by wtfcanada2015@gmail.com | Jul 30, 2024 | Career Board
Wilride Transport Ltd. is looking for experienced AZ cross-border drivers to run east coast, mid-west, south and with good time management skills, and a good understanding of the industry.
The ideal candidate for this job has the experience and has the ability to communicate effectively. If you are looking to join a premier transportation company, and become an integral part of results-oriented team send a resume today we would like to speak with you. Send resume to recruiting@wilride.com
We Offer:
- Competitive wage
- Paid drops/pickups, mileage, border crossing, clean inspection bonus, safety bonus.
- Driver referral bonus
- Group benefits/Pension plan available upon hire, no waiting period.
- Reliable, clean, maintained trucks.
- Passengers permitted.
- No/Limited touch LTL.
- Bi-weekly direct deposit
- Pets permitted
- Out of Country coverage Day 1
- Paid Drops/Picks/Clean Inspection/safety Bonus
Qualifications:
- AZ Truck Driver with a minimum of 2 years of cross-border experience.
- Clean Canada wide criminal search and a Resident of Canada
- Satisfactory road test
- Good references
- Negative pre-employment drug test
- Effective Communication skills
- Punctual and reliable
- A clean driving record
Regional Responsibilities:
- Safely transporting goods to and from specified locations according to company deliver schedules
- Maintaining an accurate logbook of driving activities, detailing the number of hours worked, deliveries completed, and rest periods.
- Properly secure goods to ensure that they are not damaged in transit
- Assist using a forklift on our cross-dock when required
- Obtaining signatures from customers upon completion of each delivery to confirm receipt of goods
- Notifying management of any accidents, parking tickets, vehicle damage, and major maintenance issues
- Ensuring that the company truck is always clean and well-maintained
- Complete a successful road test.
By applying to this position, you are confirming you possess either a Canadian citizenship, permanent resident status, or work permit.
Located:
77 Arrow Road Guelph, ON N1K 1S8
Website:
www.wilride.com
We are committed to diversity and inclusion and thank all applicants in advance.
by wtfcanada2015@gmail.com | Jun 28, 2022 | Career Board
Compensation: $70,000 +
Benefits: Medical and Dental after six months of service, and self-directed pension contributions and
one year of service.
PACART, Canada’s most respected fine art transport company has a full-time position available in our
Toronto location, for an Ontario licensed class AZ driver who is energetic, careful, conscientious, and
pays attention to detail.
The successful candidate will possess good interpersonal skills, be customer service oriented, and up to
learning about the unique experiences and challenges in the exciting world of fine art transportation!
Requirements:
• Must be able to work flexible hours
• Possess a valid AZ class Ontario Driver’s License
• Supply a current CVOR or drivers abstract
• Possess a valid passport or PR card and able to travel between Canada and USA when required
• Provide RCMP or provincial police background check
• Pass a pre-employment drug test / screening and participate in a Drug and Alcohol program in
accordance with USDOT regulations
Assets to the position:
• Relational knowledge of Metro Toronto
• City driving experience
• Knowledge of basic computer programs including Microsoft office
• Bilingual ( Not a requirement )
• An interest in the Arts
Scope of work:
• Local driving throughout the GTA and Southern Ontario – both solo and with second driver/tech
• Long distance driving – both solo and with second driver
• Overnight or out-of-town driving up to a week at a time, and on rare occasions up to two weeks
• Some onsite and warehouse packing
*All training and equipment for packing and handling fine art will be provided by our trained drivers and fine aet technicians*
Please send your resume with CVOR and drivers abstract to employment@pacart.ca
by wtfcanada2015@gmail.com | Oct 17, 2018 | BLOG
I wanted to share with you about my PTSD. I am not going to go into details of my past trauma but I wanted to show what living with my brain has been like all these years. When people hear I have PTSD most do not understand which is normal actually, its hard to describe and subject to individuality.
To start I am going to describe what I remember when I realized the full scope of what I had to deal with. Imagine living in fear with a flight or fight response continually. That’s what I remember as well the panic attacks, the anxiety and feeling bad that I felt this way. I tried so many ways to cope and nothing would or could relieve me. When something traumatic happens it actually causes your brain to change, neurons are made and your brain changes to cope. It is individual because there isn’t just way one for things to change.
