March 15, 2023
This week on the Oakley Podcast, host Jeremy Kellett sits down with some of the ladies of the safety department. Vivian Boudreaux, Amanda Hadfield, Ashley Rabun, and Allison Sledge join the show to talk all things safety. The discussion includes DOT compliance, driver physicals, trailer inspections, Hazmat and TWIC reminders, maintenance reports, and more.
Key topics in today’s conversation include:
- Oakley Update: Discount updates for truck stops and good customer feedback (1:34)
- Background on Vivian, Amanda, Ashley, and Allison (4:02)
- Ensuring we are DOT compliant (8:36)
- Why safety comes calling? (15:23)
- Locked and unlocked status (19:59)
- Hazmat and TWIC reminders (22:30)
- Auditing logs of drivers (29:56)
- CDL requirements and reminders (38:34)
- Incidents and inspections (42:32)
Oakley Trucking is a family-owned and operated trucking company headquartered in North Little Rock, Arkansas. For more information, check out our show website: podcast.bruceoakley.com.
Transcription
Vivian Boudreaux 00:12
All of us have gotten this response. Hi, this is Vivian from Oakley trucking safety department. What did I do now? Yeah.
Jeremy Kellett 00:21
Goes like typically does.
Amanda Hadfield 00:24
Not always true. I will say,
Ashley Rabun 00:27
There are times when I know myself and Allison we call drivers just to say thank you your stuff looks good. We want to recognize the drivers that do their stuff correctly. We like making good phone calls. I don’t like to call a driver and say hey, I noticed this was wrong. And then, you know, get that same responsibility. I like to hear from the safety department. It’s not always a bad phone call.
Jeremy Kellett 00:48
Welcome to the Oakley podcast, trucking, business, and family. This show is brought to you by Oakley Trucking, headquartered in North Little Rock, Arkansas. The purpose of this podcast is to communicate with Oakley owner-operators and their families by giving them up-to-date information concerning Oakley Trucking and the trucking industry. From business advice to safety updates to success stories. Also to give an inside to outside truck drivers that might be interested in joining the Oakley family. Hi, this is Jeremy kellett, director of recruiting here at Oakley trucking and I’m your host for this podcast. This is the Oakley podcast, trucking, business and family and this is episode 145. And in today’s episode, we got a little surprise for you. We are going to talk to the safety department. Now before you turn me off. Because of the safety department. We’ve actually got the ladies from the safety department here. So this is gonna be really interesting. And we’re going to cover a lot of things in this. We got Ashley, Amanda and Vivian here with us and we’re going to talk about, you know what their responsibilities are in the safety department maybe some of the common mistakes they see every day, give you some feedback on things that the owner operators here could change that might help or the safety department and just how important some of this stuff is. I think it’s gonna be great covering a lot of that stuff here in just a minute but first let me give you an Oakley update sponsored by Arrow Truck Sales. Arrow Truck Sales has been in business for over 60 years and a longtime partner of Oakley trucking and the Oakley podcast. Dre visor and Keith Wilson do a great job at putting you in the right truck to fit your needs and our needs here at Oakley. They carry all makes and models to choose from with on site financing through transport funding. So whether you’re a seasoned owner operator or a first time buyer, be sure to contact Keith Wilson at Arrow Truck Sales at 573-216-6047. And tell him you heard it on the Oakley podcast. So the update today, a couple things real quick. One is that I sent everybody an email out a week or two ago . We actually got new pricing from Pilot Flying J truck stops. And they have really stepped up to give us all Oakley owner operators a good discount, and it’s a cost plus where it used to not be locked that was different in different states. So now it’s more of a blanket, they’re kind of stepping up with love and a TA Petro and given us an excellent fuel discount, so make sure you check TransFlo and you look at all the truckstops now because they’re trying to compete quite a bit. It’s actually a little bit lower. In the essay, Arkansas, Kentucky, Mississippi, Oklahoma and Texas have actually got a little bit better deal than the rest of the states. So keep that in mind anyway that the point of it is make sure you check it out. The discounts also had an excuse, I had an email from a customer on one of our owner operators and I just read it here Sean McBay, which is our customer out of Davis wanted to compliment Monica Boykin that she loaded there last week. She was very polite, knew her gauges and seemed like she had been trained on her gauges well, so congratulations, Monica. We appreciate you doing the right thing and representing Oakley well also the last thing this is the see when this comes out. This is the week, maybe two weeks before the Mid America truck show and I know I’ve been talking a lot about that on the podcast, but it’s gonna have a big presence at Louisville, Kentucky, the Mid America truck show and we want everybody to come show up. We’re going to have some podcast recording going on there and it’s gonna be fun and it’s just if you’ve never experienced the Louisville Mid America truck show in Louisville, Kentucky, you need to experience it. You just gotta check it out. It’s a little overwhelming. Check that out. It’s coming up now. Let’s get started with our safety talk. Appreciate you ladies, join me for this your A podcast debut.
Amanda Hadfield 05:02
Thank you for them by Yeah,
Jeremy Kellett 05:03
so I got Vivian Boudreau, Amanda Hadfield and Ashley Raven, here joining me and they all work in the safety department. And we’re going to talk a little bit about their responsibilities. But before we do, I always like to give a little introduction of your sales and how long have you been here and kind of what your what you do, you know, family hobbies, because I always like to include that because it helps get to know you in the beginning of the episode. So we’ll start with Vivian. Vivian. What? Tell us a little bit about yourself.
