TransAm Trucking BEWARE OF LEASE PURCHASE OLATHE Kansas
I have been a lease purchase operator for about 4 months now with TransAm.
The plan itself is one of the top ones out there I believe,but they will not help you when you have a problem.
They leased me a piece of crap truck. A lemon if you will. The first day after I left orientation with my truck it broke down. I put it in the shop the following week and yes since I just started out they did differ my first truck payment. Ok 2 days after I got it out of the shop it started acting up again. The check engine light came on and because it didn't affect the performance of truck I let it go for 2 months because after my rough start I needed to make some money. I spoke with the leasing dept. about getting a different truck and they said I could but they would prefer if I kept it because they didn't want me to trade one problem for another. I said ok fine I'll keep it and maybe the bugs just need to be worked out of it. The truck is an '08 it had 96000 miles on it when I leased it.
Anyway I got tired of seeing the check engine light staying on and I had built up my maintanence account so decided I would put it in the shop again. Well i came off my hometime and had a load going to Cheyenne. I figured ok cool I can drop it on the yd in Olathe that way I can get a loaner truck they always said I could get. And also I would at least have some miles for the wk. The ld had 2 extra days on it so there was no rush to get it to Cheyenne. I picked it up Monday it didn't deliver til Friday. Long story short they wouldn't let me drop it on the yd and they didnt even have a loaner truck. So I went in the hole that wk. I arrived in Cheyenne wednesday afternoon put truck in shop and didnt get it out til Saturday morning.This is just one example. In the three and a half months I been with TA my truck has been in the shop 6 times.
You are an owner operator of sorts but yet you have to go thru them everytime you need something done on your truck. Even oil changes they have to approve before it's done. But then when you need help it's not there.
I was runnin good for the first 2 months. I take every load they give me and my miles were great. After 2 months things started going down hill. I now have to fight like hell for miles. I'm not doing anything different. You can say its slow time of yr. Maybe but I dont believe thats the only thing.
They are a student geared company. I am an experienced driver with 10 yrs on the rd. Clean MVR and all that. But it doesn't matter to them. They treat experienced drivers like students. I don't have anything against students everybody has to make a start somewhere. But to treat an experienced driver like a student is just not right. If you're not in a "click" with somebody in the office you will not get any respect.
Before you sign a lease with TransAm do your homework. Talk to as many drivers as you can. There will be alot that tell you the same things I have and there will be some that are very happy. I was one of the happy ones for the first 2 months but not anymore.
I beleive there is potential to make a good living here but you have to go thru alot of BS to get there
Countrycool
eastern, North Carolina
U.S.A.
2 Updates & Rebuttals
Anthony
Rossville,Georgia,
U.S.A.
There's A Lesson To Be Learned Here...
#3Consumer Comment
Sat, November 15, 2008
...and that is the simple fact that there is absolutely no truck leasing plan through a motor carrier that will be of any benefit the driver.
Every plan out there is designed to transfer the costs of operating the truck they drive onto the shoulder of the driver, to bypass the paying of certain taxes and benefits on behalf of the driver, and to boost the profits of the company. It's and absolute win/win situation for the company, and a losing proposition for the driver...every time.
I don't care who you are, or how dedicated you are to the cause of making money. If you were to run two years for a company, one paid as a company driver with all the benefits, and then the other as a lease/operator, and run the exact same mileage for each year, when you tally up the end results, you will be thousands of dollars ahead as a company driver.
TransAm is not a company that generates a great many complaints, but I like to do a little digging on companies from time to time, just to stay on top of things. I went to their website, and was disturbed by a simple, but telling issue I found on it.
You can't click on any information related to their leasing program. They have disabled all links to obtain further information about their program. You can click on the link to be taken to the online application area, which is not a secure page by the way, so I would not advise anyone to apply to them via their website, because your personal information could be easily intercepted by practically anyone with access to servers that transmit the application.
Perusing the information as to how they compensate experienced and inexperienced drivers, their pay is mediocre and their benefits are worded to allow me to believe that the offerings are below average as well.
In short, I see nothing that would make me pick up the phone to want to work for them in any capacity, but...there are most certainly worse companies to work for, or maybe not. I found a couple of recent complaints filed online elsewhere.
For instance, one report filed in February of this year stated;
"Their lease program is a scam. They will tell you that as a lease driver you will earn $12,000 more than a company driver. They also have brand new Kenworth T660's that they will entice new drivers into entering into the leasing program instead of driving a company truck, that often will have over 300,000 miles on it.
