Increased Driver Turnover, Higher Wages, and More Bonuses Expected

“Motor carrier executives continue to play a three-dimensional chess games when it comes to recruiting,” said Lana R. Batts, co-president of Driver iQ. “Managing within the context of an expanding economy, recruiters need to (1) find drivers that are already working; (2) attract them with wages, bonuses, and benefits; and yet (3) still grow and maintain profitability.”

For the first time, Driver iQ, is reporting differences among three revenue sizes of carriers: over $100 million, between $30-$100 million, and less than $30 million.

According to the Q2 survey, there are significant differences between larger and smaller companies in how they view and deal with turnover. For example, while carriers as a whole expect that turnover will increase, larger carriers (revenues over $100 million) think it will increase while smaller carriers (revenues under $30 million) think it will decrease. Over 65% of the larger carriers are finding drivers are retiring as expected while an equal number of smaller carriers are finding that drivers are not retiring as expected.

Among the details in the survey are the following:

• Over one-third of the fleets are reporting that 6-10% of their seats are unfilled.
• Over 50% of the carriers expect that the number of applicants will increase while the other 50% expect the number will decrease or remain the same.
• Almost 70% of the carriers are offering sign-on bonuses compared to 52% in Q4 2017. The most common size of the sign-on bonus is between $1,000-$2,499, with 50% of carriers paying out in less than six months.

The Q2 Trends in Truckload Recruitment and Retention Survey from Driver iQ is the fourth in a planned series of quarterly surveys designed to better understand and measure recruiting and retention experiences and expectations in the truckload sector. The results of the survey are coupled with observations of Driver iQ personnel engaged in the background screening industry.

The survey represents the views of recruitment managers who operate over 75,000 trucks and the majority of the responses came from dry van carriers with over $100 million in gross operating revenues.