Vivian Boudreaux 05:35
Well, I’ve been with Oakley for almost over 40 years on and off. So I’ve been here a long time from the very beginning. Family family. I’ve got two sons, one has just graduated and is retiring from the army this year. So I’m really proud of him. And coffee.
Jeremy Kellett 05:56
I remember Yeah, we started. Yeah.
Vivian Boudreaux 05:59
That’s a long time. I know time flies. So he’s getting ready to retire. He’s got his own family and got another adult son here in Conway with special needs and hobbies. We just bought 60 acres a couple of years ago up on Billy Goat Mountain Road. And that’s our hobby, I mean, land taking care of that. Playing on our playground, baby.
Jeremy Kellett 06:23
And we were talking just a second ago. She’d been here a long time. And we were telling her she trained me to do decals. So he was the first decal lady we ever had. And it was a little machine. We had it on a separate desk there behind us. And she showed me how to make unit numbers and VIN numbers that put on the trucks and then you had it we had a few colors I could choose from to put the Like, maybe
Vivian Boudreaux 06:47
nine colors, something like that. Nothing like it is now.
Jeremy Kellett 06:51
Yeah, it was a long time ago. Yeah.
Vivian Boudreaux 06:55
And I was the only one on a different podcast, but I was the only one in the office when I started. Just think about that.
Jeremy Kellett 07:01
Well, yeah. Because I mean, you were there with, I guess being
Vivian Boudreaux 07:05
three of us. Well, Mike Fisher, David Choate, I was the only one in the office in North Little Rock. Wow. Yeah. So we get it now.
Jeremy Kellett 07:14
You’ve hung in there. Yeah. Look at what we’re doing. That’s amazing. Okay, good. Well, how about Amanda, tell us about Amanda,
Amanda Hadfield 07:22
about Amanda. I’ve been here for about a year and a half. I am still working on the incident. But that’s what I originally worked on. Before I moved over to safety. I wanted a little bit more to do and a little bit more upbeat. And I’m enjoying every minute of it. These guys definitely keep you on your toes. Family, family. I’m not married. But I’ve been with my boyfriend for about a year. I have my dad and my sister and brother in their families. And mom passed away five years ago. But dad is happily with someone now. We accept her. Yeah, whatever. She’s an awesome lady.
Jeremy Kellett 08:00
What do you do on the weekends? Mostly?
Amanda Hadfield 08:02
Well, I don’t have a washer and dryer in my apartment. So I have to take my Washington, boyfriend towels, and he gratefully let me use it every weekend so I can have some clean clothes.
Jeremy Kellett 08:14
Well, that’s it. Hey, if that’s a hobby? A hobby, it’s just gotta do it. Gotta do it. That’s good. That’s good stuff. What about you, Miss Ashley, I know you’re looking forward to doing this.
Ashley Rabun 08:30
Absolutely. So I’ve been with Oakley, this will be my fourth year here. Only Ever been in the safety department. And I love it. I’ve been married to my husband for almost six years. But we don’t have any kids. But I will say this kind of goes into the hobbies, we kind of quit all of our hobbies. Because for the last year and a half, we have been working on trying to get our home open to start the adoption process. Oh, good. And first of February, they gave us the okay that we were open. So now we can follow through and, you know, start that process and hopefully, get a kid in our home good for you. It’s a hard process to do. So hopefully, once we get all that rolling again. And you know, get a child in our home that we can give a home to and love and all that stuff, we can start picking back up on the hobbies. So
Jeremy Kellett 09:18
It’s fantastic that it takes a lot to do that.
Ashley Rabun 09:21
It really does more than I expected. Absolutely.
Jeremy Kellett 09:24
That’s what our listeners need to understand where you girls are just real people to know oh my god last got jobs, good things do. I mean, it’s
Vivian Boudreaux 09:33
and that’s a good point. It’s our job. So when they get upset with us for calling and saying you’re not doing your logs, right or something like that. We’re just doing what we’re told to do. Yeah,
Amanda Hadfield 09:44
so don’t get mad at me for trying to help you. We’d like to do whatever you want.
Jeremy Kellett 09:50
got responsibilities. Well, let’s start with that and talk about being DLT compliant. I mean, that takes a lot of team effort from you guys of course. but it’s also got to take a team effort from the truck driver to, you know, water. I don’t know, what are some of the responsibilities you’re responsible for and concerning DLT compliant, to start with a boat
Vivian Boudreaux 10:17
physicals, med surg twig cards CDL CDL is maintenance on the truck, you know everything on the driver, the truck, the trailer, all of it.
Jeremy Kellett 10:30
So what specifically do you do? Are you responsible for maybe
Vivian Boudreaux 10:36
The biggest thing I do is the drug test, the random drug test, pre employment, and bookkeeping. I’ll do the medcerts, the physical, the part. Ashley, usually, an Allison brings the physical in, you know, make sure it’s correct and everything. And we submit it to the state. Make sure I make sure that the state has updated, you know, put the physical on their driving record, run their driving records annually.
