Them hours wouldn’t be too bad it’s the knobs in the office cocking up and have the driver work late to sort it while they go home for tea…
That’s one thing that boils my ■■■■ about this industry a complete disregard for a drivers home life while they go home at 6 pm or what ever.
Think I’m lucky with my gaffer because he drives one of the wagons and genuinely won’t ask you to do something he wouldn’t do,and he asks if your ok with late finishes if you get a few on the trot.
well you got till 2100, so why refuse to do a job just because the office messed things up, in my eyes that’s gross misconduct, unless it was going to take you over your hours, in which case go and load it, and ring them to come and collect you, unless you don’t do nights out. 12.5 average hours on a daily basis is easy hours but good hours. a bit of politeness goes a long way though and should have apologised for the 2 wrong addresses, and asked about the last job and if you could do it within your hours.
seth 70:
Reef:
Ahh the sweet sound of the “King of the road” dream shattering into a thousand tiny razor sharp poisonous barbed shards of realityYep,youve read my mind
And mine, the novelty of driving a big rig soon wears off when you realise the amount of bloody hours you’ve got to work, it can get worse, try getting back to the yard after 12 hours, ready to go home and they want to send you out again 
joker83:
Started monday 7 finish 17
Tues-7 to 19.30
Wedn-5 to 18.30
Thurs-5 to 19.30
Today 6 to … maybe18.30
Tue = reduced daily rest as 1930 to 0500 is 9.5 hours between shifts
Wed = reduced daily rest as shift is over 13 hours
Thu = reduced daily rest as shift is over 13 hours
I really hope you start rest by 1900 otherwise you will not get back today
truckyboy:
well you got till 2100
How you figure that?
truckyboy:
well you got till 2100, so why refuse to do a job just because the office messed things up, in my eyes that’s gross misconduct, unless it was going to take you over your hours, in which case go and load it, and ring them to come and collect you, unless you don’t do nights out. 12.5 average hours on a daily basis is easy hours but good hours. a bit of politeness goes a long way though and should have apologised for the 2 wrong addresses, and asked about the last job and if you could do it within your hours.
From my experience if you go do it and run out of hours they then take another 2 hours to pick you up.
I know we need longish hours in this job but I think planning or expecting a 15 hour day is wrong and should be up to the driver…but it has become the norm now for some firms to plan a 15hr work load and drivers just go with it and then moan like hell about it to there mates in the pub.
If I work a fifteen hour day it’s normally because of a long delay but there’s only 5 of us and we all just muck in together
back to macdonalds next week for you I think…possibly working reasonably light ours is not the vocational path you might have thought it was…what you’ve posted is a doddle sofar. welcome to reality where everyones ballsups are your problem. 
Big Roy:
seth 70:
Reef:
Ahh the sweet sound of the “King of the road” dream shattering into a thousand tiny razor sharp poisonous barbed shards of realityYep,youve read my mind
And mine, the novelty of driving a big rig soon wears off when you realise the amount of bloody hours you’ve got to work, it can get worse, try getting back to the yard after 12 hours, ready to go home and they want to send you out again
This is where it’s wrong a lot of firms pay a basic 40-50 hour but many driver work 60+ at these firms so if a guys basic is 50hr and he has done 12hr days Monday to Thursday after 2 hours on Friday he could legally say that’s it I’m going home.
Also I think the attitude of the staff don’t help I remember one guy at my last firm pulling his card on a13hr day and going in to office to be told “I hope you don’t think your ■■■■■■ going home”…now that just causes a mass argument
yorkshire terrier:
Big Roy:
seth 70:
Reef:
Ahh the sweet sound of the “King of the road” dream shattering into a thousand tiny razor sharp poisonous barbed shards of realityYep,youve read my mind
And mine, the novelty of driving a big rig soon wears off when you realise the amount of bloody hours you’ve got to work, it can get worse, try getting back to the yard after 12 hours, ready to go home and they want to send you out again
This is where it’s wrong a lot of firms pay a basic 40-50 hour but many driver work 60+ at these firms so if a guys basic is 50hr and he has done 12hr days Monday to Thursday after 2 hours on Friday he could legally say that’s it I’m going home.
Also I think the attitude of the staff don’t help I remember one guy at my last firm pulling his card on a13hr day and going in to office to be told “I hope you don’t think your [zb] going home”…now that just causes a mass argument
Very true and the little ■■■■ behind the counter is saying “well you’ve got 15 hours”
joker83:
Started monday 7 finish 17
Tues-7 to 19.30
Wedn-5 to 18.30
Thurs-5 to 19.30
Today 6 to [zb] knows cos im parked for second “45” at 16.40 and will get back for maybe18.30Cant see my eyes and refused to do job which i supposed to do cos they gave me two wrong addresses earlier and cocked up they pi###ed off in office cos im heading back to yard then home omfg
K
Would be glad of hours like that some weeks lol mid morning starts aswell a proper lie in make a change to 2am starts
Sounds like the job is not as it appeared at interview, not uncommon in this industry. The hours don’t appear to be anything unusual though, nor does being sent to the wrong location. There will be better jobs out there it’s just a case of finding something that suits.
