fair play to you, you are out there and doing it ,and for now you are happy. i say long may it continue for you
Thanks, bud.
dave_lol66:
Big Truck:
Rob/Wire,
now you guys really have got me confused
Did you both not leave BFS because among other things they didn’t “give you the miles”,so how was it possible to earn $19/hour if you weren’t driving enough?
$3000^14 days=$214/day^average 12 hour WORKING day =$17.85/hour (in MY OPINION that does not justify being away from home for 14 days)
Is $19/hour considered a decent wage in general for any “skilled” manual job in Canada
I 100% agree that your families have a better lifestyle in Canada but in all honesty DO YOU
How many ex-UK guys (on the forums) have had health problems/scares because of the “hard work” and terrible sleep patterns driving long haul in NA since the start of PNP in 2004
If it really was true that $19/hour was regularly attainable driving long haul why are there still guys coming back to the UK saying they couldn’t earn enough money
More importantly why do so many give up long haul (or even trucking altogether) as soon as they gain PRBig Truck, how much do you get paid per mile■■?
Dave,
I don’t even drive a truck for a living (when I was O/D it was as a sideline business venture) and if I do ever get around to looking seriously at Canada it will not involve driving OTR.
So as you know that will SERIOUSLY hamper my choices 
I’ve said it before but as a Dad of two young boys It is a non starter to leave them and the wife for 10/14 days at a time and choose the “lifestyle” of the OTR truck driver.
I don’t want to spend 90% of my working life sleeping in a truck bunk (even though they are bloody big in NA 
)
Big Truck:
dave_lol66:
Big Truck:
Rob/Wire,
now you guys really have got me confused
Did you both not leave BFS because among other things they didn’t “give you the miles”,so how was it possible to earn $19/hour if you weren’t driving enough?
$3000^14 days=$214/day^average 12 hour WORKING day =$17.85/hour (in MY OPINION that does not justify being away from home for 14 days
Is $19/hour considered a decent wage in general for any “skilled” manual job in Canada
I 100% agree that your families have a better lifestyle in Canada but in all honesty DO YOU
How many ex-UK guys (on the forums) have had health problems/scares because of the “hard work” and terrible sleep patterns driving long haul in NA since the start of PNP in 2004If it really was true that $19/hour was regularly attainable driving long haul why are there still guys coming back to the UK saying they couldn’t earn enough money
More importantly why do so many give up long haul (or even trucking altogether) as soon as they gain PRBig Truck, how much do you get paid per mile■■?
Dave,
I don’t even drive a truck for a living (when I was O/D it was as a sideline business venture) and if I do ever get around to looking seriously at Canada it will not involve driving OTR.
So as you know that will SERIOUSLY hamper my choices
I’ve said it before but as a Dad of two young boys It is a non starter to leave them and the wife for 10/14 days at a time and choose the “lifestyle” of the OTR truck driver.
I don’t want to spend 90% of my working life sleeping in a truck bunk (even though they are bloody big in NA
And as I have said in the past as long as you compare what you have done in the past with what you do here in North America you will never make it.
We get paid by the mile and cannot compare or exchange that into getting paid by the hour.
By the way good luck Jon, sorry your thread go hijacked 
good point best of luck bigjon
Hehe, i dont mind 
is funny seeing the ‘mines bigger than yours’ match going on .
BigJon:
Hehe, i dont mind
It’s not so much that, it’s more telling it like it is, everyone has a different opinion, I have mine, BigTruck has his, neither of us are right or wrong, my life doesn’t appeal to him, there’s nothing wrong in that, after all each to his own, BUT I must point out inaccuracies & his blanket statement about our wages, was both wrong & I found it a little insulting, he insinuated that we are working for peanuts, you know the old ‘all flash & no cash’ chestnut, I can’t stand by & not rise to that bait, it’s not in my nature.
I think Wire sums it up best when he said that hourly pay is unimportant to him, after all it’s just a number, but as we’re talking about numbers the fact that none of us are (usually) posting about how much money we’re earning or not earning, must indicate that it is not an issue & you can be sure that if we were all on the poverty line it would get plenty of webspace (or whatever you call it)
Let’s put it another way, I earned more money in the UK, that’s a fact, let’s leave aside the fact that I needed to because everything is so much more expensive than here & just concentrate on the amount going in the bank. Now I’m earning less, again, that’s a fact, but would I go back to England to put more money in the bank? No chance, not even if I could double my old UK wage, I wouldn’t even consider it.
Anyway Big Jon, how’s the job going?
I start on the 5th, so cant really comment on the FedEx job. But the job im doing at the moment is good, Im getting to drive around in a Straight Truck, seeing some of the Country i now call home. Last week saw me in Lloydminster on an overnight stop out in a motel. This week i was supposed to do a run to Camrose, Wetaskiwin area , but that got moved as we have too much stuff to do at the RDC. Loblaws RDC driver training exam was a joke lol. You get shown a video then asked questions about it, Then your signed off and ‘Good to Go!’ as they say at Loblaws lol.
