minimum number of items per day, this amounts to the same thing.
in answer to the op, the scheme is 100% legal as the onus is on the driver to stay within the regs and the laws of the highway.
i’ve just packed in a job that was x amount a day + bonus because i was finding that i’d regularly done 70 hours plus per week which including bonus worked out at less than £7 per hour or to look at it a different way, i’d earnt a reasonable rate for 60 hours and then done 10 hours plus free of charge! neither left me feeling i’d got paid for the work i’d put in.
btw i can name at least one large haulier that pays it’s drivers on mileage covered with no basic.
Alot of Car delivery companies pay by Car or/ plus miles, always have done.
A lot of bulk tanker companies pay on a % of what the wagon earns, so this must be illegal too surely as in my opinion its encouraging you to go like hell to try and get that extra load in on a Friday. Glad im paid by the hour makes my life so much easier.
I think a lot of firms get round it by paying what they laughingly call a ‘living wage’ - bear in mind the minimum wage rules, then a bonus on top. The bonus, however calculated, is pretty much like overtime except the firm thinks that the hours worked to earn the bonus are more likely to be productive hours rather than an hourly paid driver tossing it off in a lay-by.
The downside( just one of them) to drivers is that genuine delays on the road have an impact on their earning possibilities.
I get paid a bonus, would rather take hourly pay but that’s never going to happen at our company.
£300 pw + 20% of anything the truck earns over £200 a day. all day work, usual bonus is between £160 - £225.
Nice if you get m/way work all day but hit the w/mids and that’s it.
shortfatbaldbloke:
I get paid a bonus, would rather take hourly pay but that’s never going to happen at our company.£300 pw + 20% of anything the truck earns over £200 a day. all day work, usual bonus is between £160 - £225.
Nice if you get m/way work all day but hit the w/mids and that’s it.
Similar to us. Get loads to site and backload muck you’re quids in with minimum effort. Get private deliveries where you’re spreading it down drives#, weighing off a couple of ton to their neighbours or squeezing through gateways, you’ve taken all day to do a couple of loads which earn you nothing and you look lazy on paper.
AND WHY DO THESE PEOPLE (WHO THINK THEY CAN BUILD THE FORTH BRIDGE ON THEIR DAY OFF) THINK I’M INTERESTED IN THEIR D.I.Y PLANS??
Muckaway:
AND WHY DO THESE PEOPLE (WHO THINK THEY CAN BUILD THE FORTH BRIDGE ON THEIR DAY OFF) THINK I’M INTERESTED IN THEIR D.I.Y PLANS??
i used to drive a 3cx for a one man band ,and weekends he would get hire for self builders for me ,the things that they wanted done in a day ,you would have struggled with a 40 tonner 
one bloke left his missus as banksman , while i dug the footings for their new house ,she had a strange look on her face when i asked her to mark them out ,oh my husband said you would know what to do 