My situation, have CDL but haven't driven in 17 years.

You also have 0 (Zero) recent (Commercial driving experience within the last 3 yrs) experience and will be an insurance nightmare for a company to hire you.

Not impossible,.. but still difficult in finding the right person who wont try to take advantage of your situation. Expect to get penetrated with out lube before your first year is complete.

Personally,.. knowing what I know now,.. I am not sure I would go through all of that all over again. There are other ways of making money. I stuck it out because I knew I wanted to own my own truck but did not have enough well rounded experience to head out OTR on my own. Reading stories and listening to advice will only take you so far. Time in the seat and personal experience were the only way I was going to reach my goals.

Its not the same as it was 17 yrs ago. Everything is different. Different attitudes from drivers, the comradery is pretty much none existent anymore, everyone seems to be out for themselves. CB is a filth box of trash talking, high beam flashing space cadets who know it all and have done it all since getting their CDL 6 months prior.

25 yrs ago,.. 5 - 7 days away from home was a lot for me. Today,. 4 - 8 weeks is considered pretty common. Oh yes,.. money. They dont pay much more today than they did 17 yrs ago either. The only way most mega drivers make any money is by driving for every waking moment until they are on a sleep deprived auto-pilot. Truck stops dont sell the little white ephedrine pills anymore either.


Good luck.

Hurst

 

I haven't driven in 14 years and haven't had a current medical card for probably 10 years and I still have a CDL-A. When I go to renew my license I just pay the cost for it and that's it. They did put a K endorsement on it for intrastate only but all I have to do according to the Oklahoma DMV is get my medical card and they will remove the K endorsement.

 

Guess each state can have their own rules.

 

Washington State allows you to keep your CDL-A you are just intrastate only to change you just need to take current med card in and can be changed i have done this a few time over the last 20 years

 

In the same boat here. Have clean, current valid A w/ 2yr med card, but drove garbage trucks for last 13 years, so no recent T/T. Answers I've received from various companys: sorry can't help you, take a 40hr refresher, take a 160hr refresher, let your CDL expire then come to our school. What a nightmare.

 

Ok. You are like me. Im out of the game since 2001 for all intents and purposes OTR. I stayed in it until 2009. Ugh. Local crew boss playing with trucks and helping out a herd of either newbies or cranky oldies. Im happy to help;

If you held on to your CDL swearing a affadavit to the DMV that you are Tier Two, no need for a medical card to keep your CDL then you are good to go.

YOU WILL be RUSTY. YOU WILL be sent to refresher school to find out what you still got or lost over all these years. I bet in 1 hour all of it will come flooding back. But only do go. It's good for you. I would.

Experience? HA. Meaningless. Paper says I accumulated 31 years. But according to 2001 to 2017 gap if I magically became DOT medically compliant and legal to run interstate commerce today, no one will hire me because I have no employment recored what so ever. Just like a 21 year old fresh from school ranked Doolie with nothing either.

I know I'll go back to MeKesson in Memphis, club a few people and get back to work without too much difficulty. One can dream. But refresher school first then TWIC then then then then. Passport too. Enhanced license is required by 2020 in my state. Also enhanced carry. etc etc etc.

Do I want to get back into it? I never really left. So People are good to me. Pat me on the head, smile and I get to sit on the back porch unaware of the storm of controversary I stirred up with some topic or another.

 

@cycloguy : I drive for Abilene. I got hired as a brand new driver with the ink barely dry on my CDL. But one of my fellow drivers (@Redtwin ) was in the same boat you are in, vis a vis having some experience a long time ago. Here's what he said about it a few weeks ago:

Abilene will probably put you through the same training you'd get if you were a new driver with no experience. Dunno if that's the "refresher" you're looking for, but there's no contract and they don't charge you for the training (in fact, you'll get paid for it).

They do hire in Florida. We have two drivers that I know of and who post here regularly who live in Florida.

They're a good bunch of folks. I've been driving for 'em a year now, and I like 'em.

 

I know of 7 FL drivers working for Abilene. They were one of only 5 companies that offered me a job out of the 20 I applied to. The others only hired from North of Orlando.

 

This is what I did when I was out for a few months. All you have to do is self certify for exempt and you can keep your cdl. Now before I started driving again I had to get a new med card. 75 bucks and I was back on the road. After I self certified again for interstate