It will cost $847 a week for the truck plus fuel (about $1,400). Lease drivers earn .084 a mile. They say the rule of thumb is that the first 2,000 miles you run will be for your truck and fuel, and every thing over that will be in your pocket.
My problem with TransAm was that for the 8 months I worked for them I was averaging about 2400 miles, so if you do the math that is $336 a week take home after TransAm gets their money and leaves you what is left. I had many weeks where I just made 2,000 miles and got less that $100 pay for the week."
Another from just this past September stated;
"My hubby is leasing from them. Everything went fine until he broke down. Don't listen to what TransAm tells you about how you will make more money leasing, and how the breakdowns are covered by the warranty.
They took my husband's whole paycheck this last week and now say he that he still owes them $35.00. Plus, while he was broke down they turned off his fuel card, his pilot card, and his pay card. The considered the breakdown his "home time", and he had to pay for the hotels while the truck was being fixed. The garage charged him $486.00 for towing and 364.00 for repairs. One of the repairs was the tow truck driver's own doing - He cut off the drive shaft instead of disconnecting it.
TransAm told the garage to not give my husband the repair receipt, but he saw the above amounts when he signed it. Transam took his entire maintenance account. This was a repair that was supposed to be covered under warranty. Now he's back on the road, broke, no food, and waiting 2 days on another load back to Jacksonville. The breakdown was in Orlando.
And to top this all off, because we have not received any pay in weeks, our phone, internet, and other utilities will be turned off tomorrow so I will have no way of contacting him whatsoever."
Trucking is an unpredictable environment on a good day. When you read testimonials like the above, it illustrates just how bad it can get. Leasing a truck from a motor carrier is nothing short of a dead end proposition, and has been created purposely to transfer risk of profit and loss to the driver, and it gives a company a method to insure that their profit loss is greatly diminished. After all, if they can take all of your hard earned pay, and use it to make truck payments that they are on the hook for while a truck is down, it's money in their pocket. The need to further things along is not quite as dire, if they are not losing money.
The vast reality with any leasing program through any motor carrier, is that for every one hundred drivers that enter into it, 25 will quit within two months. 73 will quit within one year. 2 out of a 100 will make it beyond a year. 45% will endure personal credit problems as a result of having entered into a lease program. 30% will have marital difficulties, lose their homes and/or other personal property due to loan defaults, or will end up filing bankruptcy.
I can't stress it enough. Do not fall into this trap. There is not one leasing program through any motor carrier that is skewed in the driver's favor...period. There is also not one law on the books anywhere in this great land of ours, that states that a trucking company has to be honest with you when they advertise or when they speak with you on the phone. They can lie through their teeth, and on their websites, and many companies will do exactly that.
Your only protection against those lies, are to do the research necessary to insure that you have some idea of what you are walking into when you sign on with any trucking company, in any capacity.
Remember one thing, if you do nothing else. There are good companies out there, but they are hard to find. Why is that? Because they are not constantly advertising for workers. They advertise occasionally, or rarely.
Those that you see advertising in every trucking rag that can be found, or in newspapers every Sunday, are those companies that churn and turn drivers like water.
Take what I say with a grain of salt, but in my humble opinion, I give anyone who applies for this company, a 50/50 chance of being content for any length of time, if they do so as a company driver. If they do so and are lured to enter into the leasing program, I give them a 2% chance of making it very long with them at all.
Anthony
Rossville,Georgia,
U.S.A.
There's A Lesson To Be Learned Here...
#3Consumer Comment
Sat, November 15, 2008
...and that is the simple fact that there is absolutely no truck leasing plan through a motor carrier that will be of any benefit the driver.
Every plan out there is designed to transfer the costs of operating the truck they drive onto the shoulder of the driver, to bypass the paying of certain taxes and benefits on behalf of the driver, and to boost the profits of the company. It's and absolute win/win situation for the company, and a losing proposition for the driver...every time.
I don't care who you are, or how dedicated you are to the cause of making money. If you were to run two years for a company, one paid as a company driver with all the benefits, and then the other as a lease/operator, and run the exact same mileage for each year, when you tally up the end results, you will be thousands of dollars ahead as a company driver.
