Estes | Estes express extra weekend work

[donut]

extra

well the trem. i am out of, none of the other road drivers want to work either. we would all rather spend our quality time with our families. if central would handle it a little better by letting you know early sunday morning if you had to run or not. but no, they want you to waste your whole day waiting for that evening to tell you they have nothing for you. then you have wasted the whole day for nothing.

 

[Matt]

yes agreed they [dispatch] could have some call window. not well from now till then we may call lol

 

[Kings disciple]

well you guys are right if one night / one weekend a month is what we are talking about. i came from a company where every weekend was a must work weekend. so i laugh at this

Don't make me call you a supa twucka...

p.s. this last sig. you got up is killer, best one yet..:thumbsup:

 

[INTOTHENOW]

Well I got back in late Saturday morning around 10 am and they called me in on Sunday, just so happens I was one of the early ones that got back on Saturday. They called two of us well I did'nt get the message till I got back from a little get together with family and friends in the afternoon.
Long story short about a six pack down and I was unable to go so there I went to the bottom getting out on Monday, but did'nt get out till tuesday, lack of freight I guess.

I said good I liked the long weekend anyway.

 

[mildew]

A six pack will put ya about .07 by the time you get to work you'll be about .039. Just barely legal.

 

[Estands4evil]

I was wondering what all you drivers would have to say about the contractors running hard again. The only thing is that they aren't running the extra freight on the weekends only. They are pulling freight into 024 during the week. We've had Covenant drivers out the a$$ pulling freight from the south, our trailers and theirs. Seems to me on a week night especially you folks oughta be pulling that freight. It does however seem to be HD freight, but its OUR freight. Instead of having guys/gals sitting around the house or at a barn for loads.. let our people run the freight. Who knows with that extra cash they might be able to put freight on OUR trailers. :: <-- here's your loyalty from Richmond

 

[mildew]

Contractors are a cheap one way ticket with no worries about trying to keep them where they can make it home or keeping them loaded.

 

[nedseyesocket]

today there were also jb on the yard and clededon plus some mexican outfit

 

[Kings disciple]

I was wondering what all you drivers would have to say about the contractors running hard again. The only thing is that they aren't running the extra freight on the weekends only. They are pulling freight into 024 during the week. We've had Covenant drivers out the a$$ pulling freight from the south, our trailers and theirs. Seems to me on a week night especially you folks oughta be pulling that freight. It does however seem to be HD freight, but its OUR freight. Instead of having guys/gals sitting around the house or at a barn for loads.. let our people run the freight. Who knows with that extra cash they might be able to put freight on OUR trailers. :: <-- here's your loyalty from Richmond

I've seen this happen year after year, don't sweat it to bad. They do that when volume jumps up real quick till we can get adjusted to it. Then they stop using them so much or at all. I know it's a bummer sometimes but it is a good sign that biz. is picking up quick.

 

[Estands4evil]

I've seen this happen year after year, don't sweat it to bad. They do that when volume jumps up real quick till we can get adjusted to it. Then they stop using them so much or at all. I know it's a bummer sometimes but it is a good sign that biz. is picking up quick.

I'm not worried about it for myself, as much as I am for you. It irritates me when I talk to guys that aren't getting miles or have been at the hotel for hours on end and all the while we've got outside carriers running our freight. Letting them run our unbalanced lanes is alright I suppose in theory, but it's when I see my fellow employees being overlooked. That it bothers me. Especially during the week. I will also agree that the freight's been picking up. Especially this week. It is the end of the month/end of the quarter, so I'm sure that has alot to do with it. Be safe out there... make it home and wait by the mailbox for the special.. just for you DVD on the way!

 

[Kings disciple]

I'm not worried about it for myself, as much as I am for you. It irritates me when I talk to guys that aren't getting miles or have been at the hotel for hours on end and all the while we've got outside carriers running our freight. Letting them run our unbalanced lanes is alright I suppose in theory, but it's when I see my fellow employees being overlooked. That it bothers me. Especially during the week. I will also agree that the freight's been picking up. Especially this week. It is the end of the month/end of the quarter, so I'm sure that has alot to do with it. Be safe out there... make it home and wait by the mailbox for the special.. just for you DVD on the way!

You must have the wrong idea about me, I'm home right now. I run a out/back L/H schedule every night.

I ran E/B years ago but not now.

