Have any of you guys out there had the same experiences I have had of late trying to change job in these days of reported driver shortages?
In the last week I had to travel a 180 mile round trip for a driving assessment and interview with a well known tanker fleet. Driving assessment went well as did the interview and I left with a promise off you will hear from me 3 ways, either yes/no or we will call on you again.
No word for 4 days so I chase up their recruitment firm to be told ‘oh err sorry I can confirm to you that you that you have been unsuccessful. You were the second placed candidate but the two advertised vacancies was reduced to one’ which then I got a speal about how in his opinion I was the best candidate etc etc etc. Oh I forgot to mention my current employer refused point blank to give me the day off even though I have holiday entitlement and forced me to work a weeks nightshift. Such treatment of drivers makes it extremely hard to believe there is a shortage of drivers.
Likewise I was part of 10 interviewees who attended a block interview at a well known discount retailers RDC a few months ago. 10 candidates for 5 jobs. I went in with 30 years experience and the last 15 yrs in steady employment with the same firm meant nothing when I was the wrong gender and not an ex forces with no haulage experience ( I am it has to be said all for ex servicemen who fought for their country to be given jobs ). At the one to one interview the guy concentrated on my long service with my current employer as if it was a fault asking me if I was ‘sure I was doing the right thing’ which made me think I was merely there to make up the numbers.
Never even had a courtesy phone call from them to say I was not required.
Fair to say I am well pee’d off today
Driver Shortage■■? I don’t see one
Sorry to hear you had a ■■■■ time of it, seems its alright to mess folk about and not even bother to phone with a reply so downright rude. I have not seen any sign of a driver shortage.
rivits:
Have any of you guys out there had the same experiences I have had of late trying to change job in these days of reported driver shortages?
In the last week I had to travel a 180 mile round trip for a driving assessment and interview with a well known tanker fleet. Driving assessment went well as did the interview and I left with a promise off you will hear from me 3 ways, either yes/no or we will call on you again.
No word for 4 days so I chase up their recruitment firm to be told ‘oh err sorry I can confirm to you that you that you have been unsuccessful. You were the second placed candidate but the two advertised vacancies was reduced to one’ which then I got a speal about how in his opinion I was the best candidate etc etc etc. Oh I forgot to mention my current employer refused point blank to give me the day off even though I have holiday entitlement and forced me to work a weeks nightshift. Such treatment of drivers makes it extremely hard to believe there is a shortage of drivers.
Likewise I was part of 10 interviewees who attended a block interview at a well known discount retailers RDC a few months ago. 10 candidates for 5 jobs. I went in with 30 years experience and the last 15 yrs in steady employment with the same firm meant nothing when I was the wrong gender and not an ex forces with no haulage experience ( I am it has to be said all for ex servicemen who fought for their country to be given jobs ). At the one to one interview the guy concentrated on my long service with my current employer as if it was a fault asking me if I was ‘sure I was doing the right thing’ which made me think I was merely there to make up the numbers.
Never even had a courtesy phone call from them to say I was not required.
Fair to say I am well pee’d off today
Driver Shortage■■? I don’t see one
no doubt your a white,hetrosexual uk male .well experienced and competent,whereas these mobs look at you and think…he prob knows more than the entire traffic office put together,set in his ways,sooooo lets get some reverse racism,reverse sexism discrimination into gear and start some wifey or cannon fodder that wont know any better once we induct them into cabbage procedure operations.
I have been looking for a new job around 2 weeks now & I’m ■■■■■■ off with uploading my cv & getting zero reply, though the ad says “urgently required” I then hunt down the recruitment number & phone them, either it’s so & so is not in the office but I will get him/her to call you back & you never hear from them again or its completely different to the written description FFS!!
I phoned about a Petroleum tanker job & it went like this…Hi I’m enquiring about the tanker job u have advertised, “ok, do you have c+e?” Yes “how long have you been driving " 20 years “do you have ADR” Yes “do you have PDP” Yes “how many points/accidents do you have” none & none"this is only a 6 month contract” Yes that’s ok i’m looking for a job to take me through to summer. “ok I will have a chat with my boss & get back to you” This was on Monday & the phone ain’t rang…
Maybe the successful candidates were in their late twenties/early thirties with plenty of experience rather than their late forties and would make a better long-term employee.
