truck driver

driver

dispatcher

owner operator driver

mover

Gardewine

A typical day at work is pickup and delivery. You organize your freight, run your assigned route, complete deliveries and pickups, deal with customers, handle scanning and paperwork, and return to the terminal.

I learned more about local freight, time management, customer service, and working under pressure. The job itself is straightforward, and there are good people within the company.

My main issue is with management at the terminal level. There does not seem to be much value placed on work-life balance. Vacation requests are difficult to get approved, especially if you are lower on seniority, and the focus seems to be mostly on pushing productivity and long days. Being made to feel like you are “bottom of the barrel” because of seniority is frustrating and affects morale.

The workplace culture depends heavily on the terminal. The company itself may be fine, but the terminal I worked at had a culture that felt more focused on output than on respecting drivers as people.

The hardest part of the job is not the freight or the driving. It is the pressure to keep pushing long days and the lack of support when trying to maintain a reasonable work-life balance.

The most enjoyable part of the job is being on the road, working independently, meeting customers, and getting the route completed. The actual driving and delivery work can be satisfying when the day is organized properly.

There is a long of good and bad in this job.
It's a 12 hour shifts, paid hourly in town or by load in out of town (not worth it, almost 100$ difference, so work in town only).

The job itself is straight forward - inspect the truck and trailer, driver to loading site, untarp, load, tarp, drive to unloading site, scale and unload (either through a dumper or moving floor). You can use either a straight trailer or super be.

The good? - no micromanagement, 24/7 job and unless something went wrong you'll barley communicate with the management.
* Another point is the salary - pretty good for industry standards and O/T after 9 hours.
There is a sign in bonus as well, which is spread over 2 years.
*Benefits after 3 months (dental after one year)
*Profit sharing every year.

The bad? Outdated truck, but even worse:
* The trucks are NOT fitted for this type of job! They need to get heavy spec trucks!
Trucks are constantly breaks down, and if you start at 4 AM or during the weekend - good luck getting a hold of management.
* They need more trailers to accommodate the amount of drivers they hire. If your trailer breaks down - you won't be working that day.
* They need more trailers with tag axle to account for the VERY heavy weights you haul (minimum 4 axles).
* No dispatch after 6 PM or during the weekend - while micromanagement is a good thing - a management is still needed!

Overall - good income, slow paced, but really feel outdated and breakdown happens literally all the time

Pros:
Company itself is good to work for
Pay is not bad depending on the department you work in
Staff are overall friendly and helpful 
You do get bonuses 
Opportunities are there to advance your career
Being in billing department - you get to learn more about different departments and duties 
Cons:
Working in billing - hours are mostly afternoons/evenings (forget about having a work balance life!)
Constantly short staffed and staffing issues (meaning overtime and could there past midnight or later)
Workload can get changed without notice and can be doing multiple tasks that is meant for two people 
Being sent to different departments as relief staff without notice, no formal training to make sure you are comfortable to complete the tasks; if you have to help others to learn 
Hours can change without notice 
Training and verbal/written instructions given to do tasks, at times, are not properly explained and you will get reprimanded - even though you were not  made aware
Management does not fully understand the tasks that each staff member does (The staff have to write out everything they do each and everyday)
Sometimes the supervisors do not take concerns seriously
Lack of appreciation and support 
Being written up for very errors minor and, at times, atre not valid

My experience with Gardewine was terrible. The management would ask me to make lies on my log book and to lie to customers. They made false promises to me that were never followed threw. People who have status in the company would walk around wearing shirts that promoted organized crime, mainly "support hells angels" clothing. They do not provide correct training involving safety and employees rights. I love trucks and i love heavy duty equipment, but this company left a very bad taste in my mouth! I feel sorry for the people involved in this organization who are decent people but just not aware of the hornets nest of corruption and illegal activities that are common with a very alarming percentage of the employees that they have. 
 DO NOT WORK HERE! Unless you absolutely have too, i would avoid this place if I were you. When i worked at Gardewine, i never met a single other employee who took pride in the organization and with their possition. People here feel trapped. Do not waste precious years of your life in this place, they will use you and leave you out to dry.