7am until 5pm Monday to Friday this week. Overtime tomorrow for a couple of hours washing the lorry.
yorkshire terrier:
Big Roy:
seth 70:
Reef:
Ahh the sweet sound of the “King of the road” dream shattering into a thousand tiny razor sharp poisonous barbed shards of realityYep,youve read my mind
And mine, the novelty of driving a big rig soon wears off when you realise the amount of bloody hours you’ve got to work, it can get worse, try getting back to the yard after 12 hours, ready to go home and they want to send you out again
This is where it’s wrong a lot of firms pay a basic 40-50 hour but many driver work 60+ at these firms so if a guys basic is 50hr and he has done 12hr days Monday to Thursday after 2 hours on Friday he could legally say that’s it I’m going home.
Also I think the attitude of the staff don’t help I remember one guy at my last firm pulling his card on a13hr day and going in to office to be told “I hope you don’t think your [zb] going home”…now that just causes a mass argument
Most will also say ‘a reasonable amount of overtime / flexibility will be required by the employee’ or words to that effect.
I don’t think I’d stand for that last point, being spoken to like that would bring my blood to the boil pretty quick.
There are a lot of push overs in the industry now and it’s turned it to ■■■■, I’m definitely not one of them though, but the OP’s complaint is basically gay as ■■■■
If your getting paid by the hour then it is a lot easier doing long hours knowing you are totting up the pounds, but when you are on a fixed rate and doing 12+ hours a day it starts to niggle knowing your hourly rate is similar to that of a paper round.
joker83:
Started monday 7 finish 17
Tues-7 to 19.30
Wedn-5 to 18.30
Thurs-5 to 19.30
Today 6 to [zb] knows cos im parked for second “45” at 16.40 and will get back for maybe18.30Cant see my eyes and refused to do job which i supposed to do cos they gave me two wrong addresses earlier and cocked up they pi###ed off in office cos im heading back to yard then home omfg
Still can’t get my head round this. I read you can drive 9 hours before needing an 11 hour rest period but this can be increased to 10 hours on 2 days of the week.
On Monday he did 10 hours but Tuesday and Wednesday did over 13 hours and today 12 and a half hours… So hows that work as I’m assuming he’s had no rest period before the 9 hours each day but clearly gone over his hours…?
nurburg340:
joker83:
Started monday 7 finish 17
Tues-7 to 19.30
Wedn-5 to 18.30
Thurs-5 to 19.30
Today 6 to [zb] knows cos im parked for second “45” at 16.40 and will get back for maybe18.30Cant see my eyes and refused to do job which i supposed to do cos they gave me two wrong addresses earlier and cocked up they pi###ed off in office cos im heading back to yard then home omfg
Still can’t get my head round this. I read you can drive 9 hours before needing an 11 hour rest period but this can be increased to 10 hours on 2 days of the week.
On Monday he did 10 hours but Tuesday and Wednesday did over 13 hours and today 12 and a half hours… So hows that work as I’m assuming he’s had no rest period before the 9 hours each day but clearly gone over his hours…?
Those are shift times not driving times.
You can drive for 9 hours a shift which can be extended to 10 hours twice a week.
The maximum shift you can do without a split daily rest period is 13 hours and 15 hours 3 times between weekly rest periods.
Nothing like making it easy hey. Am I the only one who struggles to understand this?
So shift includes loading, unloading etc, all the stuff whilst working but not driving?
nurburg340:
Nothing like making it easy hey. Am I the only one who struggles to understand this?So shift includes loading, unloading etc, all the stuff whilst working but not driving?
You got it but the regs do not mention shifts
Shifts are restricted by the amount of daily rest that must be taken in a 24 hour period from when the shift starts or as it says in the regs - from the end of the last rest period
In effect that means the longest possible shift is 15 hours as the minimum rest allowed is 9 hours (15+9=24)
nurburg340:
Nothing like making it easy hey. Am I the only one who struggles to understand this?So shift includes loading, unloading etc, all the stuff whilst working but not driving?
The shift time is the time from when you start work to when you finish work, otherwise known as the working day, for instance on the Monday the OP started at 07:00 and finished at 17:00 that’s a shift of 10 hours, or a working day of 10 hours if you prefer.
During the shift or working day, you can drive for 9 hours which can be extended to 10 hours twice a week.
On Monday if the OP drove for 9 hours the rest of the time would have been made up of other work and breaks, I’ve no idea if he did drive for 9 hours but the time he wasn’t driving would have been made up of breaks and other work.
If you want to spend your life working stick with it. I didn’t so I packed it in . Simple