Driver turnover rate declines in 2Q 2007, according to ATA
Oct 1, 2007 12:00 PM
The linehaul driver turnover rate among large for-hire truckload carriers (fleets with at least $30 million in annual revenue) experienced its first quarterly decrease in a year during the 2007 second quarter, the American Trucking Associations reported. Driver turnover is for employee, over-the-road, line-haul drivers only and does not include local drivers such as for port operations.
ATA, which began collecting driver turnover statistics in 1995, reported that turnover for large truckload (TL) carriers was at a 116 percent annual rate during the quarter, down from a rate of 127 percent in the first quarter of the year.
Small TL carriers (fleets with less than $30 million in annual revenue) saw their average turnover rate decrease to 90 percent, marking the lowest annualized rate in two years. This is the first time that the small fleet turnover rate has been below 100 percent since the third quarter of 2005.
The less-than-truckload (LTL) line-haul driver annualized turnover rate was 13 percent during the 2007 second quarter, versus 14 percent in the previous three-month period.
Both large TL and LTL fleets experienced reductions in total employment during the second quarter of 2007, a trend that started during fourth quarter 2006 for the TL sector and in the first quarter of 2007 for the LTL industry. As freight has softened, both large TLs and LTL carriers have tried to “right-size” their operations, ATA said. The small TL carriers had essentially no change in total employment during the quarter, but they did increase their line-haul driver pool 1.4 percent.