Jeremy Kellett 11:04
Okay, so talking about the physicals, do you get any physicals that are wrong? What’s wrong with him,
Ashley Rabun 11:16
so the court could be more withdrawn, which could in turn delay the drawbar getting updated with the states, therefore making them sit longer than they had originally planned. That’s why it’s kind of important to not wait till the last minute to get it done to make sure that everything is good with your core that the state has you updated correctly, that if you get pulled over by the OE T, they’re not going to find that you’ve been mis updated or anything like that.
Jeremy Kellett 11:43
So when they renew their physical extension into you, you look at it as if you have to be in and then you have to submit it to the state.
Ashley Rabun 11:52
If it’s a state that we can submit it to you, I don’t mind one bit doing that to save drivers a trip to the DMV. But with that being said, not all states update the same way or the same calm. Some states are a little farther behind some sites that will update you in 10 minutes. So the longer you wait to get your physical done to your current expiration date, the more we’re going to recommend that you actually walk into the DMV to get that bait instantly. So
Vivian Boudreaux 12:19
technically, it is the driver’s responsibility, we just do it for them. It’s easy for us, you know, we can just know how to do it. For most states, every state is different, you know, all the drivers have to remember that. But there’s
Jeremy Kellett 12:32
still one walk in state, Missouri, you have to walk in, the driver has to actually take it to the DMV and get it. And it’s got to be certified because right when you submit it to the state, then you run the NVR what day or two later to make sure you says that the certified correct date expiration, that
Vivian Boudreaux 12:57
There are non excepted interstate that are Interstate is their driving type, and that they have the new physical on the driving record. And that’s the other thing. States have 10 days 10 business days legally to update it. So that’s another, you know, you want to get that in before minimum 10 days. Most of them don’t take that long. But that’s their standard. Yeah, that’s for the DoD regulation. They have 10 days 10 business days,
Jeremy Kellett 13:27
yeah, we’ve had had some guys sit around here and wait for it to get
Vivian Boudreaux 13:31
till the day of. And the other thing the driver can do on that card is look at it themselves. It’s real simple, real basic, make sure that they put all the information in that they check that little CDL box and that they’re marked interstate, those are the big things that
Jeremy Kellett 13:47
because that’s what the doctor does. And sometimes they do it wrong.
Ashley Rabun 13:51
So yes, and then something else that kind of falls in line with that is when you go to get a DOT physical, if it’s not someone that you have used every year or every two years to get your physical, you need to make sure that they’re on the FMCSA national registry. If they are not on the registry, then they’re not recognized as
Jeremy Kellett 14:11
we haven’t had any of those.
Ashley Rabun 14:14
Yeah, we had one yesterday, we had to look it up and kind of find out that doctor was no longer on the registry. So this driver had to go back and get everything done, and all that kind of stuff. So that’s another reason.
Jeremy Kellett 14:27
Did the doctor put their registry number on there? Yes, he had expired. Yes.
Ashley Rabun 14:31
So another reason why it might be a good idea to get it in a little early. So we could catch something like that. And it’s there’s several things that can go there. Yeah, there’s always something that can go wrong. This moral
Jeremy Kellett 14:42
The story is to get it done. Don’t wait till the last week to get your physical
Vivian Boudreaux 14:47
unless you want to be sitting. Well, you know, Midnight will set you down. You’re sitting there until
Jeremy Kellett 14:53
the other details. I mean, but that’s part of it. That’s what you got to do for sure. How about Amanda What about you is, what are you responsible for?
Amanda Hadfield 15:03
What am I responsible for? I work a lot with the maintenance reports. And I’ve been also making sure those guys turn in trailer inspection sheets, because a lot of them are not doing that. So whenever they pick up or drop off a trailer, they need to fill one out and send it there. TransFlo. So we can keep up with what’s going on with the true winners.
Jeremy Kellett 15:20
Okay, so they’re every time they draw one
Amanda Hadfield 15:24
pattern, every time they pick one up, they need to fill that out and transform it in.
Jeremy Kellett 15:29
So okay, two different shapes, the one I just dropped, need to fill out, you can even write
Amanda Hadfield 15:33
there, hey, this is one I picked up and this is the one dropped off.
Jeremy Kellett 15:37
Okay. And then they train. That is not, you’re not getting all that.
Amanda Hadfield 15:43
There are some trailers that haven’t been updated in a long time, because I haven’t gone into the workflow and looked at them. And there’s nothing there for
Jeremy Kellett 15:50
is in my watch the main purpose of that the repairs, and
Amanda Hadfield 15:56
It’s not only to keep record of the repairs done on the trailer, but it also helps to avoid being charged for the trailer damage. And it’s getting charged to the correct person. Because if you don’t fill one out, and there’s damage, and you’re the one who drops and pulls out in that shop, chances are they’re going to put your name on it. Yeah.
Jeremy Kellett 16:17
So it’s a great idea to do a walk around and fill it out correctly and send it in that way you we got record no one and when you drop the trailer, it’s in good shape, or here’s what’s wrong with it. I charge you to sound rattled. Sure.
Vivian Boudreaux 16:31
Yep, you go through and do that when you pick it up. And so you’re not responsible for somebody else’s damage?
Jeremy Kellett 16:39
Yeah, we’re talking about calling the drivers or them being mad. What is that? What do you call them about?
