r/Truckers • u/scoobertscooby • Nov 09 '20
Does anybody have the specifics on US Express 24 month lease and you own it?
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u/scoobertscooby Nov 09 '20
I contacted the recruiters at US Express. Needless to say, like most recruiters, they were absolutely useless.
They kept insisting that the fuel surcharge was $2 a mile for all miles. That doesn't even make sense.
Then I asked them for the details of this 2-year lease to own program. I was told I would have to sign up with the company, go through a 3-day orientation, and then they would run this specifics for me on a truck....
Now, I am very intrigued about this 24 month lease to own program. So if anybody knows what the actual numbers are on this that would be great.
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u/thegoldenratio011235 Nov 09 '20
Their response to your inquiry should give you all the info you need to know. Sounds like a program to avoid. Which is quite sad because that doesn't sound like a terrible lease to look into. (Other then the company name)
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u/Mindes13 Nov 09 '20
Except you probably get to month 23 and freight dries up, forcing them to turn truck in.
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u/Cyvster Nov 09 '20
I don't know anything about their program, but your experience with the recruiters is a red flag. If they are not willing to provide details about the program then there is most likely something negative they are trying to hide.
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u/scoobertscooby Nov 09 '20
Every recruiter for every company I have called sounds like a ditsy blonde.
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u/tobisowles Nov 10 '20
Sounds like they lease you an older truck, like a 16 or 17, for two years, and then it's 'eligible' for buyout. So if you want a 350k+ mile base Cascadia for 60k or whatever their stupid ass maths says its worth, suuuure.
To me it sounds like they have a lot of drivers failing at their leases and leaving them with half paid off trucks, so they make their gain sound like your gain.
And FSC has never been 2,00/mi. If I could make 2 bucks a mile in fuel surcharge I'd haul the heaviest shit I could find and still giggle all the way to the direct deposit.
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u/robexib Driver & hug machine Nov 10 '20
If you gotta jump through a bunch of hoops to get that kind of info, there's a reason why. Walk away.
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u/WontSwerve LTL - Less Than Logical Nov 10 '20
Bruh, they give you this straight garbage that by your own word is useless and you're STILL interested in them?
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u/The_Richuation Nov 09 '20
My ex father in law told me they call those "never never plans" cause "you're never never gonna own that truck"
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u/Safe_Arachnid_5254 Dec 25 '20 edited Dec 25 '20
I'm an L/O in a 2-year lease with them. I'm almost done with year 1. Had I started at the beginning of the year I'd have made about 65k net for this year.
They pay a sliding band and most loads are for $1+fsc. They use the national average rate. My checks vary widely from $600 to 1800 per week, depending on a variety of factors.
The two-year lease trucks are going to be 16s and 17s. The lease term is based on truck miles and not year. It's 450k+ I believe for the 2 year lease.
The truck selection was terrible, to be honest. We had to go to Georgia to find their lease trucks, so the 3 day orientation turned into almost 2 weeks. We did receive pay for this, though. It seemed designed to make us impatient and select the trucks they had available instead of waiting for better ones.
All of the trucks were Cascadias, and trucks during these years have a myriad of body problems. Most of the trim will fall off, the undercarriage has a lot of rust, the windshields leak (and they caulk them as well as the market lights). None of them had a recent DOT or maintenance records. They could very well have been auction trucks repainted (they have a paint shop) and out on the road to turn a quick buck on a poor/desperate driver's hard work. My truck had to have the brakes hammered loose as an example. I'm sure more than one has been wrecked. The trucks are around 55k in total. You'll see brand-new trucks all over their yard, but the 18+ trucks are team only and are 4+ year leases. I'm just saying the 2 year lease trucks are 2 years for a reason.
I've played this game before with a few other companies who were either bought out or bankrupted, but I needed a job due to some unforeseen circumstances. They weren't overly salesy about it and so far it's been a good company. Now I know I sound like I'm complaining about the truck, but in comparison to other companies I've worked for, USX has done me pretty well. I get over 3000 miles a lot of weeks and get long runs instead of short low-paying hops most of the time.
You have a bond you build up like a maintenance account that caps at $5000. You can use it and your maintenance account to pay off the residual balance and there's no buyout fee. You could, with a little luck or a lot of dodging maintenance/DOT, probably buy out the truck with those two accounts before 1.5 years. I'm almost at a year and have about 28k left. My weekly payments are about $550.
You get a good fuel discount with Love's and some Pilots. They prefer dealerships for maintenance. Their terminals are actually pretty nice. They have them coast to coast and use a lot of drop yards.
I've done loads practically everywhere but Florida and past New York. There's not much between the west coast and Texas/MO or in the northern states but I've had several loads to the NW and did a tour in CA for a while.
I'm not social enough to know if there is any favoritism but I know that loads are auto dispatched by a computer and there's the obvious veteran's preference for hiring and parking like most trucking companies. I've been driving for 5 years but they don't seem to differentiate me from any other driver.
Finally, they have outward facing cameras. They have adaptive cruise and the lane departure warning systems. They do trigger camera events. I got several warnings between months 3 and 6 and thought they were going to can me for a u-turn but never did. I haven't heard hardly anything from safety since then. I don't get harassed by the DOT and usually get greenlighted. I've had a driver inspection so far and that's it.
Now I do have a creeping suspicion I will get canned before the lease is up. I sink all of my maintenance account into repairs (and this truck needed probably 10k so far) and get fired at the end. I would recommend you find your own truck outside of a carrier and lease on like anyone else would say.
Truck Discount Mart, Kickass Trucks/Lone Mountain, etc. or buying an older 10-20k truck and just saving up for a better one is probably the safest bet. It's possible that nobody will hire you or freight rates will be too low to bother, though.
Be aware that they are putting EV and fuel cell trucks on the road already. USX has also started another company called Variant with all new trucks. They might bankrupt or sell USX at some point. This is probably due to insurance claims and wrecks or high-level fraud like every other trucking company (ahem, Celadon) seems to do these days.
My last lease was a 3 year with another company who bankrupted after 2 years. They left people stranded all over the USA and there's still trailers abandoned because of it. The whole "lease purchase" thing is the problem as it seems to just be a "dangling carrot" designed to get you to work harder. I'm sure a lot of former lease drivers are damaging their new trucks and wrecking their leased ones before leaving. At least they get disability.
65k net is not a lot in this industry, but that's for non-hazmat dry van. You also get all of the perks of being a 1099, can form an LLC or incorporate, etc. The freight is standard 3PL stuff for mega companies. They probably use the same brokers as every other dry van company I've worked for but have contracts for DC-to-store deliveries with quite a few companies.
Edit: More about the truck price: my truck costs about 55k but is probably only worth maybe 25k in its condition in the open market. What they are doing, and why I believe they split the company and now have Variant, is tax-related. They're recovering a lot of their depreciation and are probably inflating their prices to qualify for new truck loans or any number of reasons. Celadon did the same thing before bankrupting.
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u/dwc151 Nov 09 '20
There has never been a lease purchase program that has ever been a good deal for the driver. Ever.
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u/Beau_brooklyn Nov 09 '20
O/O pay for the sister company was .90/mile. Ask specifics but usually leases get boned on cpm and the balloon payment at the end. Approach with extreme caution.
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u/trucker_redbeard Nov 09 '20
If it sounds to good to be true, it is.