I was surprised Wednesday afternoon when I asked Diane at base if they had a run for me in the morning lined up, or if they wanted me to be on “stand by.” For those of you who don’t know, “stand by” involves going to base at 5:30 am and waiting in the driver’s “lounge” (six hard backed chairs) for a regular driver to call in sick and then the “stand by” driver is given that driver’s run. If no one calls in and the “stand by” driver gets no run, then the “stand by” driver is still paid for the time sitting there waiting. The wait time ends at 8am, so the driver gets paid for 2 1/2 hours of sitting and waiting.
Well Diane said no, she didn’t want me to be on stand by, but would I please be up and dressed and wait by my phone at home for a call just in case? Apparently doing that means I don’t get any “stand by” pay and only get paid if I actually get a run! So that shows that the budget has been tightened again and it will be very interesting to see how that works out in the long run! It will be more difficult for me to get last-minute runs because it takes about 30 minutes for me to get to where the buses are parked, then it takes a few minutes to pre-trip inspect and warm up the bus. So I will probably get less work now. That’s a problem because I need all the work I can get!