Was only employed there one month...bottom line they fired me for going to my mothers funeral in Ontario. She died on a Wednesday I called work on Thursday and said what had happened and had to go to Ontario and got there Friday to set things up...and it was a long weekend and we couldn't have the funeral until Tuesday and interment on Wednesday....I got back on Friday to find out I was no longer employed there. I had mentioned the situation to my employer before she died of her ailment and possible death and I was told no problem not to worry they had made arrangements for things of that nature for their employees and to take as much time as needed...ya right !!! When I got back and found out their decision...I chalked it up as experience but was told I should have gone to Human Rights about it....maybe...but who wants to work for someone like that or even fight for your job back to work for people like this....uh uh..no way Jose...loads of other employers and work available to worry about people like this......another chalk it up as experience.. I won't forget it either !!!

As soon as you walk through the office, they expect you to know everything right away. There are more than a thousand bills in the system and the supervisors expect so much from you in just a week! Don't even get me started with the assistant supervisor, as the person clearly shows favoritism & has a sour attitude that makes you feel awful about yourself. Sometimes during extremely busy days, the supervisors sometimes make you skip your lunch breaks & stay for overtime barely taking a break. The supervisors themselves should be the one's to stay for overtime and help their employees but sadly they don't care about you until the next day all you get is a thank you or treats. Supervisors, assistant supervisor and their admins are close to each other so don't bother and try to be close with them, it won't work for they will always treat you unfairly regardless. You can only get along with the employees because they are helpful, respectful, and patient when you're in need of help. Overall, the work load is not too bad once you've been here for 3 months, however the supervisors are the issue in most cases when working as a billing clerk. 

•It is grossly under staffed and over worked
•Operations runs dangerously and ineffectively leading to many problems 
•Nepotism and favouritism runs rampant, especially in the executive team.  If you aren’t either a relative or a socially connected friend, you do not stand any chance of career satisfaction or job security. 
•Daily amount of HIGH risks created from poor decisions 
•The culture is in the toilet/a lot of unsatisfied employees in all areas of the company. It is quite sad
•The turnover rate is embarrassing due to many unfavourable working conditions (cannot share this)
•Driver services needs an audit in all areas (very important)
•Secret agreements and unfair arrangements everywhere allowing certain long term low level staff more privileges and freedoms than some high level managers. These low level staff engage in harmful gossip with some executive staff which commonly leads to people feeling forced to quit or be let go unfairly. Too many good people let go.  There are so many other options than there, please be very careful. 

I worked in the Flat Deck division doing long haul delivery. The trucks were newer and fairly well maintained. The dispatchers were good and would schedule around your desired work/life balance. I would have stayed with this company because I was very impressed with how well run they were. However, after putting in lots of hours and dealing with the requirements of the job I was disappointed in my take home pay as a operator. If I had an extra $800 every two weeks (putting in 120-140 hours on average every two weeks) they would have had a driver for a long time. However the work just didn't pay... This company could save a ton of money on training/hiring by simply increasing driver retention. Actually all companies could in this industry...

A typical day at work feels chaotic and unproductive. The foreman spends most of his time running around cleaning instead of properly supervising or training his apprentice. There’s little to no effort put into developing skills or helping workers improve. Instead, if you make even a small mistake, he takes pictures and adds them to your file, almost like he’s building a case against you rather than helping you learn. Because of this, there are barely any real learning opportunities on the job. On top of that, the foreman himself doesn’t seem very knowledgeable, which makes it even harder to grow or get proper guidance. Management only shows up about once a month, so they don’t see how bad things actually are. The overall work culture is negative, stressful, and unsupportive, and it’s clear why licensed workers don’t stay on the day shift for long.

Management is mostly individuals that have been grandfathered into their positions due to many years staying with the company. Management has very little care or respect for staff; Do not acknowledge positive work or success, only dwell on mistakes, regardless of how far and few between. Staff are often very unhappy and grouchy, due to poor treatment from management. Work environment in the offices is very "divided", as salary staff look down on hourly staff. Time is not respected, an individuals strengths in one area do not outweigh or even get recognized if weak in another. Overtime is constantly expected, often would clock nearly 100hours every pay period. Training is insufficient, and staff are blamed when they do not know how to do something...despite never being shown how to do it. Overall, a very terrible work environment.

Top Job Titles	Average salary
Truck driver 35 salaries reported	$22.58 per hour
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Dispatcher 12 salaries reported	$52,083 per year
Owner operator driver 11 salaries reported	$162,766 per year
Mover 1 salary reported	$19.00 per hour

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