In 1997 I had a boyfriend who transferred vehicles, trucks for a living and I used to go with him. The garbage trucks were stinky but for the most part I enjoyed hanging out. I got in my first Peterbuilt, it was an old one and I was agog over the dash and gauges. I decided right there I was going to do everything I had to drive one. I was 27 and never even had a driver’s license when I went to get my first permit. I was terrified as usual but determined and I made a firm plan of 5 yrs and how I was going to accomplish my goals. My boyfriend enjoyed torturing me for 2 yrs teaching me to drive, he never let me drive during the day and always during the worst weather mother nature could throw at me. I panicked all the time, would stop and center myself and begin again. Over and over this cycle continued until I could cope and not panic, then he let me drive on a sunny day. I am always grateful to Bill Coates for taking on me with my issues and making sure I knew how to drive and to be able to do so without panicking. I did accomplish my goals and end result being my AZ and it was a difficult journey but not my last. I made myself work at a job driving through every license, GZ, D, A. I stepped up as I was capable and felt comfortable. I planned and executed this despite my PTSD.
In 2007 the auto industry went to Mexico and drivers were laid off. I was one of them and I decided to attend college and study accounting. School was exhausting really because dealing with people for so long in a day stressed me out considerably. Determination and hope I would get used to it kept me going and I finished with a decent average. So now I had my AZ and a college diploma and was quite happy because I started with just a damaged brain really and no education, no hope for the future. I got a job just out of school covering a maternity leave as a CSR with a trucking company. I have to say I hated the job but I needed to make money so I went and did my job. It was then that I found out about a brain retraining program for PTSD. I was excited and attend the orientations and was interviewed and accepted into the program only to have my boss say it’s the program or the job and since I needed the money I stayed with the job. I decided to research and try to change my brain myself. I discovered my limitations but slowly with self analysis I figured out what kind of triggers, what happens during a trigger and how to catch myself before my brain does what it does to shut off a lot of the panic. I learned how to ignore my impulses to react that used to frustrate me to no end.
So now I have my new challenge which is owning and I have slowly through the years become quite balanced. I still have a brain that has impulses to panic and fear but I have learned how to do what I want anyways. I still am struggling with relationships and until I figure out a way to get through that limit I am just loving, accepting myself with all my flaws, there’s really no use beating myself up over something I cannot change.
Carol and Sassy
Carol Pritchard is an owner operator at Pride Group Logistics. Carol is also a director of the Women’s Trucking Federation of Canada .
You can reach Carol at carolp@wtfc.ca
by wtfcanada2015@gmail.com | Jun 29, 2018 | BLOG
Trucking was part of my entire life. I never thought much about it. My dad, grandpa, and most of my uncles were truck drivers. They wore cowboy boots and nice plaid, snap-button shirts. When I was young I wanted to be a policewoman or a teacher. Since then, I have had people tell me I should go into one of those professions.
I loved summer vacation because each of my siblings and I got to take a turn in the truck with my Dad. I remember one trip, going over the 1000 Island Bridge, (thinking how neat it was, but that you couldn’t live on most of the islands; but that it would be cool to go on a boat through them). We picked up scrap cars in the Bronx, New York and delivered them to Oshawa Ontario. We had to be out of the truck during the loading (which makes sense now; as it was dangerous). There was a huge fence around the place, (obviously to keep people from stealing parts or breaking in and getting hurt) and Dad said it was because the city was such a scary place that “even the junk yard dogs are scared’! We must’ve been listening to ‘Bad, Bad Leroy Brown’ at the time! We had to make sure that the doors were locked when we were driving down the city streets.
Someone once said to me a number of years ago, that I “must have had a terrible childhood”. And I thought how mean, condescending and ignorant it was to assume that my life had sucked as a kid. They had no idea what ‘Driving a Truck’ was all about. To me, having a parent who drove long haul and wasn’t home a lot is no different than someone who has a parent working shift work. Sure they are home every day, but they are asleep when the kids get up, and when they get home, the parent is at work. Do those kids see their parent any more than I saw my dad?
My dad was mostly an Owner/Operator, and stopped by the house a lot on his way to/from the yard. He usually made it just in time for supper! He could also make his own schedule. So he was able to go with me on class trips. Who else had a dad go on class trips with them?
I went to college for Horticulture because it sounded fun. I didn’t know what I wanted to do for a living; let alone a career. After 2 years of college and 2 years of minimum wage, living at home with a school debt, I started to look at going back to school. After talking to and researching some schools, my dad suggested looking into trucking. He set up an appointment with Kim R. at KRTS (being a long-time friend). The next day we sat in his office, and then I went out on a road test where I was taken down the road and thrown into the driver’s seat! KRTS helped me with funding and soon I was sitting in the classroom and learning how to back a tractor trailer out in the yard.
The first job I applied for would’ve offered me a job, but the company’s insurance carriers didn’t want a younger, newly licenced driver. So I went over to Zavcor, who were willing to take a chance on me, and started driving for them the following week. They didn’t have any female trainers, let alone female drivers, (They had one O/O husband/wife team), and so the dispatcher went out with me daily for a while to Toronto. For my first year I was in Toronto and surrounding area daily. I would load/unload; drop/hook either at the main yard or at the Mississauga drop yard. I don’t think I need to say that I learned how to back up quite well! My dad was always there for me whenever I had a question (or problem). He is the best driver, boss, salesman and father I know! I knew I could count on him to help me out with any trucking situations/problems or even just to discuss trucking issues.