TransAm is not a company that generates a great many complaints, but I like to do a little digging on companies from time to time, just to stay on top of things. I went to their website, and was disturbed by a simple, but telling issue I found on it.
You can't click on any information related to their leasing program. They have disabled all links to obtain further information about their program. You can click on the link to be taken to the online application area, which is not a secure page by the way, so I would not advise anyone to apply to them via their website, because your personal information could be easily intercepted by practically anyone with access to servers that transmit the application.
Perusing the information as to how they compensate experienced and inexperienced drivers, their pay is mediocre and their benefits are worded to allow me to believe that the offerings are below average as well.
In short, I see nothing that would make me pick up the phone to want to work for them in any capacity, but...there are most certainly worse companies to work for, or maybe not. I found a couple of recent complaints filed online elsewhere.
For instance, one report filed in February of this year stated;
"Their lease program is a scam. They will tell you that as a lease driver you will earn $12,000 more than a company driver. They also have brand new Kenworth T660's that they will entice new drivers into entering into the leasing program instead of driving a company truck, that often will have over 300,000 miles on it.
It will cost $847 a week for the truck plus fuel (about $1,400). Lease drivers earn .084 a mile. They say the rule of thumb is that the first 2,000 miles you run will be for your truck and fuel, and every thing over that will be in your pocket.
My problem with TransAm was that for the 8 months I worked for them I was averaging about 2400 miles, so if you do the math that is $336 a week take home after TransAm gets their money and leaves you what is left. I had many weeks where I just made 2,000 miles and got less that $100 pay for the week."
Another from just this past September stated;
"My hubby is leasing from them. Everything went fine until he broke down. Don't listen to what TransAm tells you about how you will make more money leasing, and how the breakdowns are covered by the warranty.
They took my husband's whole paycheck this last week and now say he that he still owes them $35.00. Plus, while he was broke down they turned off his fuel card, his pilot card, and his pay card. The considered the breakdown his "home time", and he had to pay for the hotels while the truck was being fixed. The garage charged him $486.00 for towing and 364.00 for repairs. One of the repairs was the tow truck driver's own doing - He cut off the drive shaft instead of disconnecting it.
TransAm told the garage to not give my husband the repair receipt, but he saw the above amounts when he signed it. Transam took his entire maintenance account. This was a repair that was supposed to be covered under warranty. Now he's back on the road, broke, no food, and waiting 2 days on another load back to Jacksonville. The breakdown was in Orlando.
And to top this all off, because we have not received any pay in weeks, our phone, internet, and other utilities will be turned off tomorrow so I will have no way of contacting him whatsoever."
Trucking is an unpredictable environment on a good day. When you read testimonials like the above, it illustrates just how bad it can get. Leasing a truck from a motor carrier is nothing short of a dead end proposition, and has been created purposely to transfer risk of profit and loss to the driver, and it gives a company a method to insure that their profit loss is greatly diminished. After all, if they can take all of your hard earned pay, and use it to make truck payments that they are on the hook for while a truck is down, it's money in their pocket. The need to further things along is not quite as dire, if they are not losing money.
The vast reality with any leasing program through any motor carrier, is that for every one hundred drivers that enter into it, 25 will quit within two months. 73 will quit within one year. 2 out of a 100 will make it beyond a year. 45% will endure personal credit problems as a result of having entered into a lease program. 30% will have marital difficulties, lose their homes and/or other personal property due to loan defaults, or will end up filing bankruptcy.
I can't stress it enough. Do not fall into this trap. There is not one leasing program through any motor carrier that is skewed in the driver's favor...period. There is also not one law on the books anywhere in this great land of ours, that states that a trucking company has to be honest with you when they advertise or when they speak with you on the phone. They can lie through their teeth, and on their websites, and many companies will do exactly that.
Your only protection against those lies, are to do the research necessary to insure that you have some idea of what you are walking into when you sign on with any trucking company, in any capacity.
Remember one thing, if you do nothing else. There are good companies out there, but they are hard to find. Why is that? Because they are not constantly advertising for workers. They advertise occasionally, or rarely.
Those that you see advertising in every trucking rag that can be found, or in newspapers every Sunday, are those companies that churn and turn drivers like water.
Take what I say with a grain of salt, but in my humble opinion, I give anyone who applies for this company, a 50/50 chance of being content for any length of time, if they do so as a company driver. If they do so and are lured to enter into the leasing program, I give them a 2% chance of making it very long with them at all.