They may even have been more articulate at interview with better qualifications.
There is no excuse for not informing unsuccessful candidates of the fact, but unfortunately that is the way of the world these days.
only thing there is a shortage of, is good employers.
there is no shortage of drivers, only a shortage of GOOD drivers. 
I had the opposite experience when I was changing jobs a few months ago, I applied for 4-5 jobs & every job I applied for I was offered, I admit I don’t have the same amount of experience as some I’m still a newbie @ 15 years
TruckOff:
only thing there is a shortage of, is good employers.
there is no shortage of drivers, only a shortage of GOOD drivers.
Correct.
Judehamish:
rather than their late forties
So relatively speaking, still quite young? 
If the opening poster travelled that return distance for a job interview it’s probably a very good job. If so, they can probably pick and choose their employees. Why would they not pick someone experienced who was twenty years younger? Much less chance of having long-term sickness issues.
I am just into my forties myself and certainly don’t regard myself as “quite young.”
Reading these post,s its media bullsh-t and as we all know the industry has gone east plus know to ex service men/ women, no prob with latter but with former thanks for putting me car insurance up year upon year, i,m 50yrs old but it,s still on rise, i always thought it went down the older you got.
I have been offered four full time driving jobs this year, so there is definitely work out there. At the moment am doing agency driving on tippers, which should have gone quiet at this time of the year, but still busy. I personally know of transport companies with trucks standing as can’t find suitable drivers, so I for one am convinced there is a driver shortage. 
Oh well there is the answer , being 47 I am obviously too auld & decrepit to employ given I’m bound to be off sick constantly from now to I retire. I should think myself lucky I currently have a job that sees me working flat trailers & covers in all weather but as antiquated and pathetic as I am a simple phone call telling me one way or the other would not have hurt
Think there are going to be jobs that are always hard to get even at the best of times. Good jobs are always highly sort by many people in all trades and professions. I think the job market in genral has improved some what.
I can remember even the night porter jobs in the crappest hotels were all taken at on time . That was back in autum 2011. Was talking too a guy who baled into bus driving quick smart after the banking melt down of 2008 cause he knew there would be zero work about in the haulage industry in the comiñg years. But he’s come back to haulage now as seeing some choice out there now.
Think we forget were we’ve all come from in the last few years. Think it was way worse befor. There is a lack of new drivers and Alton retairing and the ecomamy is getting alitttle better.
TruckOff:
only thing there is a shortage of, is good employers.
there is no shortage of drivers, only a shortage of GOOD drivers.
Well said that man , my thoughts are exactly the same .
rivits:
Oh well there is the answer , being 47 I am obviously too auld & decrepit to employ given I’m bound to be off sick constantly from now to I retire. I should think myself lucky I currently have a job that sees me working flat trailers & covers in all weather but as antiquated and pathetic as I am a simple phone call telling me one way or the other would not have hurt
Worry not Rivits , I started with a new employer at 50 ,( as a driver ) worked full time until I was 67 , and still return if and when I`am needed at 72 .
Seems to be plenty of jobs in supply chain.
In political terms - it’s always the “done thing” to bully the current holder of the balance of power - when they don’t realize they have it especially.
An incumbent government gets “bullied” - or at least it should - by HM opposition, the free press, other countries, and even their own allies.
The same principal applies to drivers when there IS actually a shortage - but the firms don’t want you attempting in any way to capitalize on that. Imagine a world where transport HAS to get through - and money becomes “No object”… We get a situation like in the NHS at present with Agency getting £50ph because the NHS foolishly let go (under government edict) too many staff that now leaves them overstuffed with administrators and rookies - with the quality staff grabbing the exit package and running whilst they could - now overjoyed to be returning on agency with a REAL “supply and demand” curve in place for their services.
