Hello,
I’m looking to move to the states inside the next 12 months. I know i have to obtain this CDL but im not sure where to begin.
I’m a class one driver here in the UK, but i know this means nothing over there, apart from showing i have experience.
Could anyone tell me the best way to go about eg. Costs,recommendations etc.
Good info would be much appreciated.
Cheers.
over to you mister hasler ,I think
I have looked at this recently as I am in California.
Basically (states aren’t all the same rules)…
- you need a drivers license, you’ll have to take a written and practical car test.
- you need to pass the medical before you can even take the written test for CDL.
- California has separate tests for things like airbrakes (I didn’t get as far as finding out if this is covered in a class A [artic/CE] license.
- a lot of companies here will sponsor - ie pay for your training if you agree to work for them for a set period. I have seen 8 months to 2 years.
- driving schools I have seen charge anywhere fro $2000 - $10000 for the course.
- seem to be (at least locally) that will take on newly qualified drivers.
- a lot of companies pay per mile. I’ve seen between $0.34 and $0.78 advertised.
- you can take the A test straight away - no need for the ‘rigid’ test first.
I found a job with a tow truck company and my basic C ‘car’ license covers me up to 26000lbs GWV, I kind of wish I had taken the interview for the CDL training but like coming home every night.
Oh and unless you have the right to a green card or work permit stop looking now. I have a varied work and qualification history - paramedic, UK cat C, commercial helicopter pilot, UK MCA captain’s license and none of them transfer without basically starting at the bottom all over again. Even my pilot’s license that is USA issued by the FAA wasn’t enough to secure me a work permit.
Good luck.
W.
PS I can spell but licence is licenSe here! 
Thanks for the info,I’m actually looking to move to Arizona where im hoping to marry my American girlfriend in the next year or so.Hopefully i’ll be granted to stay that way.
I’ve looked at starting from scratch and going to one of these truck schools as a rookie and work up from there.The other option was the harvest season, i know the money is poor and your away from home for a long time but at least i would gain a lot of experience of driving a truck over there.It would be only for one season. Having never drove commercially over there, getting this CDL is concerning me as rules and regulations are totally different from the uk,from what i’ve read.
Once you are eligible to work in the US and have trained, at possible huge personal expense, be prepared that most jobs will me OTR (Over the Road) which will see you gone for weeks on end with practically no time off. If you’re actually moving to Arizona to get married, the last thing I’d then recommend would be to drive a truck in the United States unless you can get a local, hourly paid, home every night job, or you’ll be on a fast track to a divorce just as quickly. At least as Canadian trucks, we have to reload right back to Canada (and hence go home) but with American trucks, they often just relay around the country doing little crappy short 1-2 day trips, waiting a day in between on no pay for the next load and so it goes.
Can she not live in the UK with you? as a truck driver you’d have a far higher quality of life. You wouldn’t be paid by the mile in the UK, you’d probably be home every weekend, possibly even just doing day shifts and you’d have free health care, which to me is the biggest issue I’d have with the US where you’re only covered while in a job and as soon as you do actually get sick, you’re out on your ear and left to rot.
I think I’d rather move to Bulgaria and get a job with Willi Betz and spend weeks/months away doing that, than work for the vast majority of US firms. Driver turnover in the US isn’t at nearly 100% annually for no reason, with many companies exceeding 100% by quite a margin. In the UK if a company had 100 trucks and 100 full time drivers, but had to employ 125 drivers in a year because so many came and went, they wouldn’t stay in business, but in the US and also in Canada that is quite normal.
So my advice would be to move her to the UK, or keep her there if she’s there now and if you do need to move to Arizona, don’t drive a truck on long haul work, just don’t.
To whl1961, You really do need to check up on the regs for PR in the US. There are loads of formalities you have to complete. It took me 5 months to get my US entry visa and then it had to be used within 6months if not then its back to square 1, no extension to use it.Plus the medicals ,background checks and oh I nearly forgot the cost of it all, plus supplying proof that you both are in a stable and financial relationship. Unless its changed you can only get your entry visa to the US from outside the US and ALL filings and interviews are done at the US embassy in London. Hope this helps .
ray
I guess it’s not as easy to do it today like the way i got my Commercial licence back 1974, that was rent an artic from Hertz then take the DMV tester for a short ride then answer a few questions , done 
The DMV centres have all the books (free in NH) on driving, pre trips, air brakes, has-mat etc. You’ll need a DOT physical for your licence now and should cost about $70.
Renting an artic may be the problem without a current CDL though. I know it’s more complicated to get a CDL now but i’d rather get a non-driving job then get a CDL on my own so i would’nt have to bother with one of them big ‘meat in the seat’ OTR firms that Robinhood mentioned, of which there are plenty. 
Charles
The first very detailed answer was about right.
It is not easy to get a licence unless you find a kind minded company to help you out. It took me 18 months to get the work permit. I tried several companies to help me get the licence nearly all of them wanted huge amounts of money just to let me use their truck to take the test, one of them wanted a shocking $7K 
I eventually went to a small family run local company that let me use a truck for the test for $20.00 then when I passed and asked them if they needed a driver they gave me a job and also gave me my money back. You will need written proof that you have at least 2 years experience.
Don’t get hooked by Schnieder who say the will train you free of charge, you will hardly ever see your new wife again and will not earn enough money to live on.
Pat Hasler:
Don’t get hooked by Schnieder who say the will train you free of charge, you will hardly ever see your new wife again and will not earn enough money to live on.
