Probably an excuse to walk, let’s be honest, if it was a good job with good money conditions you would not walk. Bet the pay rate is described as “competitive”
DonutUK:
Just had a driver walk off the job because the truck he was allocated for his nights work didn’t have a sat nav in it!A former agency driver who we took on full time after Xmas.
Should ov given me a ring… was at a loose end. Can you pm me his name?
tommie1shunt:
Probably an excuse to walk, let’s be honest, if it was a good job with good money conditions you would not walk. Bet the pay rate is described as “competitive”
+1,
As a former agency driver who’s also gone full time recently - let’s play Devil’s advocate for a mo…
On agency, this guy might have had an easy cushy, flat duty run each shift. Now he is full time, they are asking him to do a mixture of runs, most of which he hasn’t done before. Not having the knowledge, the SatNav would indeed be a stress-busting piece of kit for this individual to have in what he thought would be an “allocated to the driver” cab, which perhaps didn’t work out either.
It’s possible that he’s being asked to do a lot more different shifts per week than ever happened on agency. JetLag is a killer in this business, so one should sympathise being put on say, earlies monday, days tuesday, back to earlies wednesday, then lates thursday and nights friday night. There are plenty of people on this board who’d say “F… that!” I’m sure.
The contract, when it came, was left open-ended. It clearly defined things like what the MAXIMUM pay would be, and the fact that you wouldn’t get paid for “extras” - but then from day one - “extras” are expected of the driver every day. This might by a combination of things like (1) A sixth shift, (2) A double shift change in the same week, (3) Expected to clean, service, sweep out, etc. at BOTH ends of the job because the other full timers are running rings around him as the newbie, (4) Being swapped onto a long shift on a friday night (someone else’s sickie) with his own shorter shift job being given out to agency - 'cos the agency said their driver “only wanted a flyer for a friday night”…
…and a general feeling that going full time was a mistake, as all the downside of agency remains, but is not compensated for by the upside, which might be work in January - and that was it!
…Just a few thoughts folks… 
Quite right too!
Sat navs make driving safer less stressful and easier.
Just because they make life better for the driver and not for the company, they are not deemed important enough to make them compulsory.
Are we surprised that a driver insists on being safer?
No. We are surprised that the useless prick can’t save his pennies and visit Mr Sat Nav seller.
That way, he can have an electronic device that tells him where EVERYWHERE is.
And it has a sucker attached. So he can relate to that.
Euro:
Quite right too!
Sat navs make driving safer less stressful and easier.
Just because they make life better for the driver and not for the company, they are not deemed important enough to make them compulsory.
Are we surprised that a driver insists on being safer?
This cant be true, he must be flip flop EE driver 
On the serious note, thats a joke of an excuse, not heaving sat nav, not being auto truck, what has become of UK trucking…
One question, guys, do you get correct directions for your drops from your dispatch■■?
All agency blokes should have their own kit that they take on the job and a sat nav should be part of it. Like your own gloves for example or a torch.
Can’t understand why people don’t use their common sense and invest in the job that they’ve decided to do 
All agency blokes should have their own kit that they take on the job and a sat nav should be part of it. Like your own gloves for example or a torch.
Can’t understand why people don’t use their common sense and invest in the job that they’ve decided to do
Dolph:
This cant be true, he must be flip flop EE driver
On the serious note, thats a joke of an excuse, not heaving sat nav, not being auto truck, what has become of UK trucking…
One question, guys, do you get correct directions for your drops from your dispatch■■?
lol like your tongue in cheek answer after all I have never seen a foreign lorry with ‘a’ satnav in, that is because they usually have two or three
Well, I don’t know how that happened - wasn’t me honest 
Conor:
dieseldog999:
limpers doing what they do bestYep…earning more money for doing less work. I’ve often wondered what it must be like as a fulltime employed driver knowing the agency guys basic hourly rate is your overtime rate. Must be even worse for those full time employed drivers working for parcel companies and pallet networks on night trunks knowing that not only are the agency drivers doing the job on more per hour but they also get paid hourly pay as well…
Maybe thats why there is so much hate towards agency drivers because they have a work life most drivers would love to have getting paid more, being able to pick and choose when they work, getting the easy runs, if they don’t like the job not having to go back the following week and still knowing they’ve got work, being able to park in truck stops and MSAs knowing they’ll get their parking paid whereas you can’t unless you pay for it out of your own pocket because your boss told you they won’t pay parking…
Conor, out of interest what do they pay the full time night lads at Howden’s in comparison to yourself?
DonutUK:
Just had a driver walk off the job because the truck he was allocated for his nights work didn’t have a sat nav in it!A former agency driver who we took on full time after Xmas.