With transport being the difference between “developed nation” and “third world nation” - it is seen as imperative by government, employers, and trading partners to “talk down” any introduction of a true supply and demand curve entering transport. The agency driver in particular would acquire the power of a flying picket… The government has already made it bend-over-backwards easy for any old bod to become a driver, not caring about the ever increasing death rate that comes as an indirect result of this.
(1) The average age of a driver is still rising
(2) New drivers are given too much ■■■■-upable work to do, which puts their own safety and that of the public at risk
(3) Drivers with dubious credentials are allowed jobs - providing they sign into what amounts to an indentured servant’s contract.
(4) Drivers from abroad can come here, but it’s damned difficult for drivers from here (despite the so-called “glut”) to get jobs abroad.
(5) Governments left, right, and center over three decades now - won’t let transport become re-unionized in a big enough way so that the transport industry becomes a significant lobby group in it’s own right. Never mind the Unions that Thatcher destroyed - the workplaces for most of them have already long gone. Not so Transport. They stand alone like a prince of the last city state to fall.
(6) This Christmas is different from previous ones in that this is all starting to bite now. The Japanese business model followers will attempt to source drivers over Christmas, but may well struggle this year - for any amount of money. The American business model followers is still tripping over it’s own feet in throwing out the baby with the bathwater all the time, and hoping there are enough contractors running a solid tax fiddle operation to take on when the demand spikes. The Conservative model is to blunder along, and hope that employers can keep a grip - giving them free reign to do or die this Christmas near you. 
rivits:
Oh well there is the answer , being 47 I am obviously too auld & decrepit to employ given I’m bound to be off sick constantly from now to I retire.
The problem with being at one place for 15 years is your experience isn’t that broad and its usually quite hard to teach someone who has been working at one spot for so long how to do things at a new employer. Where I am we do fridge work for a week or two before Xmas. Their drivers who have been there for years struggle like hell and because they’ve never had to use loading bays or load their own trailers by hand they tend not to know that when you’re loading a trailer with a pump truck its generally a good idea to drop the suspension on the unit and raise it up on the trailer, not the other way round. I remember meeting one of their drivers in the waiting room at Tesco on the first day. All he’d done was drive solo down to Spalding, pick up a fridge, drive to Tesco at Donny and from there back to the yard and finished. “Its crap this, its bloody ridiculous, I’m not doing it another day”. Agency drivers because they’d got a fair range of experience had no problem.
Was a similar story years ago when they changed from Scanias which they’d had for years to DAF XFs. Struggled like hell whereas the agency lads just got in them and were on their way down the road.
The more you’ve been doing own account work for an employer rather than general haulage, the worse you’ll be in a new job.
[- quote=“Conor”]
rivits:
Oh well there is the answer , being 47 I am obviously too auld & decrepit to employ given I’m bound to be off sick constantly from now to I retire.
[/quote]
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- ]The problem with being at one place for 15 years is your experience isn’t that broad and its usually quite hard to teach someone who has been working at one spot for so long how to do things at a new employer.- >
I really have got to laugh at this comment, I have been in the employment of Scotland’s second biggest haulier and biggest actual general haulier for 15 years. The variety of work is so vast every week something new occurs , multi skilled isn’t the word for it given the wide variation of vehicles, trailers and loads so really I and the majority of my co-workers could fit in anywhere.
The distance traveled for the interview was not because it was a great job, I would have if I had been successful been based at a sub depot about 8 miles from my house. The basic pay was marginally higher than where I am but the overtime was less, in fact for hazardous tanker work the pay was very poor but I was looking for less time sleeping in a cab and spend a bit more time with my wife & family.
The original point I was making was not someone else getting the job but the fact of how after jumping thru hoops to attend the interview etc a courtesy phone call was too much bother for them and after I chased it up I got a load of patronising ■■■■■■■■ and the bemusement that a good and steady employment record dating back 15yrs seems to get looked on with disdain, perhaps they would prefer the maximum of 3 months in a job type of cowboy!!
At the end of the day I daresay I am still in a job so my mortgage is safe but really no wonder fresh blood aint coming into the job and veterans are leaving in their droves