I usually post on r/truckers, but I thought I would share here for a change.
I work as a long haul truck driver with this company out of Murray Kentucky.
This company has installed driver-facing AI tracking cameras that record audio and visual 24/7. (They say they don’t record, unless there’s an incident but that’s not true, the camera is always on, and what they’re actually doing is marking an incident with a time stamp. Big Brother is watching you, always)
The A.I. camera yells at you if it thinks you’re distracted. If you’re not looking directly forward for four seconds, it says “distracted driving,” and sends a report to corporate.
The camera pointed inward into the cab and sleeping bunk feels intrusive and hostile. I feel like there are hostile eyes on me at all times and I can’t escape it.
The truck has broken down a few times over the last few weeks.
I was at their Indianapolis terminal, and had to wait for several hours on uncomfortable plastic chairs, and one of the compliance officers could be heard calling drivers who had covered their camera.
He kept repeating “if you don’t remove the cover on the camera, we’re going to have a different conversation.” Meaning that that driver would be brought in and terminated for covering the camera.
I had put in for “home time” in Texas, because the truck needed to go to the dealership for additional repairs. My home time was approved, and I was headed toward Texas from the North East.
I was driving through Kentucky on my way to Atlanta when the camera falls off the windshield.
This is a huge problem for the company, because Big Brother must constantly be staring into your eyes while you’re driving.
They routed me to Murray Terminal, where my expectation was that I’d be there 20 or 30 minutes, tops.
There’s a Check Point Charlie gate, where they inspect the trucks that come in.
Check Point Charlie doesn’t read the notes that I’m headed to Texas for home time and am going to turn in the truck to the dealership to have work done.
Nope.
He tells me “you have a PM due in 3000 miles, we are putting you out of service.”
I tell the shop supervisor that I’m within 3000 miles to Texas, and the plan was to get to Texas and have all this work done while I am at home, out of the truck.
The ignore me, refuse to read the notes from Indianapolis and put the truck in the shop, even though I’m telling them it’s a dealer shop issue.
The truck is in that shop for two days.
They do not get me a hotel room.
I’m sitting around for two and a half days on extremely uncomfortable plastic furniture.
The vending machines are empty.
There is no coffee.
There wreck of a “courtesy vehicle” has a line and is being used by the 10 other people who are also there waiting for their trucks to be completed.
Basically, it looks like an internment camp.
At the morning of the third day (after two days of eating crackers) they conceded that the truck needed to go to the dealership shop…in Tennessee…and they want me to take it there.
I have to plead with my dispatcher to call them to just route me to Texas.
They eventually agree, and put the truck back in service.
Once I’m in the truck, I decided I was going to bobtail over to Starbucks to get coffee and some breakfast.
I attempted to go through the gate system, and Check Point Charlie comes running out, furiously waving a “No No!” Finger at me.
A minute later I get a call telling me I’m not allowed to leave unless I’m “under a load.”
I was less a driver and more an inmate at that point.
Eventually, after about an hour or so, they assign me a load and I’m able to leave, and I’m able to stop at a truck stop for some coffee and something to eat (because at that point, I really hadn’t eaten much in three days.)
And I’ve felt miserable since I left Kentucky.
I don’t want to have to get back on this truck once I drop it at the dealer.
The main terminal should be a company’s Best Foot Forward.
It should not look and function like a prison, with grey paint, plastic furniture and security gates that keep you inside.
There were signs all over saying “this is your home away from home, please keep it clean.”
Yeah, my home doesn’t have a bunch of plastic chairs.
This company just doesn’t care about driver morale, at all.