Okemos Corners

Lenny Wagner

PMTG suffered a devastating loss with the sudden death of Tri Star driver Leonard (Lenny) Wagner. Lenny as he was known by all his friends, passed away February 14, 2007. Lenny began his career with Tri Star in December 1997 and had been driving commercially since 1959. He had just celebrated his 66th birthday at the end of January. Lenny and his family called Defiance, Ohio their home.

Thousands of people come in and out of your life over the years, and many are soon forgotten, if noticed at all. Then there are a select few that you meet, get to know and never, ever forget. Lenny is one of those rare people that I will always remember. First of all, I will remember his identifying Mohawk haircut. Then there was the way he rolled up the cuffs on his short sleeved shirts. I always thought he did that because the sleeve wasn’t big enough to hold his bicep muscles. Lenny had arms that any 20 year old would have been proud of. One day when Lenny came into my office, sporting that big grin, I jumped to my feet to greet my old friend. We shook hands and I thought he would bring tears to my eyes. Lenny had a grip that could crack walnuts. I never told him, but my hand was sore for two weeks afterwards, and he wasn’t even trying.

The thing I will remember most about Lenny was his attitude and his love for his family. In an industry where it is easy to fall in with the naysayers, Lenny was a class act, always displaying a smile and a positive attitude, a true professional. I never heard Lenny say anything negative about anybody or anything. When friends come into my office, the conversation will always turn to their interests. With some it might be fishing and others might be cars or woodworking. With Lenny the conversation always lead to his family and his grandchildren. He loved to talk about things that were going on in his family. You could see the excitement in his eyes as he would tell his stories. Many men love their families but Lenny made his love obvious to all he met.

My first thought at the news of his passing was “His poor family”. If they loved him, as I’m sure they did, like he loved them, this would be a terrible loss. Our thoughts and prayers are with the family that Lenny loved so much.

About two weeks ago when Lenny was last in my office, he mentioned that we had forgotten to mention his birthday in the newsletter. He said his wife noticed that we had forgotten it last year too and jokingly suggested that Lenny really didn’t work here at all. I promised we would mention him in the next edition and put poor Betty’s concerns to rest. In a million years, I never would have thought this is how it would happen.

Gods speed old friend, we will miss you but we will always remember.

Bruce E. Eldridge
Recruiting Manager

Restructuring in HR

If you have called into the Okemos office lately with a question regarding benefits, you may have noticed some changes in personnel. In an effort to be more efficient while providing better service to our employees, we are proud to introduce Kim Heisey as our new Benefits Administrator. Kim will be your go to person for questions, issues or status changes regarding medical, dental, basic flex or 401k benefits. Kim is new to PMTG and brings with her a wealth of benefit experience. If you haven’t had the chance yet, please welcome Kim to the PMTG family. Kim can be reached at extension 566.

Other responsibilities once handled by Human Resources have been transferred to the Safety Department. Safety Manager Cathy Lemon will now handle all workers compensation claims as well as unemployment claims, FLMA (family medical leave act) and tracking leaves of absence. Cathy can be reached at extension 528.

If you haven’t had the opportunity to meet either of these hard working ladies, please take the time to do so during your next visit to the Okemos office.

The rest of the HR department stays the same, concentrating on driver recruiting and retention, uniforms, marketing, communications and constantly striving to make all our drivers prosper with the Recruiting Makes Cents program.

Recruiting Makes Cents

The results are in on the 2006 Recruiting Makes Cents Program. Eleven drivers earned recruiting bonus money ranging from $7.51 to $692.24. Bonus money totaling $1,995.92 was paid for 199,592 miles driven by referred drivers.

BMT driver Mike Ford led the pack of eager recruiters earning bonus money for three referrals.

Recruiting Makes Cents is a driver recruiting incentive that pays the recruiting driver a penny a mile for every mile that a referred driver drives for as long as both drivers remain employed by the company.

If you refer an applicant that meets our hiring criteria and that applicant is hired. You will earn a penny a mile for every mile that new driver drives for as long as you’re both with the company. You will start to earn bonus money with the first mile they drive. If the driver you referred drives 100,000 miles per year for 10 years you will have earned $10,000 in bonus money for just that one driver. Recruit 10 drivers that drive 100,000 miles per year and you could pay off your house. The earning potential is unlimited.

Congratulations to all 2006 bonus recipients, good luck and good recruiting in 2007.

Any questions about the Recruiting Makes Cents Program should be directed to any of the smiling faces in the recruiting department, who by the way are not eligible for recruiting bonus awards. Bummer!!

Maintenance Phones

Drivers have recently called in and complained to Brenda that when she answers the phone & can’t assist w/ their breakdown problem, “she’s wasting their cell phone minutes & shouldn’t be answering”? On the other hand if we allow the phone to just ring until Steve or Mitch can get it, they’re aggravated that there isn’t anybody here? We are aking the drivers to be patient.

Brenda asked after that call how to handle the phone ringing? Dave instructed her to continue to proceed as she has been. If drivers could try to understand that maintenance is dealing with many truck & drivers issues and maintenance is acting as professional as they can. Cold weather like this past weekend & yesterday multiply the calls that come here. Getting through may require a little patience. With more lines than Road Support staff, our phones were 100% full several times yesterday. We never just let the phones go, nor do we answer quickly to burn up a cell phone plan. Thank you for your patience.