It's a Team's Life

Modern Technology

Modern Technology 

For those of you who started your driving career in the previous century, I give you so much credit. Why? Because I wonder how you were able to communicate with family and work. I wonder how you paid your bills when you were out on the road for weeks or months at a time.

Our business is only 12 years old. We have run our business with all the modern conveniences like a cell phone and a laptop computer. We can communicate with a phone call, a text message or an email. In many cases we use all three in the same day.

While I know there were credit cards back in the day, I do not know if there was such a thing as a fuel card. Did you get discounts on fuel like we do today? Did you have to worry about having your card hacked? Stories from the early years would be so interesting to hear.

Today, we can pay our bills on the road or take out a loan. We can do all of our banking and investing from the comfort of our semi sleeper. We can conduct meetings over the internet via a Zoom call. We can even plan our next vacation!

But with this comes some challenges as well. There is risk involved with using these more modern conveniences. There are those who want to steal from us. They want to steal our identities. They want to take money from our credit card or fuel card. They make spam phone calls and send spam emails and texts in the hopes that we will click a link or take that call. We have to be so careful.

Along with having to think about people stealing from us through our electronic devises, we also have to be very aware of our surroundings. More and more we are hearing how trucks are being stolen while a driver goes into a truck stop. Also, we hear about how freight is being stolen directly from the trailer. What do you do to lower your chances of having this happen to you? 

If we are hauling freight (regardless of what type of freight it might be), we usually make sure that one of us stays with the truck while the other goes into the truck stop. It helps for us to have a BIG dog sitting in the passenger seat too! We also have a camera system that covers not only all four sides of the outside of the truck but inside the box as well. This way if someone did try to take our truck or our load, we would have a video of what happened.

Regardless of the risks with having equipment such as cell phones and computers, I have to say that I am glad that we have them. I just cannot imagine how much more difficult driving was all those years ago.

Here’s to millions of safe, profitable and CONVENIENT miles.

Kelly Plumb