Vivian Boudreaux 16:48
Okay, let me just say this real quick. All of us have gotten this response. Hi. This is Vivian from Oakley trucking safety department. What did I do now? Yeah. Oh, oh, no. Every time of course.
Jeremy Kellett 17:04
So because I typically do something wrong. Yeah,
Amanda Hadfield 17:08
I don’t you’re not always true. I would say,
Ashley Rabun 17:10
there. There are times when I know myself and Allison, we call drivers just to say thank you, your stuff looks good. We don’t want everyone to always think that a call from safeties, we want to, you know, recognize the drivers that do their stuff correctly. It helps us you know, right, one last phone call we had to make we liked making good phone calls. I don’t want to call a driver and say, Hey, I noticed this was wrong. And then, you know, get that same responsibility. But I’d like to hear from the safety department. It’s not always a bad phone call.
Jeremy Kellett 17:42
So what about the search? We mentioned maintenance reports. Let’s go with that for a minute. And
Amanda Hadfield 17:47
those phone calls, because I want to call them and say, What did I do wrong on my maintenance report? Like, oh, wait, no, I saw what it is. I’m gonna fix it and send it right back to you.
Jeremy Kellett 17:58
So are you looking at him? I mean, pretty quick, when they send me in wherever they kinda, are they a week or two, or?
Amanda Hadfield 18:07
No, it just depends. So we gotta make sure that they have their truck number on there, that the month is on there, we don’t put an actual day when we fill it out. Because we’re going to call until you take that off. If your mileage is on there, that you’ve checked, okay, on all those boxes. Here’s a description for the brakes, you can write a check daily adjusted as needed. And I know another one we get a lot is with disc brakes. Well, I can’t do anything with those, well, then just say visual check. And then number one, make sure you sign it because if you don’t sign it, that’s another reason why we’re calling it. The receipts are important. So if you also do any repairs on your truck, if you do them yourself, and you just go buy something from Walmart, or Napa or whatever, you still need to turn that receipt in.
Jeremy Kellett 18:55
Just scan anything you did to the truck that whole month.
Amanda Hadfield 18:58
Yeah. For that whole month. Yes, yes. For us to keep up with it.
Jeremy Kellett 19:03
What do I mean, I know DLT requires a monthly maintenance report. But I mean, what are the yoti? Requirements? I mean, just that we have one of those every month on the driver and that we have the receipts to prove it. We all know is it
Rev. Beth Long-Higgins 19:22
to have maintenance to be able to provide that the main maintenance,
Amanda Hadfield 19:29
kind of like the maintenance records.
Vivian Boudreaux 19:31
There is preventive maintenance.
Jeremy Kellett 19:35
So we have to have that. I mean, because, you know, the maintenance report, the monthly maintenance report can come up in a situation when there’s an accident. Yeah. That’s probably one of the things that they look at. When’s the last time brakes had been put on this truck or tire or something like that. So it’s just another way you Have Coburn yourself as a truck driver and as a company having these forms and receipts, hey, you know, I’ve just done this. There’s no way this could have failed, you know, or something failed and hey, I’ve got proof that it did it. Okay. Absolutely. Yeah. So we got to have a receipt. Yep. Because just putting it on there didn’t count. Just putting it on there. Not gonna. Not proof enough. I guess it held but having the receipt? Yes. monthly maintenance reports. Man, we have been talking about that since the day I’ve been here. You’re missing the big thing that we used to talk about? No monthly maintenance reports. Can you believe you haven’t said this yet? When are they due?
Ashley Rabun 20:45
Every month, the first week of
Rev. Beth Long-Higgins 20:48
the month? Yeah, the end of the first pay period is what it says.
Jeremy Kellett 20:52
We’ve always been, I gotta be here the first of the month. And then. And then driver, the dispatcher plays this game until the third tag team.
Amanda Hadfield 21:03
And they’re like, oh, can they just send this in on this pay number? Can you hurry up and unlock them? I’m like, Well, I’m on the phone right now I’ll get that just one second.
Jeremy Kellett 21:11
So a lock of what would tell the listeners what that means. We’ll know what locking and locking means It means they know what locking and unlocking
Ashley Rabun 21:23
it means they can then be dispatched. If you are locked up, you are not getting put on a load, it’s going to hold you up.
Vivian Boudreaux 21:29
We have a database with all the drivers and all their expiration dates for CDLs, physicals, twit cards, whatever it may be monthly maintenance reports. And if that expiration date comes, and they do not have that document turned in, we locked them up, that means they get shut down. They can’t be dispatched. Now drivers pay close attention to this. Your dispatchers know that these dates are coming up. And they can help you remember how they know it’s in TM W in that database. So they have all that information on all their drivers. So that dispatcher and, you know, they can say hey, so and so you know, your physicals coming up? In a couple of weeks, if you’ve gotten it?
Ashley Rabun 22:12
And the dirt list? And the dirt list?
Jeremy Kellett 22:14
Yeah, yeah, that’s, which is what I was getting at, actually is the dirt list, something that’s been in front of them for years and years, but you’re robbing them, you know, the driver has a tendency to think it’s the safety department’s fault. No, right.