MAP, MAP, MAP, MAP Etc…!!!
mbax81:
Conor:
dieseldog999:
limpers doing what they do bestYep…earning more money for doing less work. I’ve often wondered what it must be like as a fulltime employed driver knowing the agency guys basic hourly rate is your overtime rate. Must be even worse for those full time employed drivers working for parcel companies and pallet networks on night trunks knowing that not only are the agency drivers doing the job on more per hour but they also get paid hourly pay as well…
Maybe thats why there is so much hate towards agency drivers because they have a work life most drivers would love to have getting paid more, being able to pick and choose when they work, getting the easy runs, if they don’t like the job not having to go back the following week and still knowing they’ve got work, being able to park in truck stops and MSAs knowing they’ll get their parking paid whereas you can’t unless you pay for it out of your own pocket because your boss told you they won’t pay parking…
Conor, out of interest what do they pay the full time night lads at Howden’s in comparison to yourself?
Used to be about £4 per hour more than agency, but they get it as a salary based on 56 hour week
mbax81:
Conor, out of interest what do they pay the full time night lads at Howden’s in comparison to yourself?
It is the only exception I’ve come across in 23 years where they pay more than agency and by about £4/hr. Their day drivers are on £41,500 plus bonuses that can add up to another couple of grand for a 56hr week which includes breaks for the Howden site in East Yorkshire. Not sure what the Northampton NDC drivers get but I know agencies supplying Northampton are paying a couple of quid an hour more than we get so I suspect it may be more for the employed drivers. That rate of pay is not very common in non-specialist truck driving.
Contraflow:
Conor:
I’ve often wondered what it must be like as a fulltime employed driver……and I’ve often wondered what it’s like to be an astronaut. It’s basic human nature to desire what we can’t have.
Stop trying to glamourise your miserable existence Conor, we don’t want the young impressionable readers to be misled and think agency work is a smart life choice now do we.
Nope, I’m not impressed!
I’m currently limping, gaining experience and looking for the right full time job!
The pro’s to agency work is flexibility for part time workers, variety, and a chance of work for those that can’t GET a full time position.
It’s not so you can earn more money, as what do you earn while on holiday Coner?
It seems to me that agency drivers tend to get the crappiest truck in the yard and the dross the full timers don’t want to do.
Maybe Coner is an astronaut, as he isn’t on this planet!
P.S. Coner, you’re a big boy, why can’t you get over the banter about limping? I find it amusing…
yes its a pathetic excuse - conor whilst I agree with some of the ’ parts you mention ref agency driving ’ such as being able to pick the days I want to work etc. didn’t you post not so long ago that the full timers were on about 40 k a year and you would love to get on board?
maybe I am wrong, maybe I just don’t care, maybe I have said it 100 times before there are ■■■■ drivers out there full stop both full and part time, agency and employed.
Conor:
dieseldog999:
limpers doing what they do bestYep…earning more money for doing less work. I’ve often wondered what it must be like as a fulltime employed driver knowing the agency guys basic hourly rate is your overtime rate. Must be even worse for those full time employed drivers working for parcel companies and pallet networks on night trunks knowing that not only are the agency drivers doing the job on more per hour but they also get paid hourly pay as well…
Maybe thats why there is so much hate towards agency drivers because they have a work life most drivers would love to have getting paid more, being able to pick and choose when they work, getting the easy runs, if they don’t like the job not having to go back the following week and still knowing they’ve got work, being able to park in truck stops and MSAs knowing they’ll get their parking paid whereas you can’t unless you pay for it out of your own pocket because your boss told you they won’t pay parking…
I’ll let you know for free we don’t get the easy runs. And then you get a shift, get all your ■■■■ together, drive over to the place (40-50 mins away) “Oh hello mate. Did no one tell you you were cancelled?” Err, no? You got anything else? “Got your Class 1?” No, I wouldn’t drive for less money if I did. “Then no mate.”
And the days sitting around. Sure it sounds brilliant when you’re on full time, but spending too much time in sends me mental. And when you’re doing 2 ■■■■■■ shifts in a week on 7.5’s, breaking your back (sometimes literally), and your bank account is dwindling away in to nothing… I’ll take a full time job please. Flats or steel if anyone would give me a chance 
Getting back to the OP, don’t knock it mate, i’m firmly of the belief that idiots like this, and those who haven’t a clue and cause thousands of poundsworth of damage whilst failing entirely to ever do what they are paid to do, except winge and moan about every single thing, come up with more excuses the you could shake a stick at why they shouldn’t do a particular job etc etc are actually beneficial to the company in one really important way, they make the rest of us look brilliant in comparison so they should be encouraged at every opportunity.
These college and ex shop sales types now running our transport in too many cases get carried away with dumbing the job down to the lowest level, then odd as it may seem the job attracts dummies, then dummies do as they always have and they might, just might, actually learn to appreciate the good staff they have who just go out and get on with it every day of the year without a murmer…course i could be living in lalaland… 