So the big day came that I would be released into to wilds of the open roads all by myself, well sort of, as there was a great team of professionals that were only a phone call away if I needed any help. Prior to heading out on Monday, Renee and I spent some time on Saturday giving the truck another quick cleaning but also organizing the truck to my needs. This will be an ongoing project as I will make mirror changes as I get used to everything. I am hoping that once organized to my satisfaction that the daily flow will go much better.
I was up bright and early on Monday morning to pack my stuff for the week and then head off to the terminal to see where I would be headed to start the week. I got to the terminal around 10:00 a.m to have a meeting with Tammy my DSR (Driver Service Rep). This was a meeting to discuss not how I was doing but to get my opinion on how Kriska was doing. I was given a survey to fill out with a number of questions with a grading system of 1 to 5. It was a good meeting and refreshing to see a company wanting to be graded by their employees and wanting to know if there was anything they could do better.
Once the meeting was complete, I made my way over to dispatch to get my assigned load and it was off to PA again. (Kriska has a lot of clients in the Northeast U.S and a lot in PA as it is a major manufacturing hub.) The load was a light one so it would be a quick and easy trip through the hills of PA. I arrived to the client by mid evening and up to that point all was going very well. This was to be a simple drop load but simple did not happen. At this client prior to dropping the trailer, the wheels of the trailer had to be slid all the way back, that part was simple. The problem arose when I had to park the trailer. The area where I had to park the trailer had a slope on both sides with a pretty deep valley in between. Well, due to the wheels of the trailer being all the way to the back, the drive axle of my truck got caught up in the air of the valley. It also did not help that I never backed up a trailer with the wheels all the way to the back so it reacted so much more different from what I was used to. Let’s just say that it took a lot longer than it should have to park the trailer but to me it was time well spent as I learned so much in that time.
There was not a back haul out of this client so with little time left on my clock, I made my way to a truck stop for the night and await my next assignment in the morning. Sure enough upon waking up in the morning, my next assignment was on the computer. I was to pick up one of our trailers at a repair shop and then proceed to the next client for a live load. After picking up the trailer, I headed to the customer only to find out they were very strict about their appointment loading times. (I was 2.5 hours early) While training with Sylvain, I had gotten used to just showing up to a client whenever possible so this threw me for a loop. I was not allowed to wait on the property and had to find a place to park elsewhere. I made good use of my time reviewing my company manual and having lunch, all the while my clock was ticking. I finally got a call that I could proceed to a dock for loading that was very close to my original loading time. For some reason it took a very long time to load and it was very late before I could leave. It was at this point that things started going wrong for me for the week. I am one of those people who if I am 5 minutes early, I already feel like I am 10 minutes late and I take it personally.
This load was to deliver at 11:00 a.m the next morning but having wasted so much of my clock sitting and waiting, this was not going to be possible. I did call the client on the other end to advise that I could not make the appointment time and that I would most likely be there at 1:00 p.m which they advised would be ok but anytime after that, I would have to go to the end of the line. Well, I did not make it until 1:30 p.m due to an accident on the highway. I apologized to the client as I felt as though I let them, Kriska and myself down by not being able to make it on time. The client did their best to squeeze me in to unload and the off load was much quicker than the on load.
It was back to the Mississauga terminal to drop the empty trailer and pick up a loaded trailer that was heading to Montreal. I looked at the trip profile and was happy that I could once again get back on schedule. The trailer I picked up was different from any of the others I have hauled as it had disc brakes. Talk about a difference in stopping distance!!! I could certainly feel the brakes each time I applied them versus the traditional drum brakes that I was used to hauling. That night, I made it as far as our Prescott terminal where I stayed for the night. In the morning it was off to Montreal to drop the trailer and pick up a loaded one head to PA/NJ border. All was going well until I had to get the load weighed, through the jigs and reels this took about 2 hours and I could see that was going to be pushing my delivery time once again. Once weighed, I completed all my paperwork and sent required documents to the border, or so I thought.
Once out of the Montreal area I did a quick calculation and realized that I could make the appointment time with time to spare. I stopped along the way to see if my border crossing had been approved and apparently one of the computer messages I sent did not go through and I had to have Tammy my DSR complete it for me. With this message now complete, I should have my approval to cross the border in about 5 minutes. Those 5 minutes turned into 3.5 hours as the broker said they did not receive my paperwork so I once again had to send my paperwork to them for processing. I knew that I could not make the appointment time so I notified customer service who would notify the client. Once all the paperwork was cleared, across the border I went only to be told that the load required a FDA (Food and Drug Administration) clearance. Oh great, another delay!! At this point I was once again running out of time and I needed a place to stop for the night, luckily, not far from the border there was a rest area that had space.
