Old James Freight

by Brian Miller
(Salem, OH)

Old James Freight of Des Plaines, IL. DOT# 3224408. Owner is Bogdan Roman, assuming that is his real name. Check their website. Very polished, and full of bogus information.

Was recruited by the company owner to drive a Freightliner Cascadia. It became obvious pretty quickly that it was another problem truck. I could see some issues just walking up to the truck. Badly mismatched drive tires, federal inspection issues, a small hole on the front trailer wall. Also found a broken off shock on the trailer, a completely unsecured spare tire in the trailer tire rack, an enormous amount of flatbed gear and tires chains in the cab storage boxes.

The first day the owner also sprang a ridiculous driver contract on me. Even after reading my resume, which clearly states that I will not sign anything I haven't seen before leaving home. I refused to sign it. He said don't worry about it. Now he thinks he can impose that contract on me. Not going to work.

As soon as I drove the truck the bad handling became obvious, which I suspected due to the badly mismatched drive tires and the overloaded storage boxes. I mentioned it to the owner the next day, and he made it clear he didn't want to put money into an "older" truck. A 2015 I believe. At this point I knew my stay with this company would be very short. As it was around the holidays, I decided to tough it out and get through the holidays. After a load to Washington state, I told them to route me to Chicago and I was going home.

Enroute to Chicago, I got this company a clean inspection in South Dakota on New Year's Eve. I dropped the truck and the load at a secured lot in Chicago, as I was instructed. Even suggested I leave my big personal padlocks on the trailer because it was a high value load. The owner thought this was a great idea, and agreed to reimburse me for the padlocks. So I left the padlock keys in the truck. I tried to be a pro till the end. The owner also tried to get me hired on with his friend while I was heading to Chicago. I declined.

Now this company is withholding my final pay and reimbursements, about $3k worth, even after I did my job. Putting a real hardship on my family. Threatened me with a lawyer after I kept after him about it. Sadly, it's not the first Chicagoland company to play games with my pay. I have plenty of ways to legally deal with them. I just hope no one else gets sucked in by this dirtbag company.