Then I started going across the border. My first trip out was only to Rotterdam NY (which is near Albany), but as with many drivers, it is too far to go in a single run! (I remember having new drivers tag along with me a few years later and how I would have to stop for them to take a break.) It’s amazing how exhausting it can be paying attention to the signs, traffic, and weather! At the end of the day you are as tired as if you moved a load of bricks from one pile to another by hand! So I drove highway for about 3 ½ years. I thought about leaving to try something else but I had just bought myself a house and was asked to move into the Safety Office. I had a great trainer in the Safety/Compliance office and learned things like what questions to ask applicants, how to judge people, and all about Drug and Alcohol testing, dealing with Insurance Companies and keeping up to date on employee and truck and trailer files. I took a course at the OTA (Ontario Trucking Association) called “Take the risk out of Hiring and Firing”. (FYI I would never fire anyone without someone else being in the building.) I took ‘The Exceptional Assistant” through Fred Pryor and a course on Occupational Health and Safety (OHSA) through the Transportation Health and Safety Association of Ontario (THSAO (now IHSA)).
I would fill in for dispatch occasionally and was in charge of compliance issues, drug and alcohol testing, safety training, file maintenance, log books, annual reviews and accidents.
I left Zavcor in 2006 to work for a small 5-truck operation and would complete local deliveries and pickups with a flatbed when I wasn’t working in the office. I ended up running the entire office by myself, which included billing, accounts payable, accounts receivable, dispatch, payroll, safety, compliance, etc.
With the 2008 economy drop, we all had to walk away from the company. So I tried a completely different job – filling in for a 1 year maternity leave position as potted salesperson at a large greenhouse. I got married that year to a guy I went to high school with and asked out at our 10 year reunion. The next summer I worked in my husband’s family owned greenhouse (so my Horticulture diploma sort of paid off!).
I then went to work at a sod company delivering bags of soil and mulch along with skids of sod on a tri-axle flatbed with a piggyback tow motor. In the winter I took a job delivering scrap metal around Burlington and up to 5 hours across the border. I spent a lot of time at the recycling plants off of Burlington Street in Hamilton (so again, lots of backing up). I drove scow and dump trailers, but it was a little too dangerous for me. Standing on top of a load of scrap metal in the snow is not my idea of fun.
In the spring I went back to driving the flatbed with the piggy back tow motor; and in the summer I drove the live-bottom trailer for pick-up and delivery of various soils, peat moss, gravel and sand. I got to see a few quarries and drive into the middle of fields! At the end of the summer, I decided to stay home for a while. We were trying to start a family without much luck. I went back to the sod company the next 2 springs as a sales rep on weekends.
I was then called by a small company who had been referred to me, to handle compliance. So I also did that part-time for a couple years. I was approached by a local farmer to work 1 day/week delivering grain to his barns. It turned into hauling pigs from Norwich to Dunnville on a triaxle every Friday, and going down the escarpment to deliver to the grain mills or to haul back pig feed.
During all this time, my husband and I were still trying to get pregnant. With lots of help, in the spring of 2013 I was pregnant with twins; and was unable to work at all. My son and daughter were born early January 2014. (But that’s a whole other story!)
In 2015 I was approached by my first trucking boss to drive 1 day a week hauling dry vans to/from Wainfleet, Brantford, London and a little bit of Toronto, for another of his companies. It was mostly drop/hook, except that you usually had to place the new trailer in the same door – which means extra drop/hooks! (Eye roll)! Actually, I loved it. It was a reprieve of days with just me and 2 babies. (I struggled greatly with PPD (post-partum depression) and thought this would help; but it only helped me to avoid it.) I had a sitter show up in the morning, and she stayed until my husband came home, so I was free to get home at whatever time I was finished. If there was no run that day, I would help with filing and vehicle maintenance records.
In 2017 I started working full-time back at Zavcor in the new role of Director of Zavcor Training Academy. With my experience in so many previous roles, this was a great fit for me. I’m back in the industry I love, working with great people and assisting those wishing to learn more about our industry and become a Licenced Driver. I wouldn’t say that I’m a role-model, but I think that I am doing my part to make this industry better and safer; and to show/prove that it can be, and is, a viable career; regardless of age, sex or race! I love trucking ☺
Sarrah Dekker – Director Zavcor Training Academy
Email: sarahd@zavcor.com
Zavcor Training Academy
