u/VladIsRambo

Vlad here, carrier. I know it's not a broker question, but still:

DOT has been harrasing me for 3 months now. They pull my trucks only when they can give me a violation. I don't question most of the violations - speeding, driving in left lane, stuff like that is normal, it happens.

What I question is the absolute refusal from DOT to give me a clean inspection. Yesterday for example I had a driver pulled over at a weigh station (not the port of entry) and 3 DOT fuckers checked EVERYTHING on the truck - tires, brakes, HOS, paperwork, windshield wipers, reflective tapes even... The truck was IMMACULATE. They told him they won't give him an inspection, because they were just checking the weight. I told the driver to record them on video and they ran away to the cabin.

This has been happening for 3 months now. They gave a born and raised Texan a failed language proficiency violation. The guy has a degree in theology. They put another driver of mine OOS and slapped me with "ELD tampering" because the DOT animal couldn't believe I allow the driver to drive only 300-400mi. The driver was sick, those were his actual miles.

Literally 3 months ago I was top 10% in safety among companies my size. Now I'm bottom 25%. I used to get 4-5 clean inspections for every one with a violation. Now they refuse to give me a clean one. My safety is fighting the unreasonable violations. I have lawyers in 4 different states working on removing those. But it takes months to get a court hearing, my safety is shit and now it will cost me on the insurance renewall.

The trucks are immaculate. I'm about to hire a former DOT officer turned safety consultant. I'm consulting a lawyer to take it to DOT in court. I'm wirking with the DataQ system.

But it doesn't matter, because I just can't get clean inspections.

Any suggestions how I can get those fucking animals off my back? Has anybody experienced anything like that? Is it because I'm an immigrant with a trucking company in Chicago? What the fuck do they want from me?

Vlad here, anti-AI freedom fighter.

Guys, the tech is not there yet. The robo calls, the stupid email chatbots, the slowing down of the process, the repeated questions, the glitches, starting over, the wrong postings, the collosal waste of time...

It doesn't work. Like, at all. It's bad even at screening! Most of us carriers either ask it to transfer us to a person, overquote it or just flat out hang up. It trains you to hate it, to get frustrated by it and to expect it to waste your time. Eventually you just learn which brokers are using it and you stop calling them out of sheer practicallity.

I know that few of you will say "it works for me". To those of you I'll answer that you have no idea how the industry works, you are too low-IQ to be in this business and the sooner you get out of it - the better for you and the rest of us.

To mid and upper management: ladies and comrades, I own a business too. I'd love to save tens of thousands of payroll every month too. But the tech is still complete trash. Even the Indians are better and cheaper. Your brokers are short staffed, they are leaving money on the table and AI is causing you bigger losses than the savings it brings. You are skipping dollars to pick up pennies. It's just stupid. Someday (maybe as early as few months from now) the tech will work. But right now it doesn't. You are not early adopters, you are boomers who got scammed by IT nerds who sold you useless product.

My 5.5yo Note 20 is still working great, but my business partner decided to gift me a iphone 17 pro max or whatever.

The iPhone sucks and I’d rather return a free phone, risk offending him and splash up to $2000 on a new samsung. The iOS is just too limited and dumbed down.

The question is what’s better for me - ZFold or s26ultra?

Im a power user, 100-300 calls per day, countless messages and emails, YouTube videos running on the background while driving, heavy multitasking, spreadsheets, files, attachments bounced around.

Battery life is important, but I have charges everywhere. The thing is the phone keeps ringing and I can’t keep it on the charger longer than 15min. Camera - I don’t care much about it. Durability is important - I’ve dropped my note 20 at least 30-40 times over the years and it doesn’t even have a scratch. I love the SPen when I use it, but to be honest - I rarely use it.

Thoughts? Is there a spen for the fold? How durable is it? I’m in Chicago, winters are cold here and I’m worried about cracking the display. Do you recommend some kind of a protection plan?

My 5.5yo Note 20 is still working great, but my business partner decided to gift me a iphone 17 pro max or whatever.

The iPhone sucks and I’d rather return a free phone, risk offending him and splash up to $2000 on a new samsung.

The question is what’s better for me - ZFold or s26ultra??

Im a power user, 100-300 calls per day, countless messages and emails, YouTube videos running on the background while driving, heavy multitasking, spreadsheets, files, attachments bounced around.

Battery life is important, but I have charges everywhere. The thing is the phone keeps ringing and I can’t keep it on the charger longer than 15min. Camera - I don’t care much about it. Durability is important - I’ve dropped my note 20 at least 30-40 times over the years and it doesn’t even have a scratch.

Suggestions?