Vivian Boudreaux 22:33
Now we have 800 900 drivers that we’re keeping up with. And technically, our job is not to say this is due, it’s to process it. When we get that document, it’s the driver’s responsibility to take care of his stuff. Nobody tells me when my CDL is due or my driver, you know, and then it’s the dispatcher’s job to help them keep up with it.
Jeremy Kellett 22:59
Drivers first responsibility, make sure all your stuff is up to date and not about to expire, then we actually have a report that helps dispatch to say, hey, here’s your guys, and it’s coming up. Just a reminder. And then it gets to it. And then we do the old lock them up.
Vivian Boudreaux 23:18
Now we get it. I mean, you know, I’ve been around a long time and drivers used to drive. That was their job. And now it’s I mean, they have so many documents and that they have to keep up with so we’re here to help you know, if we see, we call them we look at everything we try to look at everything and say hey, you got this coming up. You know, we’re talking to you about your E logs, but hey, your car’s gonna expire. So. So
Jeremy Kellett 23:46
What about hazmat and Twics? Get specific on what gives? You may have issues with that man, what’s the deal with the hazmat and the Twic?
Ashley Rabun 23:59
Actually, so the days don’t always, you know, at the same time, your twic may expire before your hazmat, vice versa. But if you go to reapply, or get your fingerprints or whatnot, for your hazmat for your Twic, make sure you send us a receipt because that’ll help prevent you from being locked up if we have a receipt showing that you have started the process of that weekend. Not necessarily with the hazmat but with the tweaks. We can kind of help you I guess not get locked up for it. I guess I’m not really explaining that right.
Jeremy Kellett 24:39
But you know, I think you’re blank. The hazmat is different from the twig right. And if it is required there’s good debt Allah aisle here on a table is required for every Oakley owner operator to have hazmat and a Twic card. That’s something I think they don’t understand. have tabs, because a lot of times they apply for the hazmat, we’re giving them the benefit of the doubt that if they pay the $86, or whatever it is $89 to do the fingerprints, then they’ll go ahead and complete it. But we’re finding out that not necessarily happens.
Ashley Rabun 25:17
Now. So like, for instance, for the twic card, I had one, I guess it was last week that he had applied for it when he was at least on the week of orientation. And here it is six, eight weeks later, and he still didn’t have it. So I got a hold of him. And I said, Look, you need to call this phone number, figure out what the holdup is, because you should have had it per their standard business, usually four to six, eight weeks, something like that. And if you don’t have it, you need to call and check on it. Come to find out his birth certificate was not legible once it got to the main office to process everything. So we rejected it. So he wants to start the process all over again. So make sure that if you don’t have your stuff within, you know, their standard business timeline, call and check on it.
Jeremy Kellett 26:08
Yeah, if you don’t have results by now and on the you know, the Tweak, I actually did this a couple of weeks ago, as I had an owner operator come in, and he was wanting to renew his tweak. And I actually did it. So I don’t really know, but let’s just do this together. And I did it online there at my desk and you know, he paid for it said it would be shipped to him and it was SIP was I will Oh really, I was thinking they had to go back to the you know, then to the location,
Ashley Rabun 26:56
No. So the way I understand it is like if he already had a current one, and he went into the office and got it the first time that way, the next time he can renew online and it you know, it’s simple, and it’s easy, saves him a trip to the twig office. But next time he goes to renew, he’ll have to go back to the twig office. But those were good, you know, tweaks. They’re usually good for five years. You know, depending on how long ago it’s been since they’ve gotten their initial fingerprint and background check done.
Jeremy Kellett 27:28
Is the hazmat and twig. I mean, is that a major issue with the safety department? We’re trying to? Are you constantly trying to get people to complete the process? Yes, constantly. Yes. What are the keys? Well, I
Ashley Rabun 27:41
I just haven’t made it home yet. Well, you gotta make Tom get home and take care of yourself. We can only do so much to help you in that, you know. And if
Vivian Boudreaux 27:51
They communicate that to their dispatchers, dispatchers can route them along the way. So they’re just not deadheading back and forth. No one can make it work for Oakley and the driver
Jeremy Kellett 28:00
colleague will use I’ll blame the dispatcher so
Vivian Boudreaux 28:03
don’t tell them though.
Jeremy Kellett 28:06
They probably don’t even listen to know I do a good job.
Vivian Boudreaux 28:09
We didn’t Yeah, we have really good ones and we have some ones that we have to stay after.
Jeremy Kellett 28:16
It’s easy with all that responsibility to portal.
Rev. Beth Long-Higgins 28:20
The web average can also get their explorations from the driver portal online
Jeremy Kellett 28:26
like Canada so you’re wondering if Allison’s telling us he can go into you can log into the driver portal and a lot of you guys probably do that to check your settlements but all the explorations are in there all your explorations of everything listed with Oakley is in there so keep up with that. We need to be sending oh my god a reminder or something? Do we not do that? Do we need to send them something like you know, if it’s a physicals coming up then it needs to shoot them a reminder though,
Vivian Boudreaux 29:00
that this is an IT thing where they can kind of automate that Yeah, we actually I think had something like that in the past might have gone to the dispatchers I’m not I don’t remember.
