Paschall Truck Lines
Terminated for keeping cool!

When I first started working for PTL, I was getting the miles and no one was complaining. Then about two weeks for working for the company they asked me to make a trip to New Jersey. I explained that I had signed a paper stating that I would not go into New Jersey or Northeast. I had done this at orientation.

At this time I had been switched to a new fleet manager and she contacted the Ops director for me to talk to. He was rude and stated that I was a company driver and I was unable to pass down a load. When I firmly stated to him that I had signed a paper in orientation, he hung up on me. Before he hung up he talked down to me about my idling. He told me I didn't care about the company and that I liked to waste company money. I informed him I did care, but with the tempatures rising, I had to stay cool in order to not become fatigued. Later after he hung up, he contacted me on the qualcomm to tell me to just watch my idling.

What this company was asking me to do was sit in my cab of my truck with no air conditioning (my truck did not have an APU), they suggesteed to roll down my windows. I do not believe in rolling down my windows, because of all the lot lizards and drug pushers at all the truck stops. I feared that if my windows were down I would get robbed. So I was expected to sit in my cab with no air. I chose not to do so.

I however did one weekend when stuck waiting for a load, bought idle air. It cost me $55 for the weekend, and then if I chose to use it again it would cost me $26 for ten hours. (The company does not reimburse this) The problem with using it is the fact that PTL would route me away from truck stops with idle air, so what was I supposed to do? Not only for the fact that it is expensive with no compensation, but I was not gettiing to the truck stops that had it. So I idled.

Again I was harrased by the company fleet manager for idling my truck, I was threatened with retraining if I did not get it down. This happened for about two to three weeks.

Then without a retrain I was told that I was heading to Murray to be terminated. I recently passed a DOT inspection with flying colors and was supposed to recieve $30-$35 as a bonus for doing so. I never recieved that money and now I was being terminated for idling.

I think it is pretty sad that a company thinks that they are saving money by firing good drivers because they need to be comfortable and in turn hiring new drivers that could possibly do the same thing. When I was leaving the company, I noticed about 100 NEW trucks with APU's on them just sitting. What would it have taken to just put me in one of those trucks instead of terminating me?

Company: Paschall Truck Lines
Country: USA
State: Kentucky
City: Murray
Address: 3443 U. S. Highway 641 S
Phone: 2707531717

  <     >