Pros
Best pay, offers significantly more per hour as a Dock Worker than any surrounding competition. Good Benefits, Healthcare provided by Cigna with options to add vision and dental coverage. Good vacation, immediately after starting you get access to two weeks worth of vacation time that resets yearly. Job Security- LTL freight is a stable and always in-demand job. Certain periods throughout the year freight slows down so you get less hours, but the company compensates with frequent raises and a yearly bonus adjustment for inflation. Uniform plans- Every so often you get a budget alloted for gear through the employee store for things like shirts or hats, and every year you get a budget to get work shoes, either as a discount from wholesale prices or entirely free if it's within that budget.
Cons
Terrible active dock management, Some supervisors have terrible priorities instead choosing to respond to emails instead of clearing and closing trailers that are full while freight gathers, then getting angry that they're running out of dock space as if they haven't been told by multiple people that "Trailer A is full". Some also talk as if you're wasting their time when you need them to force shipment data into the local system, forcing you to wait while they focus on something else. Or instead of staying on the dock, goof off in the office with terminal management while the entire dock system crumbles because only supervisors are authorized to close trailers. Some management holds the increased pay over your head, as if it gives them an excuse to treat you like trash just because you make a couple more bucks an hour than you would somewhere else. Some will call you off the task you're working on and force you to do something they want you to without the e-dock credit, then later try to write you up for not having a high enough efficiency number due to lack of said credits. Such things include back-stripping entire trailers to fix weight distribution, helping recoup freight you never touched, and stripping an unrelated trailer to fill a priority load. Damned if you do damned if you don't on that last one as you'll either get chewed out for not having numbers because you put what you didn't move back into where it came from, or chewed out because you left it there wasting space for other freight. You will not get the chance to leave the dock unless you leave altogether. Yard Jockey and shop positions are always full, and you wont even be considered for the driver training program unless you already have prior experience as either a jockey or a driver. Other positions such as OS&D clerk pay little in comparison to working the dock. You will be discriminated for your efficiency. Either sent home early and miss out on pay because your numbers don't look good enough on paper or forced to stay and work extra because your numbers are good. For some people they even overruled seniority to place them on a staggered shift because they didn't like their numbers. Consequently supervisors play favorites, often giving people they're buddy-buddy with priority over certain things like lift choices and trailers to break or as stated keeping you over to waste what little free time you'll get after work or cutting your hours if they don't like you. You'll get voluntold to work extra shifts then threatened with an insubordination green sheet if you refuse due to other obligations.