When you are looking into the pay you can earn as a truck driver, one thing you need to consider is whether you will receive benefits, and if so, how the benefits will factor into your overall salary.
This post will explain the different types of benefits that truck drivers can receive. We will then introduce you to the benefits offered by some of the top companies you can work for.
Do Truck Drivers Get Good Benefits?
Yes, truck drivers can receive excellent benefits. Here are some types of benefits that companies may offer truck drivers:
- Health insurance
- Dental insurance
- Vision insurance
- Disability insurance
- Life insurance
- Retirement accounts
- Tuition reimbursement
- Employee discounts
- Paid training
- Stock purchase plans
- Paid time off
- Deals on insurance
- Payroll tax coverage
- Monthly mileage bonuses
- Referral bonuses
Do all trucking companies offer all of these benefits? No. Some companies may offer just a few of these, while others may offer many of them.
This is something you will need to investigate as you are applying for jobs. If you get to the point where you are strongly considering working for a particular company, make sure you understand what the benefits package is comprised of.
Also make sure to ask whether the benefits are in addition to the quoted salary, or if they comprise a part of the quoted salary. Otherwise, you may overestimate the actual pay you will receive.
Trucker Benefits at Top Companies
Now that we have introduced the types of benefits that you might get as a company driver, let’s take a look at some more specific information about some of the biggest employers.
After we finish sharing the benefits information from individual employers, we will give you some tips for how you can evaluate whether the benefits plans being offered to you are worth it.
Costco Truck Driver Benefits
On its careers page, Costco offers the following list of benefits for full-time and part-time employees. This list applies company-wide, so that includes Costco drivers:
- Health care
- Pharmacy program
- Dental care
- Vision program
- Paid bonding leave
- Health care reimbursement account
- Dependent care reimbursement account
- Voluntary short-term disability
- Long-term disability
- Life insurance and AD&D insurance
- Employee assistance program
- Employee stock purchase plan
- 401(k) plan
- Programs to support physical, emotional, and financial well-being
Costco offers the following information about its paid time-off policies:
- Paid sick and vacation time
- Eight paid holidays
- One paid floating holiday to allow employees to observe a day that’s meaningful to them, e.g., Juneteenth, Indigenous Peoples Day, Veterans Day
Alas, Costco does not maintain a page that offers a list of detailed benefits that are specific to drivers. So, this is a question to ask Costco’s HR when you apply to work there (i.e. what they offer in terms of monthly mileage bonuses, fuel cards or so on).
We have seen truck drivers at Costco offer positive feedback about their benefits. For example, one review over on Indeed says, “Costco pays great, pays premium pay for working on Sunday, has paid time off that accumulates by hours worked and can be taken if time is available, has fantastic medical for a really low cost and works their drivers pretty close to 8 hour work days.”
Walmart Truck Driver Benefits
Another big company you may consider driving for is Walmart. Walmart provides specific, detailed information about benefits for truck drivers on its website.
According to Walmart, these are the benefits you can look forward to as a Walmart truck driver from day one:
- Earn PTO immediately—up to 21 days in your first year
- 401K, medical, and dental
- Company paid life insurance and short term disability
- Up to four paid safety days a year
Under “payment for everything,” Walmart lists:
- Leading industry pay
- Activity, training, and mileage pay from day one
- Quarterly safe driving bonuses
- $42.00 for DOT 10 hour break
Walmart offers the following additional benefits:
- No split days off—consecutive days of work
- Variety of schedules available
- Regionalized delivery and home every week
- New tractors are eligible for replacement at 525,000 miles
- Condo style sleepers (except day cabs)
- Fully equipped on-site maintenance facility staffed daily
- Qualified maintenance technicians
Here is a PDF that talks more about some of the benefits that Walmart offers company-wide:
In this guide, Walmart discusses benefits such as short- and long-term disability insurance, a Fitness Pass, free Walmart+ membership, a Personal Healthcare Assistant, free video chat with doctors on-demand, and more.
In short, there are a lot of great benefits that come with working at Walmart, especially for truck drivers. So, this is another company that is well worth looking into.
Amazon Truck Driver Benefits
There is more than one way to be a truck driver with Amazon. You might become an Amazon Freight Partner, or you might become an Amazon Delivery Service Partner (DSP) through the Logistics program.
The DSP page says, “Delivery drivers have competitive compensation of at least $20 per hour at select stations.* DSPs provide their team with full benefits, such as paid time off and health insurance for full-time employees.”
If you work as a DSP driver, you are an independent contractor. The wording here is a little confusing, but it seems to suggest that despite this status, DSP drivers get the same benefits as employees at Amazon.
Amazon also says that as a DSP driver, “By partnering with Amazon, you’ll have access to exclusive deals, services, and best-in-class technology at every stage of your business.”
What about Amazon Freight Partners? If you choose to join that program, Amazon does provide benefits to your team. Amazon states, “We are looking for leaders to run a full-time, hands-on business, hire and coach teams, and operate in a highly regulated and fast-paced environment. Uplift your team of up to 20-45 commercial drivers by providing full-time W-2 employment with competitive pay, healthcare and other benefits, and building a strong safety culture.”
Amazon adds, “Recruit high-performing commercial drivers, pay them competitively as W-2 employees, and provide healthcare benefits and paid time off.”
One more thing that may be helpful to look at are the benefits Amazon offers to its employees in general.
Here are some of the benefits that Amazon lists for its employees:
- Health insurance
- Dental insurance
- Vision insurance
- Life insurance
- Accident insurance
- Financial counseling
- 401(k) plans with company match
- Stock opportunities
- Estate planning services
- Paid time off and paid holidays
- Medical accommodation options
- Discounts for child care and eldercare
- Paid leave for parents
- College expenses (for some employees)
If you visit that page, you can read about these benefits in more detail.