The next morning I updated customer service to a new ETA to the client and began the day trying to forget the frustrations of the day before. I finally got to the client about 15 minutes later than my ETA and went inside to see about where I needed to park for the off loading. The young lady said she would get someone from the warehouse to come and see me. I waited inside of the business and chatted with the young lady. One of the guys came out and asked where the truck driver was and the young lady pointed to me. The guy said sorry, I thought you were a customer. Not sure if it was the way I was dressed or if he had thought I would be waiting in the truck. I was given directions on how to set up to the loading dock and once on the dock asked the guys for an estimated time for the off load which they said would be about 90 minutes. I stayed near the loading dock talking with the employees when one of them asked if I would like a tour of their business.(once again for security and business reason I will not disclose the nature of the business). Me being me I said you bet. I had been to similar businesses in the past but this one was very interesting. By the time the tour was completed, the trailer was empty so it was off to the next client.
My next assignment was to drop the empty trailer and pick up a loaded one near by. Upon arriving at the client, the yard jockey told me to drop the trailer anywhere and I could hook up to the loaded trailer. Bonus!!! No need to waste time finding a place to back the trailer in and drop it. I looked at the time and thought great, back on track for my time. I have to stop doing that as no sooner had I done that and everything went to crap again. This place was one of those where the wheels of the trailer had to be slid all the way to the back so that meant I needed to slide the wheels forward so the trailer and weight would be legal. There are pins that keep the wheels in place and on this trailer, on this day, they just did not want to retract. After spending 2 hours trying to make it work, I had enough and called my DSR, telling her I was ready to quit. I was not ready to quit but was so frustrated with the past few days I needed to vent. The team back at Kriska did their best to help me over the phone to try to resolve the issue I was having but in the end I was advised that I would need to go to the nearest repair shop.
Once arriving at the repair shop, at around 6:00 pm, I was told that the earliest that I could be seen was the next morning at 8:00 a.m if all went well but realistically it would be closer to noon. So with that said, I called Kriska and they said they would call a mobile service unit to come and fix. Well even those guys were booked solid so I just called it a night and went to bed. I was up very early the next morning so I went in grab a shower and a tea to help start my day. When I came out, there were two guys standing near the end of my trailer and one said, “you do know that your trailer is not legal, right?”. I told him what was happening and how long I might have to wait to get it fixed. Well before I know it, the guys are giving my help and the trailer wheels did finally slide into place. I weighed the load to make sure I was legal and away I went. It was now Saturday morning and it would be late Saturday afternoon before I would get back to Mississauga so I knew then that it would be Sunday afternoon before I would get home, 7 days on the road, the longest I had been out since starting.
I got back to Mississauga around 6:00 pm, dropped the trailer, found a place to park for the night and crawled into bed so I could get up early to hook onto a loaded trailer going to Prescott. I finally got home around 2:00 pm on Sunday, tired and still somewhat frustrated as to how the week went. As hard as the week was, I learned a lot about trucking and myself. I would say that within 4 hours of getting home, I was relaxed and looking forward to going out again, realizing that every week was not going to be all puppies and rainbows and that I had to deal with these weeks in the best way possible.
While on the road during the week, I received news via the onboard computer that Kriska had purchased another company. Over the past year, Kriska has purchase two other companies with the purpose of growing the company. All these companies will keep their names but fall under the Kriska Transportation Group. It has been hard for Kriska to grow the company over the company over the last few years given the driver shortage so they created the Kriska Transportation Group to grow the company. From what I have read, the companies they have acquired all have great safety ratings and have a good client base. The management group seem to be doing a great job not only growing the company but finding companies that would fit in with the Kriska culture. If you wish to read more about this acquisition you can follow this link Kriska-Transpo.
What I learned this week….. That there will be things that are out of my control and that I need to learn how to deal with it. Also that if I have problems not to wait so long before asking for help.
What I need to work on…… patience. I used to have a lot of patience but one of the side effects of my PTSD is that I get agitated easily.
Until next time, keep the blue side up.
OTR Duane 