Jeremy Kellett 29:12
Anything we could do to get a callback you get a notification on stuff if you got one hate your physicals come and do more this month or whatever. Just something to help on maybe but yeah,
Vivian Boudreaux 29:23
maybe online. Can you do that? Yeah. Oh,
Jeremy Kellett 29:27
Wait, that’s a big discussion right now.
Vivian Boudreaux 29:31
Would be good. They just take their iPad.
Jeremy Kellett 29:32
You know, I talked to Patrick yesterday, matter of fact, and it wasn’t looking at potluck.
Ashley Rabun 29:38
It guys are busy each with
Jeremy Kellett 29:39
the transport people I think, oh, is where they’re running into issues. Okay, good stuff, man. This is good. Vivian Amanda. Ashley was in the psych department talking about things going on in the safety part? I think it’s good for owner operators and listeners to see how this I mean, you know, you’re not made mean, you’re not?
Ashley Rabun 30:53
No, I mean, look at us.
Vivian Boudreaux 30:57
There’s no way but we can be if we need to be
Jeremy Kellett 31:00
sometimes you. I bet. I bet they’re not.
Jeremy Kellett 31:14
What’s the what about? I know, Roger mentioned that where we used to, we’re all taking logs now that we didn’t used to do. We always do. We did it outside of you know, somebody else did it. And then now,
Vivian Boudreaux 31:30
somebody else gave us reports, you had the ability to report it all in a report. But we’ve always auto checked. Yeah, fuel stops loading and unloading times their hours of service. Yeah, pre pre trip, post trip, just everything.
Jeremy Kellett 31:49
But put a little more. Let’s put a little more work on load for you guys. When you’re doing that, getting rid of the third party is still looking over the report.
Vivian Boudreaux 31:58
Now you’re absolutely yeah, man.
Jeremy Kellett 32:05
We do all three. Y’all do that? Or is everybody does everybody does it. Explain that a little bit.
Vivian Boudreaux 32:10
I’ll just start and let y’all get into the details. Like we said, we just audit them. If we find one thing wrong, if there’s we do have a couple of reports, you know, hours of service. If we have a driver that has a 14 hour violation or something before we call him we’ll check his logs to make sure he’s attaching and detaching shipments, loading and unloading fuel times are correct. pre trip post trip, what else? Anything, any bit better putting notes, anytime you’re on duty, there should be a note as to what you’re doing on duty if they’re using PC, right? Everything. We just tried to cover everything. So when we make that one call, it’s one and done, you know, and we’re not ever, you know, all of us calling them at a different time, different little aspects of their logs, but when we do we try to check everything to keep it legal. And try
Amanda Hadfield 33:02
to cover it all in one phone. Everything. Yeah.
Jeremy Kellett 33:07
So it’s I mean, you’re doing all 850 separating them out, and it just takes you how long to get through one person. You’re looking at what
Ashley Rabun 33:21
on how their log looks. Honestly, you know, if how many things we might see that is wrong, and
Jeremy Kellett 33:30
you’re looking at a weak slog.
Ashley Rabun 33:32
But roughly I would me personally, I go back about two weeks,
Amanda Hadfield 33:36
because that just with the fuel report is I go back to the very first time they got that fuel all the way to person day. Okay, if they do have a violation there, then we’re going to look really hard at what’s going on.
Jeremy Kellett 33:48
So it takes you what, five minutes, 10 minutes?
Amanda Hadfield 33:53
I wish it was just five minutes.
Vivian Boudreaux 33:55
Yeah, it depends. Like I said, if they’re doing what they’re supposed to do, you can see that and you can just go on down. There are some things we have to check a little bit closer. But you know, the bottom line is, you need to be logged in. If you do and what are some
Jeremy Kellett 34:10
of the most common mistakes you see Joe?
Ashley Rabun 34:13
Not there upon logs. Yeah, make sure those are verified everyday, make it part of your pre trip to verify your log. Young Drivers can get started for having one day unverified. That’s something that takes you 10 seconds to do, maybe not even that long, they will just be part of your pre trip. You only have 14 days on this login system to verify if your trucks in the shop login once a week, keep them verified, just to keep it caught up. They have to be verified. That’s a DOD requirement.
Amanda Hadfield 34:42
Then they want 15 minutes for the pre trip and around two minutes for post trip asset inspection.
Vivian Boudreaux 34:50
fuel stops you the whole time you’re on the fuel Island. You pull up you drive you stop, you go on duty, you may have to wait a few minutes to get to the pump and then you may pull forward and run into the truck stop to get your receipt and it takes you four or five minutes that four or five minutes still has to be on duty you don’t go off duty or into the sleeper and you can be in the sleeper berth and in the truck stop getting your receipt at the same time so when it says sleeper berth you’re in physically the sleeper berth. You’re not, you know, eating, you’re gonna be asleep. Yeah, you don’t have to be asleep but you got to be in that your body has to be in that sleeper berth if you log it that way. And I know minutes matter sometimes but possibly if you’re if you’re shaving minutes off to get it that close, maybe you’re you shouldn’t be in a rush. You know, maybe you’re just but I don’t know anything about dispatching but yeah, the whole time you’re fueling needs to be on duty. If you go into the store after an eat or what, shower whatever and You, that’s fine. That’s off duty. But that’s a big thing.
Jeremy Kellett 36:04
How does it feel? To look at some that are? Perfect? Nice. Fantastic. Do we have a lot of that?
