Schwan's Home Service How they get around the law. Marshall, Minnesota

Drivers are scheduled to work at least 12 to 14 hours straight, there are no breaks every 2 hours and there are no meal breaks.  This time consists of build time, drive time and sell time.  Because the Department of Transportation regulates their shop hours employees are told to arrive at least one hour before checking in and be prepared to stay at least one hour after checking out.  Meetings are not paid.  Work commonly performed before clocking in on a hand held computer (HHC) includes but is not limited to Daily Vehicle Inspections and Reports, preparing "Sorry I Missed You" pads, preparing day dots for regular and intermittent customers, updating a route manifest with dormant customers, customers with pre-orders, and customers who have outstanding accounts receivable, attending weekly meetings, addressing issues from the previous day ie., customers who have moved etc., watching corporate videos and taking online assessments.  Work performed after clocking out includes, perparing banking statements and load requests, documenting daily sales, buying customers, new customers, contest items sold and opera items sold, performing return vehicle inspection and filling out corresponding inspection form, sending sales, and taking deposits to the bank (for which employess are alloted 8 minutes), and filling out daily reports for sales, charges and expenses, filling out a mechanic request form should a vehicle be considered in unsatisfactory driving condition.

Employees are expected to knock on 65 doors for every hour of build time they have, which is time not driving and servicing customers.  Home work may include calling every customer on the route to remind them of their service day, inventory price comparisons, and other work as may be necessary.

Trainees (RSRT's) receive $115 per day.  RSR's receive $50 base plus another $50 if they meet all of their metrics (visiting customers within their assigned time windows @ 70%).  Commission begins at 1% of sales up to the first $900.00 then from there it climbs maxing out at 15% at sales over $2,500.  Some RSR's have gone back to RSRT status because they are losing money as an RSR.

100% of all employees are expected to be buying customers period.  If an employee works 96 hours in a week at RSRT pay schedule they will make $690 or $7.19/hour maximum, however on paper it will only count as 84 hours or $8.22/hour.

The GPS is completely outdated and anything built in the last 5 years at least is not in the system including, streets and subdivisions.  They now charge $1.75 for delivery and yes the trucks are running on propane (1 gallon of Liquid Propane Gas = 270 gallons of gasoline).  Candidates are not re-imbursed for their ride along time (minimum 12 hours) if they are hired.