Now, after discovering this website and reading all the posts, I felt I had to contribute my recently being fired by Gordon Trucking into this post. I've driven 19 years and have owned two trucks of my own and I think I have a fairly good grasp of what is to be expected and what's not. It is correct that GTI, like other companies "sensationalize" their status in the trucking industry, as all companies do, but I've never worked for a company that "required" you to wash their equipment and then charge you $20.00 to add insult to injury! I never entered a single tractor that had not smelled like an ash tray, or like what has been posted by others, that took large amounts of cleaning supplies to render the equipment "safe" and "acceptable" by health code standards. Not only is their lack of concern for the driver's well being apparent there, but the driver's lounge, in the summer of 2011 had air-conditioning issues to the point that drivers that were forced to sleep there, because maintenance had their trucks and no one would authorize a motel, filed a complaint with the local health department and a thorough inspection of the premises ensued, resulting in a substantial fine. Now I can tolerate a lot. I've seen some pretty deplorable conditions in this industry, but being allowed to be verbally assaulted for doing my required duties and fearing the situation was going to get physical, and taking action to protect myself and getting fired for it is too much. I was dropping a load of beer at a customer in Renton, WA. On 4/23 and set up to back in between an empty GTI trailer that I was about to swap for, and a TP Trucking driver being live unloaded. I stopped at the point of my trailer was even with his cab, got out, and proceeded to move the wooden blocks you often find that customers make to keep your landing gear from destroying their asphalt, under the TP Trucking trailer, so as not to crush the blocks during my backing. The driver dove out of his truck into my path, calling me a "fat s.O.B." more times than I could count and proceeded to sling the blocks from under his trailer to the empty trailer on the other side of me. I followed him, try to politely explain that the blocks were about to be placed under my landing gear and there was no needor hostilities, but my efforts to recieve understanding went ignored resulting in his turning in my face and screaming "f-you, you fat s.O.B.". He turned to enter his truck and I thought he might be escalating the confrontation, so I grabbed him from behind, and throwed him to the ground and shook my finger in his face and said " I've had enough... I'm not taking anymore of your crappy"! Because he suffered a broken finger, I'm now facing a 4th degree assault charge and I got fired for ending an unprovoked threat. Gordon, like other corporate entities looks at drivers as "lower forms of intelligence", not worthy of the most basic of human respect... And why not? We put up with their veal. They watch as we take our fustrations out on each other, as if it were the drivers who are really at fault for our deplorable working conditions, when in fact, it's operations, management, and ultimately the owners who are responsible for all of these bad practices. Without us, they are nothing more than sanctimonious socialites who put themselves on pedestals so high, that only God breathes air as thin as they do. What will it take to rebel against such treatment? I myself am using the opportunity to try and go to college and seperate myself from my nobel efforts to support a cheating second wife, with an 8th grade education, and an infant child that I HAD 19 years ago, to become someone who is actually considered an important part of a business that I can proudly call "My Career"! I hope I'll have many more to follow in my path.
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