Ashley Rabun 36:13
We Yeah, we have a lot that, that everything looks good I, there’s some drivers that I look, they’re logged out, man, I wish more
Amanda Hadfield 36:21
that they all could look
Ashley Rabun 36:24
for their paperwork, it’s all nice and neat. And we can read it and everything like that. But it’s a great feeling, knowing that they took the time to make their stuff correct. And it looks good, it looks wrong
Amanda Hadfield 36:35
and makes it easier on us
Vivian Boudreaux 36:38
that they take pride in what they do.
Jeremy Kellett 36:41
You can tell that by looking at logs paperwork.
Ashley Rabun 36:46
Absolutely, thank you for that.
Jeremy Kellett 36:48
Well, you know, the majority of our operators, I think do it right. They take care of their business and do things right. And they want to, it’s important. And that’s why he can’t let you know, just a group of people that don’t do it right. You know, you don’t want one bad apple making the whole bunch bad, because that’s not the truth. You took the word for it out of my mouth. It’s a, you know, the majority of the people here we have some fantastic owner operators, and I’m telling you on the recruiting end of it, it is hard to find these people, these good owner operators with a challenge. So we’ve been very blessed to have good owner operators at this company and continue to do so. But I like you know it, like we say before we were going to do this episode, we didn’t want to didn’t feel like we were beating up on anybody to do things. Right. I think that it’s an eye opener for owner operators to see what goes on in the safety department. What happens, you know, what people are responsible for? And how good a job you got to do and how good a job they do. I mean, it’s just what most of them do. I mean, most of it is just taking care of your business. And even
Vivian Boudreaux 37:57
When we call them, most of them are receptive. They’re Oh, I’m sorry, you know, I’ll start doing that. You know, there’s very rarely we, I think, generally get really hateful responses.
Jeremy Kellett 38:11
Like so yeah. But
Ashley Rabun 38:14
It also has a small safety department. And we have a lot of drivers between, you know, the eight of us out there. You know, a lot that’s,
Jeremy Kellett 38:24
that’s why I was saying I don’t know how to do it, all of them. You know, but I guess it helps when they’re all right.
Vivian Boudreaux 38:29
Yeah, because we don’t sit down driver by driver, we try to just start with a violation, and then drill down. And yeah, so it’s a lot of spot checking. We do have a few reports that we know, we catch a lot of it, and some of it, we don’t, but we will eventually, you know, eventually it will come out. And
Jeremy Kellett 38:51
so mom can be crafty, they
Ashley Rabun 38:53
definitely. And there are some that don’t even realize that they’re doing anything, you know, wrong. Like maybe a violation of a 14 hour violation, they may not realize that if they are using that sleeper berth rule that they may have forgotten to go into the sleeper berth. And they went off duty. And you know, they didn’t realize it, you know, that they call us that violation. You know,
Amanda Hadfield 39:17
That’s more of an easier fix.
Vivian Boudreaux 39:18
Yeah, some of them just say, Okay, you caught me, I’ll start doing it wrong.
Amanda Hadfield 39:24
Or they might accidentally hit you instead of the PC or vice versa.
Jeremy Kellett 39:29
Oh, yeah. I’ll tell you why. If I keep driving five, around this parking lot out here. I don’t like you gotta say, but I’m not in their shoes. I guess they got to creep around for five minutes or something. He can do that or so they don’t start to talk. I’m just kidding, guys. I’ll get to you like healing yourself like to cover. I believe we’ve done a great job, you have done a great job.
Ashley Rabun 39:58
I would actually go back to you. I meant to bring this up by going over the CDOs and stuff like that. If you get a duplicate CDO, or a new CDO, get it sent to us because it’s going to show up on your NVR whenever Vivian runs it. So if you get one, go ahead and send it. If it’s a cord, send it to your dispatcher. If it’s temporary, send it to us through the train.
Vivian Boudreaux 40:20
And it wouldn’t hurt to just give us a call at safety and say hey, I’m texting this to my dispatcher because they get it the dispatchers have a lot going on too and they forget to send it to us and then we don’t realize we don’t have and we have to call them back so that doesn’t hurt to just give us a call and say hey, I’m sending in my dispatcher. Can you make sure you get it?
Jeremy Kellett 40:38
Yeah, because we’re gonna have a current lady ill on file receives
Ashley Rabun 40:43
the hazmat with you know, temporary CTO. Send all that to us. Yeah, cuz we need to
Jeremy Kellett 40:50
temporary steel. This takes us to do a temporary CD.
Ashley Rabun 40:54
Yeah, Texas. They do like three I think and they usually all end up on a cord but they’re still Other states that do the paper temporaries that are okay to send to us their trains flow. But if it’s an actual cord, your twic card, your CDL, or the plastic card, please don’t send that to us their train’s flow, we’re not going to ever read it, text it to your dispatcher written back with a clear copy. Anytime you get a new one might say that we have the most current copy of it.
