Estes | Tell me about line-haul.

Impala

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I am considering a line haul job at the Richmond, VA terminal. What are the working hours? Mostly at night or day? How many hours/miles can I expect a week as a new driver? How do you like your job? How bad is driver turnover? I know, I know, lots of questions but appreciate all responses good or bad. I've been a long haul tanker driver for 7 years. (Total time working as a truck driver 11 years). Thanks.:nutkick:
 
you are not likely to hear very good things here about estes. alot here have been with the company a long time and have seen all the changes, 95% of the changes being for the worse. that being said, turnover is still very low...atleast at my terminal it is. i think this is just a result of the economy and the sorry state of jobs lately.

you will probably be out 5 days a week, sleeping in bunk houses and some motels. most likely one day will be a weekend day, maybe both weekend days. usually driving nights.

2400-3200 miles a week, depending on how much you force them for miles.

this job is usually for guys new to LTL. if i were you i would highly suggest fedex freight/upsfreight/conway over estes
 
Like the other guy said, if your still young get started at somewhere like Holland, Yellow, Ups Frieght, Fed EX.
The one that seems to be flyin high these days is Holland, and they haul nothin but 48 and 53 footers behind them no pups.
Wonder why they do so well?
10 years ago a terminal by me had 60 day drivers now they have around 130 or so.
Now that is some growth.
 
yea i agree holland is a great place. but they tend to layoff past few years. so if you are in a position that you can deal with it, then thats what i would do.

personally i would do a union place first
ups
abf
holland
upsf

then
fedexfreight/national

im going to do a side by side comparison of pay and bennies between the big guys in the LTL, should be interesting
 
well i dont know about VA. but a 60k a year job to start aint to bad in my opinion :D if you need a job bud do you best to get 1 :D
 
well i dont know about VA. but a 60k a year job to start aint to bad in my opinion :D if you need a job bud do you best to get 1 :D

Please don't listen to Jimbob. He rides the little short school bus to work, frequently drools on himself, keeps sharp objects away from himself at all times and generally doesn't have a clue what he's talking about most of the time. So if you want advice from someone that hasn't overdosed on koolaid, I would say spread that resume around and don't settle for a bottom feeder like Estes. Just sound advice from a sound individual.
 
Please don't listen to Jimbob. He rides the little short school bus to work, frequently drools on himself, keeps sharp objects away from himself at all times and generally doesn't have a clue what he's talking about most of the time. So if you want advice from someone that hasn't overdosed on koolaid, I would say spread that resume around and don't settle for a bottom feeder like Estes. Just sound advice from a sound individual.

HAHA LOSER!!! elvis you no longer WORK for this company.

of coarse you will have bad feelings about the company, they cut your runs and made you quit after you lost your battle with them over the Union vote. HAHAHA

and i tpld you that you would lose back when you started that crap. SO, as an employee i can say i do like my 60k a year job. and as a former employee, elvis, has nothing better to do then bash this company.

evlis do us and everyone a HUGE service...keep you manpleaser shut and go live your life at your new job!!!
 
bad thing is he doesnt realize that the same job performed at fedex freight/overnight etc pays considerably more. i dont dispute that estes is a good job, it just doesnt pay the same or have as good of benefits as other comparable companies. that is a FACT

if you were hired from snider or jb then this job is GREAT! but once you start to talk to other national LTL drivers you start to realize whats going on. and realize where all the money is going.

we just had a meeting, the salesmen told us that we were slow from the union places under cutting us. and there is nothing they can do about it. how does that happen when they have much more overhead than us?

writing is on the wall...
 
bad thing is he doesnt realize that the same job performed at fedex freight/overnight etc pays considerably more. i dont dispute that estes is a good job, it just doesnt pay the same or have as good of benefits as other comparable companies. that is a FACT

if you were hired from snider or jb then this job is GREAT! but once you start to talk to other national LTL drivers you start to realize whats going on. and realize where all the money is going.

we just had a meeting, the salesmen told us that we were slow from the union places under cutting us. and there is nothing they can do about it. how does that happen when they have much more overhead than us?

writing is on the wall...

