Blackballed!

Hi all,

Have you every heard of someone being "Blackballed"? Do you know what that term means? I didn't, but I have been using the term to describe something I have been finding in our industry during this job search. I had also been exposed to something similar earlier in my career.

According to Wikapedia, Blackballing describes a voting procedure that was common in Gentleman Clubs of the Victorian Age. It was a procedure used to vote in a new member. It only took one black ball in the ballot box to exclude the initiate. If you sponsored that initiate and they were blackballed, you would then suffer the same fate as the blackballed person. In this procedure fairness and explanations played no part, if you pissed one person off you could be blackballed.

In our industry (trucking) I have found there are two entities who are likely to "cast" you the black ball if you are trying to get a new job. The first is the Safety Dept. of your previous job and the second is (and the most likely) the Insurance Company of the job you want.

If you have been fired from your previous company for anything safety related you will be blackballed from many companies, period. The period of blackballing will last from 3 months to 5 years. And, it doesn't matter what your CSA score is or how much experience you have. With some companies just being fired for any reason is enough to get you blackballed.

I believe, though I can't prove it, I was blackballed from flatbed companies after I had gotten hurt while working for flatbed company in California. After that job, I could not get hired on with a flatbed company for a period of seven years and I am one of those fools who actually like "throwing rags". I began to get suspicious when one employer was all hot to hire me, then after the DAC was pulled, they wouldn't even answer the phone when I called. I pulled my own DAC and saw absolutely NO bad information on my "Consumer Report". After being turned down by a few more flatbed companies for no good reason, I gave up and went to work for JB Hunt for 6 months,(6 months too long).

There is another thing that can get you blackballed, take six months off of work and your blackballed from many companies.

I understand the companies have a great deal to lose if they hire the wrong guy, but when someone such as myself with 20+ years of experience, a clean MVR (Motor Vehicle Record) and a great CSA score knocks on your door at lest take the time to find out what happened and judge it in light of the aforementioned data not the data that some statistical genius in an ivory tower somewhere that's never even seen the inside of a truck has come up with.

Here is one of the things that is really wrong with this system. Dispatchers and Safety Directors know how this system works better than the average driver and will sometimes use the system to "burn" a driver they didn't like. It can be very time consuming and expensive to correct false data on your DAC, (the main tool used for blackballing) and the companies have little to fear in the form of reprisals if they get caught doing it.

Bottom line is, if you like driving truck for a living always be professional and realize it only takes one slip up to get blackballed.

Keep the rubber side down. God bless

Please comment, especially if you have ever been blackballed.

Leslie R Auger has driven truck for more than 20 years. He has written a book for the want-to-be truck driver called, "So, You Want to Be A Truck Driver", You can get it here by clicking on the title or visit his website at So, You Want To Be A Truck Driver? | Wix.com

Job Hunting

If your anything like me, you hate looking for a new job.

In today's truck driving industry it has become a bit simpler to search for work, as you don't have to travel around and log a bunch miles on your personal vehicle to put in apps. Now-a-days, you can just hop onto the internet and within a few hours have a hundred or more truck lines to check out.

With my experience, I also got about ten to fifteen phone calls from recruiters, but that might not be the norm, I don't know.

At any rate, thought I would write about one of the pitfalls I have been able to spot as I have been going through this process.

As I wrote in "So, You Want To Be A Truck Driver" our industry is filled with dishonesty and that is especially true when searching for work. Remember a recruiters job is to fill driver seats, the bigger the company the more likely they are to waste your time since you are just a number to them. If you are experienced with three or more years of driving and have a clean MVR (Motor Vehicle Record) and a 0.0 CSA (Compliance, Safety, Accountability) score the recruiters will work harder at trying to sign you up for orientation.

One way I have tried to cut through all the nonsense has been to seek driver comments on any company that I am interested in. I have been able to find driver reviews at several web locations; Rip-off reports   Indeed.com   Glassdoor.com  just to name a few. But, there are problems with relying on these reviews, especially if you only read the first one you come to. Often the first review you see is written by an angry disgruntled ex-employee who is not above lying about the company he/she just left, so read several, if they are all saying the similar things then stay away from that company.

You also should be aware that some company recruiters will check out these driver reviews and post good reviews that appear to be coming from a driver. So read as many reports as you can and watch for similarities in both kinds of reports, good and bad, only the most experienced writers can hide their style.

Shouldn't need to be said, but, you can pretty much discount any report written by someone who doesn't know how to write, or tell the whole story. If you are not an experienced driver the whole story will be much harder to spot, but if the writer doesn't confess to some wrong doing on his or her part then they "ain't" telling all since we are all human and there is always blame enough to go around when there is a problem. Here is a good example of what I mean: Boyd Bros.Review

One more thing you might want to check out is the companys safety rating which you can get for free here. They use our safety ratings to determine if they want to hire us so let's turn the tables on them and use their safety data to determine if we want to work for them.

One last thing, you should know what you want in a job. How much home time do you want, is insurance important and how much are you willing to pay for it, and of course how much do you want to get paid as well as how many miles do you want to run weekly? These are important questions to answer before checking out any company, but don't buy their answer until you check them out or until they are willing to put it in writing.

Well, I am scheduled to start orientation with a company on Jan 6th 2014, but still have my ear to the ground.

Keep the rubber side down.