Hi all, I’m emigrating to the states later this year and after 35 odd years of uk, european and M/E driving and I am thinking not of truck driving for a living but teaching others at a truck driving school. So I’m wondering if anyone can help me with a few pointers on obtaining a us truck licence. Now I realize my HGV1 is not transferable as it is in europe and you have to pass a test as you do with the us car licence but with the car they don’t require you to do a driving course before taking a test and as an hgv course is about 4500 dollars I could do without having to go down that route. Having tried to obtain info from the state equivalent of the DVLA (they must get their staff at the same place) with no real success does anyone know whether its possible to shortcut it with some revision on the driving laws in the states then take the test in a driving school truck or is there no alternative but to do the complete course which is a bit like teaching your granny to ■■■■ eggs when I have 30 years experience on left hookers.
thanks Chazzer
Depends where you are going to move to ?
i live in NY state and got fed up with companies trying to rip me off and expecting huge amounts to get me through the test, I have been driving all my life.
I went to a local small company and they loaned me a truck for a morning and I did a delivery for them with one of their drivers accompanying me. On the test day I used the same truck for 2 hours and passed, they wanted $20.00 for everything but I took a job there the following week and they gave me my $20.00 back.
Hi Pat, thanks very much for that, I’m moving to the west coast possibly around seattle (washington state) to start with due to family commitments then to sacramento area northern california or maybe direct to sacramento depending on timings. Obviously you have to apply for a provisional or equivalent through the local DMV but I suppose the rules for obtaining a licence with or without training differ from state to state. If you have any info on the rules in west coast states that you could pass on to me I would be extremely grateful to you or if anyone else reading this on the west coast has any ideas bearing in mind that I’m only want to teach driving rather than do general haulage that would be great. If I have to do some long distance driving in order to get a licence then so be it but after 35 plus years I was hoping to change direction in my career. Just out of interest does a Canadian HGV count in the states as I believe they are easier to obtain if you already hold a uk hgv 1?
regards Charlie
One of the easiest and cheapest ways to get your trucking CDL is to go on a USA harvest run, look here for “custom cutters” looking for drivers:
combineforums.proboards.com/inde … employment
If you were going over on a H2A temp work visa most cutters would want you to commit from April til Nov,but as your already sorted with your visa requirements theres good chance of getting on with a cutter who will put you through your CDL if you can commit to work for them from late August til November.
This is the time of the year when it gets real busy and some cutters will have younger guys who need to leave harvest and go back to college.
Some Custom Cutter websites:
taylorharvesting.com
hollandharvesting.com
frederickharvesting.com
demarayharvesting.com
weberharvesting.com
ckharvesting.com
BTW,
I did a USA harvest run in 2002 and I’ve still got my out of date CDL in my wallet and it cost me about $100 to get it 
chazzer:
Hi all, I’m emigrating to the states later this year and after 35 odd years of uk, european and M/E driving and I am thinking not of truck driving for a living but teaching others at a truck driving school. So I’m wondering if anyone can help me with a few pointers on obtaining a us truck licence. Now I realize my HGV1 is not transferable as it is in europe and you have to pass a test as you do with the us car licence but with the car they don’t require you to do a driving course before taking a test and as an hgv course is about 4500 dollars I could do without having to go down that route. Having tried to obtain info from the state equivalent of the DVLA (they must get their staff at the same place) with no real success does anyone know whether its possible to shortcut it with some revision on the driving laws in the states then take the test in a driving school truck or is there no alternative but to do the complete course which is a bit like teaching your granny to ■■■■ eggs when I have 30 years experience on left hookers.
thanks Chazzer
AHHHHH…
u lookin for work in America 
i remember you bought a ex maritime Mercedes
Well,you are right,will do it too 
Is it just me?
You want to teach others to drive & yet you want to circumvent the driving test process? Hardly ethical…
You say you want to teach others & yet you have no knowledge of the American test procedures yourself yet & you still won’t have any if you take a shortcut to getting your own licence, yes you may be able to drive, but at a driving school you don’t teach people to drive, you teach them how to pass a driving test, learning how to drive is an ongoing process that starts the day you get your licence & finishes the day you stop driving.
A Canadian licence & test is the same as the CDL in the USA, 2 theory tests, a pre trip & air brake test. so no shortcut there & AFAIK in Canada you have to be a certified trainer so if the US is the same there’s another hurdle to overcome, or bypass 
If you’re going to Seattle why don’t you get in touch with Boeing, there may be a back door into Aircraft design, or give Starbucks a try 
Oh & don’t forget your umbrella
Well said Newmercman.
We all had a lot of experiance as truck drivers before we emigrated but we didn’t expect to be given a CDL on the basis that going through the testing procedure would be like “sucking eggs”. If that is the case then it should be easy to pass shouldn’t it? (which it isn’t).
I remember the chap that that trained me for my CDL mentioned that when he became an instructor he first had to hand in his CDL and then take a pretty stringent exam and road test, with a DOT inspector, before he could be licensed to instruct people.