My husband and I did read the reports about Prime on this website before we hired on with them. We thought that every company has un-happy employees and that we would give them a chance. Bad mistake! First of all, they wanted us in a brandnew truck, which we did not want. Finally after a lot of arguing with leasing we did get a truck that had 13 months left on the lease for "only" $722 a week plus an extra $55 a week for the APU. Going thru orientation we quickly found out that recruiting did a real good job avoiding telling us the truth about the real costs of leasing a truck from Prime.
On top of the lease payment, they charged an xtra $15 for getting a paystatement, $0.92 for every time the pre-pass went off, anywhere between $0.03 to $0.01 per mile for over mileage, $. 045 for every mile for a "lease fee", $. 015 per mile for tires, and all of the mileage based fees are for EVERY mile, loaded or empty. Then we found out very quickly that their trucks get probably the worst fuel mileage we had ever seen.
We had a 2006 Freightliner Super Century and even bobtail we would only get about 7.5 mpg at 60-63 mph. Our dispatcher would deadhead us on average about 200-250 miles to the next load, because for some unknown reason there was never any freight where we were. Or they would send us on a treasure hunt for an empty trailer, of course on our dime.
As far as detention pay or lay-over, yes we were told we would get that, but we never saw a penny on either. Even though we paid into a tire fund we had to fight and argue to get new tires on the truck when the old tires were down to 3/32", which is only 1/32" from being illegal.
Finally, after 4 months making about the same money as we would have driving for Swift as a company team, we turned our truck in to the yard in Springfield. Turning in the truck was the first thing that went smoothly with Prime! But that might have been because we turned it in on the weeken.
If you are out there to make money, I would advise you to stay as far away from Prime as you can. They say, they have a fuel surcharge guarantee, which is true, but if you look at the numbers, every time their fuel surcharge guarantee goes up, their line haul rate goes down twice as much. Also, the money, when and if you make any, might look good when you get it, but remember that you have to pay your own taxes out of it. We are now driving as company drivers and would never go back to Prime.
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