The driving aspect of this current job is great, but the actual work we do in the RDC and the stores is mind numbing. We have to scan barcodes on damaged products, then donate the items we scanned to the Edmonton foodbank.
Next week should see us going to Whitecourt, Edson, Drayton Valley .
Funnily enough, my current employer is trying to keep me on, they have asked me to put in writing what it would take to keep me. i must be doing something right , But i dont think they can match the overall package that FedEx are offering. not many places give 80 - 90 % coverage for benefits.
I also have to agree with all the expats here about the money situation. To me it doesnt matter how much i bring home, so long as i can pay my bills, and provide for myself , and save up to start the sponsorship for my wife, when she has finished her uni course.
I have dreamed of living in Canada for years, and as I have a family connection to Canada, it has always been a topic for discussion within the family. Now I’m here living the dream , And wouldnt move back to England if you paid me (although i will admit there was one point after 3 months of not being able to secure work, I did contemplate going home)
It is good to hear that things are working out for you over here Jon. Good for you. You certainly have the enthusiasm to make it all work.
And that, Mark, is the whole point, isn’t it…
Besides, the question asked about our standard of life as OTR drivers…
Hmmm, on the whole I would say it is better. You see, I was always able to do more than the law allowed me to do, so I was often sat waiting for the clock to run around to get going again. Here I am left to get on with it so I can work harder, as is my wont, then go home. That is how I always have been and so it suits me well. Those who go back are either unlucky or homesick. There are some who are simply not cut out for it, too. That is simply the way it is.
Look at it like this, I went away on Sunday last week, and got home this morning (owing to an airport being in the middle of a road so I couldn’t find the address and the load not being cleared or I would have been home yesterday) and the trip was 4900 miles. I won’t say how it worked out, but it did. The company were excellent, too, because they arranged a reload for me because I had pushed on a bit but it got cancelled when I got there. Instead of sitting, they found me another but it was 400 miles away. I was able to get it on wheels and hammer home, no questions asked. It all comes down to how you want to work and having a company that will work with you.
And that total put me at 14000 miles for the month so I get full whack on bonus, too.
Another point asked was about health problems. Well think on this, there are far more drivers over here that actually retire and have their pensions than manage to in the UK. There are more drivers in their 60’s and 70’s here than in the UK who are still able to do the job and are not complete wrecks. I wondered about my future after my accident, but I am working as well as ever. And my ulcer, earned as a younger man in the UK has not flared at all since I started here, despite the radical changes in weather which always affected it there.
As NMM says, it is something that suits or doesn’t. I am bound to say it is good because I feel it is. Both Marks say the same, as does Dave. It suits us, and we tell it as we see it. That doesn’t make us wrong.
Okay,
you guys have made your points and I’ve no problem with that but each to his own and all that.
I still stand by that there “generally” is too much time driving OTR doing jobs that you aren’t paid for and some of you guys took 1,2 or 3 different trucking companies before you settled.
I still maintain that driving OTR could not be a good “lifestyle” for me as being away from home leaving a young family for long periods is the road to nowhere.
It wasn’t all that long ago that Dave-lol66 was singing the praises of local work on the forums with “Jade” as opposed to being away from home for 10/14 days on OTR. 
Put it this way:
How many times in a trip do you guys fill with Diesel
Are you paid for that
If not and you add that up over a year thats some amount of time (never mind all the other “free work”) that you have worked for said trucking company and NOT been paid
Big Truck:
Okay,
you guys have made your points and I’ve no problem with that but each to his own and all that.
I still stand by that there “generally” is too much time driving OTR doing jobs that you aren’t paid for and some of you guys took 1,2 or 3 different trucking companies before you settled.
I still maintain that driving OTR could not be a good “lifestyle” for me as being away from home leaving a young family for long periods is the road to nowhere.It wasn’t all that long ago that Dave-lol66 was singing the praises of local work on the forums with “Jade” as opposed to being away from home for 10/14 days on OTR.
Put it this way:
How many times in a trip do you guys fill with Diesel
Are you paid for that
If not and you add that up over a year thats some amount of time (never mind all the other “free work”) that you have worked for said trucking company and NOT been paid
wrong again BT Jade was OTR
More to the point, why carry it on, BT? Your question about what we are or are not paid for are getting more ridiculous. Paid for filling up with diesel indeed… We are paid to do it as part of our mileage rate the same as we are paid for the pre trip and everything else.
You simply cannot grasp the idea of being paid by the mile, can you. If we were paid daily then you would probably find fault with that too, simply becuse you are so convinced you are right, and it is something you have never tried so are in no real position to criticise. You have been banging on about it for years now.
