Extreme Weather
It can be bitterly and uncomfortably cold up north working outside. On the positive side, most companies shut work down from -30 to -35 and colder. This is only because the equipment fails, breaks down, and gets damaged.
This can cost these companies a substantial amount of time and money. Otherwise, we’d bet money they’d make you work through it.
I’ve seen temperatures as low as the -50’s, so this may not be a good career move for you if you don’t like the cold.
Loneliness and Social Isolation
This is something that affects more people than you may think. We cover this is another article on our site about Truck Driver Attitude. Is there any amount of money that makes being away from your kids worth it? Missing your family, friends, kids, and loved ones is a huge sacrifice, and you may not know how much it affects you until its too late.
You’ll have to find things to occupy your downtime like, movies, books, computers, games, writing books or articles. Be productive if you can by doing something new and challenging. If you want to learn how to play a musical instrument like a guitar, this is a good time to do it. How about educating yourself for a different career?
If you want to earn a passive income by building a website, it’s a fun and challenging job. If you have another area of expertise you can tap into by writing and sharing your knowledge, contact us and we can talk about it. You can even be a contributor to our site if you like.
Oilfield driving can sometimes be socially isolating, but you’ll appreciate the unique beauty as well.
Drug and Alcohol Abuse
The industry may be pushing more drug and alcohol testing and safety on the workers, but substance abuse still happens. This isn’t just you for you as an adult to consider. Many of the kids in these oilfield towns have problems too.
If you’re planning on moving your family to one of these towns, I suggest you spend some time researching this first. As harsh as this sounds, there’s some oilfield towns and cities that I wouldn’t want to raise kids in.
Research the Company Whenever Possible
There’s one last thing to think about when it comes to finding a company to work for.
Companies request resumes, drivers abstracts, references, criminal background checks, and other personal information. Make sure you take the time to do the same background research on your potential employer. As drivers, we rarely ever check out the companies like we should.
If you want to find out reviews of companies, try using negative words associated with the company name in your keyword search. This will usually lead you to forum posts by other drivers. Take it with a grain of salt and use your best judgement when reading these reviews for what they are. There’s a lot of good companies that have bad things said about them that may not be true. Remember there are 2 sides to every story.
Make sure job details and pay are clarified on paper before making a move
If you’re moving from another location and are new at oilfield work, I’d recommend getting your feet wet with a medium to larger company first. They usually have the best training programs and your pay is always in the bank. Owner operators and small companies tend to be hit or miss like anywhere else.
Rarely is anything ever going to be as good as they make it out to be. If it sounds like a dream job, wouldn’t you think they’d have that position filled already?
You’re also less likely to have contractual or disclosure problems with a well known company. Have everything in writing before you move. There can often be surprises after a driver spends money on a flight to get here, and is faced with issues that were not disclosed over the phone.
How will you be able to deal with disclosure problems after arriving? There won’t be much you can do or say at this point in time. Hopefully you get the message I’m telling you here?
At this point, you’re stuck.
Thanks for reading Truck Driving Salaries
Let’s move on to Oilfield Safety