^^This^^ and there are many many many more similar companies that could be added to the list.
The green card and work permit seems to be a bit hit and miss.
My wife is American, we had planned to get married in the UK near my family and our friends (her family is pretty much out of the picture). We returned to California to sort out a close friend’s estate and to cut a long story short found a perfect wedding venue here.
I had entered on my B1/B2 visa as a visitor as I had been doing for several years. Our friends and my family came over for the wedding. After the wedding we filed the paperwork for my green card ourselves - no attorneys, etc who want to charge lots of $$$$. We filed in the December and I had my green card in April the next year - a month of that was waiting to get some paperwork from the UK.
I think all in it cost us around $2000 for everything. We took our wedding photos, trip photos, joint bank statements, joint lease, love letters/notes, proof of income I think you have to show a minimum of $21000 per year, etc. to our interview. The interview was relaxed and despite my wife giving information like our address and my DOB like she was reading it from a script (!) we were approved.
My only slip up was not filing for a work permit initially as I thought it was automatic with the green card application - its not -and getting the work permit about 2 weeks before the green card.
W.
Hi whl1961
I reckon I have found a perfect driving school where you could get your CDL in the States, it’s also in the western part of the States, looks cheap and could be interesting, just don’t tell your newly wed wife where you planning to get training.
here it is:
Quality video,may have to keep that one quiet though!
Thanks fellas,lots of food for thought.Not looking great is it ? 
My girlfiend cant come back to the UK as she has two young kids from a previous and an ex who has them every other weekend.
This is so frustrating, the only thing im trained to do and its basically not worth a toss in a country i want to live in,with someone i want to spend my life with.Then if i actually manage to get one,i’ll never be at home, on crap money
Maybe i should take up being a taxi driver over there, as everytime ive jumped in a cab whilst on vacation,the drivers always been a bloody foreigner!
whl1961:
Quality video,may have to keep that one quiet though!
Thanks fellas,lots of food for thought.Not looking great is it ?
This is so frustrating, the only thing im trained to do and its basically not worth a toss in a country i want to live in,with someone i want to spend my life with.Then if i actually manage to get one,i’ll never be at home, on crap money
Maybe i should take up being a taxi driver over there, as everytime ive jumped in a cab whilst on vacation,the drivers always been a bloody foreigner!
More and more truck drivers are also foreigners now too and I don’t mean people from fellow western countries who just fancy a bit of a change and something different. The good old boys are getting few and far between now and all you’re left with are very basic redneck types who accept anything and know no better and then hordes of African Americans who due to their usually incredibly poor socio-economic situation, jump at the chance of free training with a crap company, get tied in to a legal contract to stay for so long and become prisoners effectively, or face being sued and then there’s thousands and thousands of Mexicans, Russians, Africans of various nationalities. Its like Canada, except its worse. If Canadian trucks were allowed to perform cabotage within the US then I think we’d have it just as bad, but as we’re not allowed to do that, we do at least have some sort of trip “there and back” mentality that sees us get home much more often.
Just have a read through this link…thetruckersreport.com/trucki … pany-here/
If you do end up in Arizona, all well and good, just think very hard before going down the road.
As Robinhood said don’t get taken in by these companies "Covenant, ‘USA truck’ and some other big companies will tie you to a contract, Covenant wanted a ridiculous $7k to train me something I have been doing since 1975.
Why has it cost you so much for the green card ? I did use a lawyer to set things up and got charged $750 including the paperwork, when we went for the interview the officer told us we had been ripped off because all we needed to do was get the paperwork ourselves and fill it in, the total charge should have been $450.00 
Do you mean me for the costs? If so from memory it was:
Application $1450
Medical and vaccinations $200
UK police certificate £35
Plus postage (I sent everything certified mail), copying costs, driving for fingerprinting and interview, etc.
We did it all ourselves as well. It’s simple enough a long as you get all the right paperwork and fill it in correctly.
W.
You must have got everything through a non government site, we checked after and the total cost for the forms downloading and the interview was $450, my medical for INS purposes was $75.00.
Nope direct from USCIS. Checks paid direct to them. Only independent thing was the medical.
This was only last year (and based on marriage to a US citizen) - how long ago did you do it? Our neighbor’s mother only paid around $500 but that was 20+ years ago.
Fees list is here - uscis.gov/sites/default/file … g-1055.pdf
We had to file the I130 and I485.
I also have to apply to have it made permanent after 2 years.
W.
Hi All, Mine was back in 07 and when I landed at Cincinnati gave all paperwork to Immigration and 3/4 weeks later my pr ( green card) arrived in the post. Now in 2011 I got my US citizenship. When we was doing all the filing back in the UK all cheques and payments were made out to the USCIS. PilotWolf are you a commercial pilot?
ray
PS…Even before I got my green card I was allowed to work but hey I,m now semi retired.
It was 2001 and just like Flyer, I got a work permit before the green card. My green card expires next year and I will have to renew it, I am told it will cost about $400 for everything.
I did it all whilst here. I should have got the work permit earlier but I slipped up and didn’t realise it want automatically processed with the green card application so only got mine a few weeks before the green card. The initial issue of the green card is now ‘probationary’ for 2 years and then we have to show we re still married for it to become permanent. Then I ll apply for citizenship as without it I can’t get my US coastguard captain’s license and working the deck has come as hardwork!
Yes I have a commercial pilots license for helicopters but not many jobs unless you have an instructor rating or want to work in the middle of nowhere.
W.