Tri-National (TNI) reviews

I understand that being truckers we will always have to deal with crap. But what I've read on Tni isn't completely accurate. Reasons why!

1. Tni has mostly all their problems cause of abusive drivers, who treat trucks and trls like crap. 

2. Layover and detention pay is avail when u sit for 4hrs but must be dispatched on load. 

3. As far as fueling goes its all bs when u fuel u are suppose to top off, so on a act week 6 days u should fuel 6x. Every 6-700 miles. If u go over call in and tell them that you need extra fuel. They will open card up to top off. They do this to monitor fuel for theft!!

3. I have been here roughly 2yrs not once have I had problems, however my complaints are simple

most issues are customer related issues. Delays, no Mty Trls, uses our Trls for storage, and as far as dispatch, it's simply explained like this.

dispatchers are like the weather man. U may get 1 good one out of 10 any dispatcher should know his drivers, I take the time to call anytime I get a new one and explain. I'm here to work I need miles I will push to be ontime and all I ask is you keep me happy and we both will benefit.

As far as trucks go. They are mostly new, and do have issues occasionally but like my truck it's under warranty. To say that they run illegal is lies. Do drivers yes and they get caught. By personal standards I refuse to run illegal and so should you. I run on avr 650-695 miles a day 11hrs fuel in morning or night I like morning at start of day to run straight. I don't kiss butts and I tell them how I feel I don't get punished. I can give as much as I get. And they all know me. Anytime u start a company fill out an inspection sheet and have them sign it call in and inform fm, safety. As far as that one comment about no one being in charleston is a lie. 24hrs pal. U could not have gotten the key without or even bills so don't lie. I rate them at a 7 for ease of loads, a 6 for quality of trucks/Trls that's drv fault, a 8 on maint/ and a 3 on shop williness to fix problem when asked to fix them. Terminals are fine however there is a severe health hazard that need fixing. That's wiping ur butts and throwing the paper in a open container. Laredo mostly. There are good people working here. Friendly?? Better than jb, or usx if u want a job here establish itself as a driver. Not a lazy, attitude throwing blame maker, or a pissed of baby who screwed up.

I worked for TNI in 2009 and I spent more time in their trucks not getting paid than I did getting paid. My last trip to Laredo I sat for 3 days as usual and noticed that I kept getting bumped down the board. My newly assigneddispatcher was a rookie and was clueless about the business. After one excuse and another I finally got a load going on the 4th day and I talked to the rookie dispatcher about this situation. He didn't care how I felt about it or that I spent those days not getting paid. He told me at that time that he was going to send me home for a week for a bad attitude so I told him "F""" that I quit. I went to Bryant,AR turned in my keys and paperwork and cleaned out the truck. Two weeks later I got turned down on a job because a DAC report was filed that accused me of cussing out my superior and they fired me. Odd thing was I told the I quit and did. Told the terminal manager too! Well I went to file unemployment and was refused because they told them I was fire for cursing the superiors. They asked if I cussed the dispatcher and I told them no I did us the F word but it wasn't directed to him as an insult. I also told them that if I got a nickle for every curse word I got from a dispatcher I wouldn't need unemployment but got refused.
Also TNI never got the paperwork to me to sign up for Cobra but kept claiming they had. Finally 5 mths later I got it. 
They are a shoddy unprofessional outfit run by thugs and truck maintanance is poor at best. Also they would never let us fill our trucks up. Never understood why we weren't allowed to top them off.
My story is just one of many on them but most never post it. Don't think for a minute that they won't file a DAC report on you. They want to hurt the drivers if they leave them.

This company started out real good and is really going down the drain. Ive only been there 4 months but am really looking to go somewhere else.