While Amazon seems to suggest that it offers these same benefits to DSP contractors and Freight Partner teams, we are not positive that this is the case. It is wise to contact the company to double-check before you apply.
UPS Truck Driver Benefits
Driving jobs with UPS are highly desirable, in part because UPS is unionized. That means that you can look forward to competitive wages and excellent bonuses.
What’s more, as a UPS driver, you have the union looking out for you. In the future, the union will negotiate to ensure that you continue to receive fair compensation for your labor. Now let’s talk about UPS driver benefits.
Indeed says you can qualify for these benefits if you become a driver at UPS:
- Employee discounts
- Weekly bonuses
- Performance bonuses
- Health insurance
- Dental insurance
- Vision insurance
- Paid toll fees
- Paid time off
- Retirement plan
These are some benefits for UPS drivers according to Glassdoor:
- Disability insurance
- Accidental death & dismemberment insurance
- Supplemental life insurance
- Occupational accident insurance
- Health savings account (HSA)
- Mental health care
- Retiree health & medical
- Flexible spending account (FSA)
- Healthcare on-site
You can also take a look at this page at UPS, which lists the following benefits for employees in general (not just drivers):
- Healthcare (medical, dental, vision)
- Retirement benefits
- Paid time off
- Employee discounts
- Education assistance
- Adoption assistance
- Employee assistance
- Discounted stock purchase plan
As explained in this NPR report from earlier in 2023, “UPS says that by the end of the new contract, the average UPS full-time driver will make about $170,000 annually in pay and benefits. It’s not clear how much of that figure benefits account for.”
When we conducted some additional research using Glassdoor, we found the total pay range for UPS CDL drivers listed between $52,000 and $78,000. Glassdoor also listed the base pay, stating that it was between $48,000 and $70,000. That means there is a difference of $4,000 to $8,000 a year which could all be comprised of benefits and bonuses.
So, you can add UPS to your list of major companies to work for that provide fantastic benefits to truck drivers.
Questions to Ask When Comparing Benefits
When you are looking at the benefits offered before accepting a job, you should not simply note “health, dental, vision – good to go.” You should take the time to understand as much as you can about the benefits. Otherwise, there is no way to be sure that they are going to offer you a worthwhile value.
Below are a few questions that drivers can ask themselves as they are exploring various benefits packages.
1. How much of your salary is accounted for by benefits?
The first and most basic question is the one we have mentioned a couple of times in this post already. You need to figure out what percentage of the salary listed in the offer is comprised of benefits.
Obviously, you want the value of the benefits to be high in terms of dollars—but you do not want it to eat out too large a chunk of your base salary. Basically, you need to make sure both the base salary and the benefits are competitive enough for you to consider accepting the offer.
2. How good is the quality of the benefits?
One benefits package is not interchangeable with another, not only in terms of dollar value, but also in terms of overall value.
As a simple example, let’s say two different companies are offering you two different health plans. The health plans feature similar premiums, but there the similarities end. If you research the plans in detail, you may find one has a much higher deductible than the other, and/or much higher co-pays, and/or other shortcomings.
In a situation like this, if you had just glanced at the premiums, you would never notice that one plan has a far higher value than the other.
There can be similar differences in value between other benefits between employers. So, be sure to dig in and do some extra research.
3. Do the benefits extend to you alone, or to your family?
Let’s return to the example involving health insurance. With some employers, the plan being offered may cover only you as an individual. But with other employers, you might be offered a family health insurance plan that can also cover a spouse and children.
4. Are these the specific benefits you need?
Another question you should ask yourself is what benefits are important to you. It is easy to see a huge list of benefits and think, “Okay, this is the best option, I am joining this company.” But it may or may not be the best choice for you.
There are some basics everyone needs, like medical, dental and vision insurance. But maybe you do not need life insurance, or perhaps you have no use for estate planning services, etc.
You have to remember that benefits, if not listed separately from your base salary, will erode your base salary. So, if you are getting a lot of benefits you do not need, you probably are also being paid a correspondingly lower base salary. That may just not be worth it for you.
Sometimes, it may be more logical to pick the company that is offering a higher base salary with lower benefits, rather than vice versa.
On the flip side, many people really can use all the benefits, especially if they have complicated lives outside of work that might require extra time and expense to deal with.
So, it may be worth it to look for a really comprehensive benefits package. You will just need to think through your scenario and figure out what is most suitable for you.
5. Are all the benefits for you?
If you are going to be working with the company as an independent contractor, do not read the list of benefits for employees with W-2s and assume that all of those benefits are going to be offered to you.
In some cases, companies do offer the same benefits to contractors as they do employees. But in many cases, they do not. Indeed, some companies specifically bring people onboard as contractors rather than as employees to avoid giving them benefits.
6. Do all the benefits kick in right away?
Another useful question to ask is whether the benefits are going to be available to you on day 1 of work, or whether you will need to work for the company for a certain amount of time before they kick in.
Some companies may offer benefits in tiers. You may qualify for certain benefits starting from day 1, and then additional benefits after 6 months or a year of work. The benefits might also become more competitive the longer you are with the company as an incentive to increase retention.
Become a Truck Driver Now
As you can see, truck drivers can receive competitive benefits as part of their pay. Now you have an idea what some of the top companies are offering their drivers. If you want to take the next steps in your path toward becoming a driver at Amazon, UPS, Walmart or Costco, you can continue exploring the guides on our site or you can visit these companies’ official pages to get started on the application process.