Myself and another driver were talking about the same thing the other morning. From what I gather Estes began their growth spurt in the late 90's. I contend, thats there's a limited pool of shippers that all the companies compete for,union or non-union doesn't matter. Estes has gone through this pool leaving damaged frieght and service failures fresh in the shipping managers minds.
The amount of damages that I see on a weekly basis is mind boggling. We were talking about the number of customers and the amount of freight that just the two of us has lost and its amazing. He took a new sales rep into an old customer and the shipper flat out told them that he would rather pay 2% more to Holland and Dayton Freight and know that his freight would get delivered in good shape than to use Estes. He's also had an unresolved 2300.00 claim with us since last year. I was informed by one of my customers thats why my 12-15 bills a day is now 0-5, they've been trying to settle claims from back in the fall of '06. It seems like the slower we get, the more damage we have. High and tight, don't pay attention to the do not stack warning stickers, or maybe they just can't read.
 
one of my biggest customers would always tell me it was between us and holland. that everybody else just destroyed thier stuff. and he used everybody out there. but this is just one customers view.

from what i see is just a bunch of dropped out of school kids and parolees working the dock, so what should we really expect?

i have been to and drove by the docks of our competition. the ones with decent pay and bennies and see a BIG difference in the workers...
 
I think one of the differnces is using pups holland runs 53 and 48 foot vans with logistic bars for top freight only very light skids go on top of something solid
 
yea that could be part of it i guess, but we gotta be over 90% logistic equipment. imo its the older guys that are working the dock there that know they have something to look forward to in 20 years. im pretty sure all of them or nearly all of them have CDLs. as apposed to estes, where if you are old enough to drink you either have no license at all or are wanted by the law lol. if you are a young dude then this is probably your first decent paying job.
 
Seems one JimBob's spew has stopped, we get decent conversation here. Keep it up non-JimBob'ers, we finally have something good and constructive going here!
 
Seems one JimBob's spew has stopped, we get decent conversation here. Keep it up non-JimBob'ers, we finally have something good and constructive going here!

nice come back :biglaugh:

here is the deal. back in the GI days they were cutting customers a 77% discount rate on frieght. Estes said they would not continue with that rate after the contracts were expired. guess they couldnt see how the company would make any money hauling everyones frieght for free :D , i guess that Estes figured that would cause a company to go belly up and be be bought and sold to 3 diffrent companies, sound familiar???

anyway our current slowdown is because those contracts have now expired and we are in what you would call a biding war with all the other LTL companies. yes we will lose some frieght, however i believe that in the end this will make the company grow because we will be making a profit on the freight we will be hauling now.

yes we have claims. i believe all LTL companies do, we may have more than average claims, what we need is good training on the docks, i think we can agree that is what we really need, not bad mouthing the dock workers and calling them names. have any of you every went on the dock and gave any suggestions to a dock worker about how he is loading the trailer??

in my area Fed-Ex pays the exact same top scale pay as we do. i will admit that Fed-Ex does thier pay differently than most any other LTL company. Fed-Ex starts you at .49 cpm but like $10 ph. as you stay with the company your hourly pay increases not you mileage pay. so yes up front you get more cpm but in the end we end up the same. my self i would rather go to my meet point turn arond and go home, cuse i make $30 ph driving, rather than go to my meet point and sit there for 4 hours making $10 ph. do the math 8 hour run pays $240, sit at termianl for 1 hour for free, so $240 divided by 9 hours = $26.7 per hour and i am at home. or 8 hour run at $240 + 4 hours sitting at $10 ph = $280 divided by 12 hours total night out = $23.3 per hour. i myself would much rather be in bed with my wife than sitting somewhere needlessly for 4 hours, but thats me.
 
Why has this thread turned?
It was about linehaul.
I like my job, but i would tell anyone take the job best for them. If it is with another company so be it. if it is with Estes welcome.

One of our biggest problems is accountability. If one dock damages alot of freight it never seems to get resolved. They just say oh it was someone else.
In the west it seems terminals with reg mgrs terminals do no wrong and do not care about damage, and ship more damage. I think these terminals should be held to a higher standard.
I really thought Estes would fix this problem but it is the same as it ever was. Less damage = more money for everyone and makes the customer happy
 
yea i agree holland is a great place. but they tend to layoff past few years. so if you are in a position that you can deal with it, then thats what i would do.

personally i would do a union place first
ups
abf
holland
upsf

then
fedexfreight/national

im going to do a side by side comparison of pay and bennies between the big guys in the LTL, should be interesting

UPSF is non-union, not to be mistaken with UPS that is union.
 
yea i agree holland is a great place. but they tend to layoff past few years. so if you are in a position that you can deal with it, then thats what i would do.

personally i would do a union place first
ups
abf
holland

(and to make beermug happy)
soon to be union upsf

then
fedexfreight/national

im going to do a side by side comparison of pay and bennies between the big guys in the LTL, should be interesting

edited to make beermug happy
 
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