I disagree with your statement about someone always being at the Charleston facility and resent your calling those who disagree untruthful. I have been to the Charleston facility during the daytime many times and there has been no one there. I've had to wait. The mechanic is the one who goes in the office and gets the paperwork. The dispatcher I was assigned made many mistakes and even lied to cover them up. He was barely competent in my opinion, plus he never returned my phone calls and I left him many messages over time. Also, several of the of dispatchers are downright nasty. I won't name them, we who have dealt with them know. I know one Saturday recently I kept calling and it appeared I was hung up on. I finally had to have my mom call them and she reported the same. She called several numbers that I had been given including that of the operations in Laredo and guess what? NO ONE returned my call. Beware: TNI management does not take kindly to criticism of any kind, especially that of its dispatchers. To say they are defensive when confronted would be an understatement. They make a big thing about "appreciating" their drivers and having raffles and such on the Qualcomm but I never got any of that from them. I felt just the opposite.

I have waited not just at Charleston (their second largest facility and one of three with a mechanic available) but elsewhere as well, i.e. Little Rock, Laredo, etc. The facility at Texarkana is a "ghost" facility, BTW, with no one there and it's used basically to store trailers and relay loads.

I have been to the Laredo facility many times and had to wait for someone to sign my paperwork--the mechanics are nowhere to be found, no one even in the back office. I also had a lot of downtime with this company due to poor planning or some kind of communication break down involving the planners. I was not compensated for this downtime at all. Example: delivering an empty from one area in Tennessee to another area two hours away, and then not being dispatched anywhere else. Fully 50% of all the loads I carried in six months were relayed in either Texarakana, Hayti, MO or elsewhere, presumably because they were "hot" loads that needed to be delivered sooner than I could deliver them. A common complaint among TNI drivers is having to wait while another driver relays a load to them. If it's you, you may have to wait until the next day to be assigned a new load if you are not switching trailers. They expect many of their loads to be there at 6 am in the morning which would require you in your sleeper berth by 8 am the previous night. Since I am dispatched to the Laredo terminal where loads originate and usually arrive from where I am around six or seven at night, this is unrealistic. I actually worked my butt off for this company doing three week stints without going home and I really did not earn good money at all. It's at least $100 less per week than the company I worked for before.

Did you know TNI drops dead during the summer months? That's because they exclusively deliver auto parts. I really resent the fact that my dispatcher was not up front with me about this lengthy period which starts in June while the auto industry retools in Mexico. They completely deny it and the fact that work essentially dries up due to this. I was not told this at the orientation and the company denies that they do in fact lay off drivers during this period when there is virtually no work. Instead, they tell you they are waiting for a truck or a load or they ask you if you want to hitch a ride with someone to Texarkana with no firm offer of work once you get there. Having a revolving truck system works best for them in that they aren't anxious for you to go back to work in the first place since the truck isn't sitting there losing money. They always have a large number of potential drivers and they will choose and rely on those that work and don't care about going home. My dispatcher was extremely nebulous about this and giving out information or admitting that this slow period can cover up to two to three months. This is when they lay off the drivers that relinquish their trucks and go home for their breaks. I was off for three weeks waiting for a truck and finally told after two weeks of waiting that in actuality there were no loads coming in from Mexico. After two weeks, I informed my dispatcher that I would be applying for unemployment. After being told I was number #30 on the list waiting for a load, suddenly two days after a load becomes available the next day out of Laredo. ( Anyways, I got no unemployment as my dispatcher told the TWC office that I had refused work by refusing to hitch a ride).

I had three blow outs in a week and a half span last July due to the heat and shoddy condition of the trailer tires--almost all of them are retreads and do not look good to me. This was explained due to the heat but I had a lot more blow outs than would be the norm due to poor tires. Many of the trailers are not really in good condition and the doors have issues and can be difficult to close, such as the rubber stripping falling apart. I got many trailers that had prior damage visible on them, such as large scrapes on the sides, etc. TNI switched to all electronic last summer so it would be nearly impossible to run "illegal". This company has a revolving door policy towards its drivers, always hiring, because employees quit or are constantly let go for minor infractions. It's true they do nickel and dime you to death. I heard one driver at the Hidalgo facility was charged $250 to clean out his truck, and he was quite upset about it. Someone who did not work for TNI but was there told me about this.