Vivian Boudreaux 41:18
And don’t forget to send in your D O T inspections, any citations, even if it’s in your personal vehicle, we need a copy of it. So just send it I guess, trance flow and not your personal vehicle. But if it’s in your CMB, it needs to be logged on duty
Jeremy Kellett 41:36
is an illicit Chase and another rabbit but you say send it in, which is really easy. But do they need to send it in under certain
Vivian Boudreaux 41:44
safety miscellaneous wouldn’t be high enough where
Jeremy Kellett 41:47
you think you can just go ahead and pay number,
Ashley Rabun 41:49
your last completed pay number. If it’s one year currently on, it could air out. We could never get it. But yes, don’t use all zeros. Don’t use your chart number don’t use one through five, six,
Amanda Hadfield 42:02
but don’t have that with them. They can call and ask us and we can get it to him. Yes.
Jeremy Kellett 42:08
Okay. Is it one of the biggest signs you’ll probably get if a Senate majority can get it? Right. And you think that’s because of the fight number? Yeah, majority of the time.
Ashley Rabun 42:20
And they’ll tell us that, you know, we’ll ask them what paint number they use, why didn’t they use one, let me give you your last completed pay number and resend it. So we did a little tidbit there. It’s also not instant, it takes about 10 to 15 minutes to get to as well. So if you’re on the phone with me and say I just resent it, I’m not going to have it right, then it’s gonna take a few minutes to get to us.
Jeremy Kellett 42:41
So a good little tidbit of info out there
Amanda Hadfield 42:44
and make sure not to dark in any of those documents, because then we’re gonna have to have you resend them, because we can’t read
Jeremy Kellett 42:50
them. Oh, they don’t look good on their phones. To see you back in there doing better probably,
Amanda Hadfield 42:56
there’s only certain documents that need to be darkened. And that’s going to be the ones that tend to colored like the yellow ones and the pink ones, like the carbon copies, yeah, dark, and then we can see the print there better. But if you darken a regular piece of paper, by the time we get some black, we can’t read it. And I’ve actually called a couple there. So make sure that they don’t darken their paperwork, the only time you need to darken anything. So if it’s like a carbon copy, and it’s on a colored sheet, it’s the only time that you’re gonna need to darken that document. Because I’ve got some that I can’t read and I’m waiting for them to send their maintenance reports back where they’re not so dark because I can’t even make out a trick number.
Jeremy Kellett 43:43
Good stuff. Okay. I think we covered a lot in that episode. I mean, I feel like he covered everything on our list. Joe,
Amanda Hadfield 43:51
Do I need anything on incidents? Are we good? Okay. I don’t care either.
Jeremy Kellett 43:58
Incidents will not work over. Yeah.
Amanda Hadfield 44:01
Yeah, that was really fun. Well, the lady that gets to take your money, let’s have some more fun. I think the trailer inspection sheet. People don’t feel that apathy. No, they shouldn’t. And I’m gonna tell you time and time again, if you don’t send those in, and it comes up, that trailer was damaged. I mean, those payments can even be split, I can still charge one driver and charge another one.
Jeremy Kellett 44:27
What’s that mean? Which we touched on critical on to what you mean with insidious trailer damage, because
Amanda Hadfield 44:34
I will go and look and see the last time when we’ve had a trailer inspection sheet turned in on those and the majority of them they’re not, not dated.
Jeremy Kellett 44:43
Yeah, we need more than I don’t think people feel that outlet. These two in the shop, I know they get in there and fix up or something’s wrong and they send the bill to the dispatcher, or you know.
Amanda Hadfield 44:55
They’ll send the pictures to shoot pics, and make sure there’s the incident that’s created. There’s already one created, then attach those short pictures to it. Make sure it has the right driver on their dispatcher and the trailer number. And then I wait for the work order from the shop. If the dispatcher doesn’t let me know who to build, probably within the first week I haven’t got to talk to the dispatcher. Because they need to get out and they need to get out quickly. But we do not email voices to the drivers. Or say how much it’s actually going to cost him so if they ever have any questions. They need a contact dispatcher they can call me and now can even email one to them. Since it needs a copy?
Jeremy Kellett 45:38
Good. Now please do that. Listen to what a man is telling you. Yeah, my good lord, she’s gotta go well with her boyfriends and do her laundry. She doesn’t need to worry about these treasures.
Amanda Hadfield 45:51
Laundry every week. Better hobbies.
Jeremy Kellett 45:56
I’m just kidding. Thank you all for joining me on this episode. I really appreciate the info link, it’s a little bit of change in the pace of what we normally do here. So that gets good information. And once again, it’s always targeted to our owner operators and to make it better, make them better, more successful us better as a company, so. Oh, good. Thank you for doing that. Thanks for everybody listening to the Oakley podcast. You guys are awesome every week and really enjoy it. Be sure to subscribe, comment, let us know what you want to hear on this million miles and can put it together. It’s always good to know that we’ve got a bunch of listeners. And you guys have responded every week and we really do appreciate it. Share it with other people. That helps a whole lot. And let us know what you think. We appreciate you listening to the podcast. We’ll talk to you next week. Thanks. Thanks for listening to this episode of the Oakley podcast: trucking, business, and family. If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to rate or review the show on the podcast platform of your choice and share it with a friend. We love hearing from our audience, so if you’ve got a question, comment, or just want to say hello, head over to our website, theoakleypodcast.com, and click the “leave a comment” button. We’ll get you a response soon and may even share some of the best ones here on the show. We’ll be back with a fresh episode very soon. Thanks for listening.