All the posts on british expats, all the nonsense. The majority of those on there are the ones who find fault. I joined, looked and gave up very quickly because that is all there is on there- complaints- and you figure prominantly in there but you still are in the same place you always have been and always will be.
Regarding Dave and Jade, I know the story there- you do not. I know why he left there- you do not. And I know that he is now with a firm where he gets good miles and little trouble. That is a major part of the attraction for us here, a little peace, and quiet and we are getting it even if we had to change hobs to find it.
It all suits Dave, the 2 Marks, me…
Our points of view are based on the actual experience and they are our points of view, n ot anyone elses, and certainly not from someone who has no real idea.
You tell him Rob 
It would seem that some do not like it when others are happy with their lot 
Can’t remember the last time one of us ExPats got onto the UK forum telling people that they are mugs for putting up with all the HSE bollox, VOSA persecution, poor job security (none if they’re on an agency) ridiculous levels of traffic, lack of parking facilities blah blah blah.
newmercman:
You tell him RobIt would seem that some do not like it when others are happy with their lot
Can’t remember the last time one of us ExPats got onto the UK forum telling people that they are mugs for putting up with all the HSE bollox, VOSA persecution, poor job security (none if they’re on an agency) ridiculous levels of traffic, lack of parking facilities blah blah blah.
Dont forget the absolutely awfull facilities for LGV truckers
newmercman:
You tell him RobIt would seem that some do not like it when others are happy with their lot
Can’t remember the last time one of us ExPats got onto the UK forum telling people that they are mugs for putting up with all the HSE bollox, VOSA persecution, poor job security (none if they’re on an agency) ridiculous levels of traffic, lack of parking facilities blah blah blah.
Alot of it is just pure envy nothing more nothing less than that, some of us who have been unhappy with our lot have had the balls to get up and do something about it and go somewhere where we enjoy living and working, some find it straight off others take a tad longer, I had 6 years in Germany and 8 years in Holland before settling in the north of Spain 15 years ago. Wild horses will not move from here now.
dave_lol66:
Big Truck:
Okay,
you guys have made your points and I’ve no problem with that but each to his own and all that.
I still stand by that there “generally” is too much time driving OTR doing jobs that you aren’t paid for and some of you guys took 1,2 or 3 different trucking companies before you settled.
I still maintain that driving OTR could not be a good “lifestyle” for me as being away from home leaving a young family for long periods is the road to nowhere.It wasn’t all that long ago that Dave-lol66 was singing the praises of local work on the forums with “Jade” as opposed to being away from home for 10/14 days on OTR.
Put it this way:
How many times in a trip do you guys fill with Diesel
Are you paid for that
If not and you add that up over a year thats some amount of time (never mind all the other “free work”) that you have worked for said trucking company and NOT been paidwrong again BT Jade was OTR
Dave,
it was an easy mistake to make
OK it was the grain hauling hopperbottom company then
BTD,
Paid for filling with Diesel in the mileage rate
I think if I made that statement on a Trucknet USA forum I would be called insane
NMM,
you say you average 15000miles/monthX 0.40cpm=$6000/monthX12 months=$72000 plus say $8000(approx $25/day which I would say is VERY conservative) for all those layovers/border crossings/drop/pick-up pay.
Do you gross $80’000+/year 
I meant, as you well know, that it is part of driving trucks that they need to be filled up with fuel. It is obviously he who burns the fuel that replenishes it. I generally do about 11 or 1200 miles between fills and so every other day…ish. Another thing worth remembering is that you get your showers and coffee when you fill up so there is recompense there- that is always assuming you really want to be this picky.
And to be fair, if you put most of what you put on tnet usa you would be laughed off the forum as you very well know.
And there is a very good chance that Mark did earn that figure. I think I was up around 70 last year and some of that time, 5 months, was on with BFS. I just got 14000 miles for September with a limiter at 61 mph, and that was to Sunday morning and I was home for 2 weekends before this past weekend. If you find it so hard to believe that is up to you, but we know the reality.
It’s always the same, isn’t it.
Big truck, for heavens sake. Long haul trucking over here is a way of life. If you are a diesel in the blood long haul trucker i would say that here is the ultimate place to be one. However YOU are NOT a long haul trucker and you do not have any aspirations or pretences to be one so why in the hell would you expect to find the lifestyle appealing? By your own admission you would not like to haul long distance or be away from your family so it not surprising in the least that you think what we do is an undesirable lifestyle choice. I fully respect your point of view and find it to be a commendable enough philosophy but wonder why you feel the need to constantly berate the way of life that we have chosen for ourselves.
Is it perhaps because you fancy the idea of living over here and are frustrated by the fact that you cannot qualify without pretending that you are a longhaul trucker? If this is the truth of the matter i would seriously advise you not to bother as quite a few Brits have already tried to go down that route and it nearly always ends in heartbreak for them and their families. (And they nearly always blame it on Canada).