 

[Matt]

i can't wait for our information video

 

[Starkravinloon]

we have been told no extra !!! at kansas city no weekend work !!!! but those contractors are in and out all weekend. what is the deal ??? are you guys seeing the same thing.... :: <<< is what it is i see

Seen 2 contractors pulling our trailers coming out of Tennesee on my way back from vacation onThursday. Our team has also pulled Schneider and Covenent trailers in the last 3 weeks. Schneider out of Riverside and Covenent out of Nashville.

 

[Starkravinloon]

I'm not worried about it for myself, as much as I am for you. It irritates me when I talk to guys that aren't getting miles or have been at the hotel for hours on end and all the while we've got outside carriers running our freight. Letting them run our unbalanced lanes is alright I suppose in theory, but it's when I see my fellow employees being overlooked. That it bothers me. Especially during the week. I will also agree that the freight's been picking up. Especially this week. It is the end of the month/end of the quarter, so I'm sure that has alot to do with it. Be safe out there... make it home and wait by the mailbox for the special.. just for you DVD on the way!

I agree. Unbalanced or undesignated lanes are fine by me, but when we have to set at home, that's where the line is drawn. I went through that for a year, and I'm on a schedule run. Man, was that tough.

 

[Wild Turkey]

From what I recently heard from management there will be NO EXTRA WEEKEND WORK! No way no how and not for the foreseeable future. All weekend work is going to contract drivers so they don't have to return them empty as they would with a single driver. That's why you see so many Covenant and Schneider trailers recently. They load them up on the weekends and get them out on Sundays.

Sure, it would be nice to make some extra money on the weekends like days gone by, but this is a management decision and Estes, in this economy, cannot afford to run 80% of their weekend drivers back home empty as they did in the past when they could afford to throw money away. Would you if you owned the company? Not likely.

 

[Estands4evil]

From what I recently heard from management there will be NO EXTRA WEEKEND WORK! No way no how and not for the foreseeable future. All weekend work is going to contract drivers so they don't have to return them empty as they would with a single driver. That's why you see so many Covenant and Schneider trailers recently. They load them up on the weekends and get them out on Sundays.

Sure, it would be nice to make some extra money on the weekends like days gone by, but this is a management decision and Estes, in this economy, cannot afford to run 80% of their weekend drivers back home empty as they did in the past when they could afford to throw money away. Would you if you owned the company? Not likely.

We're only loading the outside carriers to heavy points, that should have return freight. However, we're getting the outside carrier loads out of places where I know we have return freight and some that we don't. Covenants out of GBO and CHA, we have plenty of return freight. The ones out of 037 and one or 2 more Tennesee terminals we're getting our loads from make perfect sense. So it's kind of going both ways here. Another thing I think Richmond fails to realize is that by using all these outside carriers and using mostly their equipment (trailers) they offset the trailer pools dramatically. Not many of these outside carriers have doubles endorsements. So we at the terminal level have to generate solutions. I do know we pull Covenant vans and they pull ours, but if they'd require our contractors to be able to pull doubles.. it'd offset the problem a little bit. We're in the business of selling service, and I'm not so sure running a few empty miles on the weekends instead of running them all Mon/Tues night is really any different, except that the freight might arrive early for once.

 

[Wild Turkey]

We're in the business of selling service, and I'm not so sure running a few empty miles on the weekends instead of running them all Mon/Tues night is really any different, except that the freight might arrive early for once.

Good point there Estands4Evil. SOme of what they do seems to make sense on the surface, but when you take all things into consideration and the empty miles on Mon and Tues it really does not make any sense. If they can't pull doubles, what's the point in use in using them? To save a few cents on fuel and bennies? Maybe, but some things corporate does, as a former suit myself, does not make any sense. It's almost like all the memos issued are being issued by people trying to justify their position and reason for being and how it gets approved without any brainstorming or talking to drivers is beyond me.

It's seems almost like corporate has abdicated their responsibilities to those suits they hired from companies that went under. Hello!? Is it any wonder why they went under? Could it be because of these same suits? Sometimes I feel that Estes is getting too big too fast and it is getting beyond their control as most memos are rubber stamped with no questions.

 

[Matt]

good point. all day sunday was spent taking stuff off our trailers and putting them on contractor trailers here on the dock in kc...............WOW

 

[Estands4evil]

good point. all day sunday was spent taking stuff off our trailers and putting them on contractor trailers here on the dock in kc...............WOW

That happened here @ 024 a few weeks ago. Breaking hooked sets of pups, then stripping them, and reloading them into contractors. Nothing like handling the freight more than we have to. Even if the contractors are pulling the &quot;not so time sensitive&quot; freight, the the freight is still that of our biggest customer.