My company has grown to the point where we need to get a CDL truck and train someone on our team to be a CDL driver. My worry is we spend the time and money getting a team member their license and then they leave.
Any tips for helping make sure we don't waste who we train?
Just pay them enough not to leave. Easy answer
The average gross salary for an OTR driver is 60k. If your not paying your guys 60k a year gross how is that competitive. That's union apprentice money.
They are making more than that. But they could make close to 200k if they wanted to live the trucks driver life.
Ummm we're?
Wouldn't that fall into paying competitive wages?
Do you mean “any advice other than paying them more?”
No. No advice other than that. Pay them more or they’ll leave. That’s life.
You pay them enough to not leave
Pretty simple
Call the truck driving schools, they have a list of graduates looking to drive.
Just hire a local driver? Or if you do train make them sign a contract. If you do sign local drive be prepared to pay that rate for an experienced driver.
At my workplace we're all required to get our cdls within the first year. We've obviously had people that quit or get fired but I don't think we've ever had someone leave to go be a truck driver. Having to travel that much and not getting to sleep in your own bed every night is a pretty significant downside. Pay people enough money to live comfortably and treat them well and they'll stay and if they don't then 🤷 really not much to do about it. You can't force someone to stay and investing in employees costs money. If you're that worried about someone leaving then you should get the license yourself
There are different types of CDL. What kind of truck will you be running? For example, CDL-B is for box trucks. Lots of those drivers are just looking to run locally during the day and not go OTR.
Also have you considered promoting from within? Maybe there are a couple folks who would love the opportunity to share the route part time. That way you're not reliant on one driver.
Eh not quite, it's a weight classification and not restrictive of the vehicle type. With a B I can drive anything up to 36,000lbs with a trailer load of up to 10,000lbs. Anything more than that you need a class A
You can drive a loaded dump truck with a B.
I never said you couldn't?
The gist of what I said was the Class b restrictions are weight based, not based on the vehicle type.
A loaded end dump weighs more than 36000lbs.
Are you sure you aren’t conflating that a cdl-b enables you to drive vehicles over 26,001lbs?
You're right, I miss spoke in that regard. Is it anything with 26,001 GVWR or more.
It’s Based on WHAT you are hauling more that how much. Liquids and hazmat for example require additional licensing.
This is also true, there are additional endorsements (Airbrakes, Hazmat, Passenger, etc), but the CDL classes (A and B) are based on WEIGHT.
Trailer weight specifically. A B can drive any weight with no trailer and a trailer up to 9,999 pounds. A trailer of 10k or more requires a class a
Yup!
Have them sign a contract, if they don't remain with the company for x amount of time they have to reimburse you for cost of getting their class A. People might call you names but the cost of a class A can be thousands depending on location, not to mention paying the time that employee is at the school. It can cripple a small business.
Yeah this advice sucks, don't do this
Welcome to the nightmare that is having an OTR driver
If your company can’t absorb the cost of putting one person thru CDL school then you’re not ready to get in to commercial trucking. Just one round of new tires on one of my dump trucks cost more than getting a driver licensed. You will have to pay your driver a competitive wage, because they are more valuable.
You could try to MK ultra them. Find some dirt for blackmail. I got all sorts of ideas, but you’ll need to pay well if you want the job handled professionally.
Make them finance it and pay the loan amount monthy as a bonus.
If they leave, they are on the hook for paying it
I would tell my employer to drink dirt and die if they offered me a way into debt like that lol
Thats pretty standard in the trucking industry.
Offer a start up bonus equal to schooling. Quit early and its back on you
We pay competitive wages for our position but cross country truck drivers make a lot more but there is a barrier to becoming one and that's getting a CDL. However it would be easy for them to pack up and go try out that life once we get their license. Reason it pays more though is because that life kind of sucks when it comes to family life. But yeah two different jobs basically but they become eligible for both.
That’s trucking company koolaid you’re drinking there buddy. OTR drivers get paid shit.