As an owner operator would you want a potential employee who shows willing to report one of your drivers for bad practice?
I ghosted a driver to see what the job would entail and I observed the driver:
A vehicle check that consisted of a check of the tyres and wheel nuts. Fine, perhaps I caught him towards the end of his checks.
No seat belt. Okay, I thought it’s a few hundred metres to the loading bay where he is about to reverse the trailer. oh okay, he states he doesn’t wear it.
Okay, now a bag of crisps while he drives with a window open. now an egg sandwich.
Blocking cars on the on-ramp to the motorway. Pulling onto the roundabout like he owns the road. Not really any defensive driving observed and certainly no economical driving.
Now back for the next load and he states between me and you I am not going to strap this one down. Now you can F off!
I ended my unpaid ghosting there and said my goodbyes.
Do I ring the manager and say this guy is a liability? and risk hearsay without getting the job?
Report the company? (bit drastic but the not strapping was dangerous)
Do the nowt to do with me thing and ignorance is bliss (not really an option seeing as I joined this forum just to pose the problem)
By the way, the following day I told the manager I could do the job no problem and he says " leave it with me and I will ask the driver for his opinion" WTF!
It is just possible that the driver was testing you.
He may have been trying to suss out what you think is acceptable and what attitude you would bring to the job. Seen it done before.
your in the wrong profession.
surely a career in highways agency (or whatever they call themselves this week),security gatehouse guard,or just log onto jobseekers and search for self appointed road commander…you should just fit in there nicely.
the only careless thing about eating a piece and egg when driving is dribbling the yolk down your chin…who would want to work for you ffs
dieseldog999:
your in the wrong profession.
surely a career in highways agency (or whatever they call themselves this week),security gatehouse guard,or just log onto jobseekers and search for self appointed road commander…you should just fit in there nicely.
the only careless thing about eating a piece and egg when driving is dribbling the yolk down your chin…who would want to work for you ffs
“A piece and egg”
not heard in a loooooooong time DD!!![emoji28]
dieseldog999:
your in the wrong profession.
surely a career in highways agency (or whatever they call themselves this week),security gatehouse guard,or just log onto jobseekers and search for self appointed road commander…you should just fit in there nicely.
the only careless thing about eating a piece and egg when driving is dribbling the yolk down your chin…who would want to work for you ffs
I would suggest the OP has a great future in H&S,
could have also had a great career as a Troll but posted this in the Owner and Fleet operators forum, instead of the PDF, I think if it was moved there I’d give it, several major spats, drag a few of the better known trolls out of the woodwork to keep things going and probably a few pre mods and and bans for good measure with the thread being locked after 10 pages.
As for the OP’s question, you seem to have a certain level of moral fibre and community spirit so I would suggest you do whatever your conscience tells you to do.
Quite apart that our industry needs no more grasses or company spies, though such applicants would be welcome at places where staff turnover is ironically already high and we already have quite enough electronic spying equipment doing the grassing ta very much, things look an awful lot different from the passenger seat especially to a non commercial driver.
I’m impressed if the regular driver can scoff an egg sarnie without wearing it, a true pro, it can be done but must be on the straight or steering with knees cos two/both hands will be needed to stop the lower slice bending even if you manage a large biteful allowing all that yummy warm yoke hiding in the bacon (of an egg n bacon, the lorry driver’s staple diet)to run off onto yer shirt or worse still embarrassingly close to yer crotch, what a waste, the true pro lorry driver never allows an egg drip, plus the pro will only have Daddies sauce inside said sandwich, you can’t allow a single drop of unsurpassed Daddies to go to waste.
As a (presumably) new driver no one is going to pay much attention to your opinion of another driver. The driver you were “ghosting” must be someone the employer trusts; he is going to be asking for the drivers opinion of you. The experienced driver will be performing economically enough for the owner. On certain junctions I will close the door on cars to prevent them putting themselves into a dangerous situation beside my trailer. Didnt strap a load? What sort of load?? Some loads dont need it, some are dangerous without straps and chains, most are in between. If you do criticise this driver the employer will wonder who you will criticise next? Him? No-one wants an employee (especially a new one) telling them how wrong they are to employ another person and will worry how you will next tell all about how they are doing wrong in their company. Maybe (probably) this driver is not the best, but if you were to get a job there, you wouldnt be obliged to be as bad, after all.
I work with some drivers who I have enormous respect for, and some who look almost like accidents waiting to happen. But even those who are IMHO idiots I wouldnt describe as being actively "dangerous". But then, Im sure some (many) of them have an equally low opinion of my skills and attitude. Ive never yet reported another driver. On certain junctions I will close the door on cars to prevent them putting themselves into a dangerous situation beside my trailer. Would I EVER report anyone?? If I saw a perceived positively dangerous practise I would first speak to the person concerned, maybe there is summat happening that I dont understand, maybe there is a valid reason for what I see as an error. I have taken the keys off one driver once when he was well over the drink limit and talking about driving off. Didnt see the need to report that. In extremis I would consider phoning the Police to stop a drunk angry person who had driven away. I wouldnt be happy about doing that, but could never live with myself if any innocents were killed. Complain about a guy eating an eggie sarnie? Nah.
paulypaul:
Whats so wrong about eating with the window open?..
wouldn’t want his crisps to fly out the window, that wouldnt be cost effective
Health n Safety, mate.
Especially this time of year: the salt used on the roads could become airborne and be ingested with the sandwich. This would give a serious risk of raised blood pressure to the driver. And there`s enough high blood pressure evident on this site already.
