Stevens Transport Scam, and a Rip-off Dallas Texas

My husband has worked for Stevens for nearly 3 years now. He attended their school where he was told that after a year of service and paying on the tuition loan the balance of the tuition would be forgiven. He went with the alliance team as soon as he could and for the most part was making good money.  He has been able to trade in his truck when significant mechanical problems arise and the company has always put his safety above the load.  Due to what he was told about the loan forgiveness, when they stopped taking money out for his school payment in Oct of 2012, we thought nothing of it and just kept on going.  He became a trainer. One that the students fraught to get.  He even went out of his way to help other drivers and students (usually friends of the student he was training). Were there weeks that he did not make much money due to waiting on loads, yes, we're there times that we had to call in about a reimbursement getting missed, yes, but overall we were happy.  Then this year his truck was hit by another tractor trailer while parked at a receiver. He got hurt.  Initially, things were good, Stevens made sure he got to a hospital, and then back to the yard.  The lease department said "we will suspend your lease so those charges don't pile up while you are off."  We are thinking this is going to work out ok.  The insurance department tells us what they are going to go after the other company for damages including lost wages, and we are thinking this is good.  We do understand that the payment on these things is usually delayed and that is not an issue.  Then the bombs start dropping.  We aren't given all of the paperwork so his short term disability is delayed an extra week and would have been more if we had not been pestering the insurance company.  At this point we were in contact with Stevens nearly every day.  We did not go more than 3 days ever during this whole ordeal without talking to someone at Stevens AND the insurance company. We did not like the first doctor's approach of throw pain pills at it and wait for it to fix itself, so we changed doctors.  We have the right to do this simce we are owner operators. Doctor #2 wants an MRI, insurance takes 12 days to approve the request and turns out doctor #1 closed his claim out so we had to start a new one.  Then we find out that the lost wages is just a courtesy and the other guys insurance does not have to pay that.  At this point we hire a personal injury lawyer to resolve the lost wages issue and to make the medical go more smoothly.  Enter issue #2. Remember the lease department told us they would suspend the lease? Now in fairness they did warn us that after 60 days off the lease would actually terminate that would start a domino effect on some other things, but it was all fixable. However, day 42 the lease gets terminated. We get a nasty letter in the mail about charges we owe Stevens.

First problem we have is there are charges for maintence done to the truck more than a week after my husband was removed from that truck. Secondly, they do a final settlement, but remember they sent him to the hospital while over the road, that was $80 in cab fare that was promised reimbursed.  Nothing was reimbursed on that either.  Third problem was this nasty letter demanding money due to termination, when at this time we knew he would be back before the 60 days was up.  So logically, we go into Stevens to talk with the signature on the letter.  She tells us that it is a stamped signature and she had no idea this letter was going out.  Ummm...sure. Then she tells us the Stevens systems are linear and one person does one thing and another person does another thing etc. but the paths don't cross so while she knew my husband was on med hold the girl responsible for sending out those letters had no way of knowing that information. (Shouldn't this all be in the system under my husband when he is pulled up in their?) In essence the right hand has no idea what the left hand is doing. She sends us to the shop to straighten out the maintence charges that are invalid, and assures us the rest of it will work itself out when he comes back to work.  Fast forward one week to issue number three (today) my husband receives a call from his brother in law saying that an attorney is calling on behal of Stevens that they can't get ahold of my husband (he just talked to Stevens on Friday). When my husband calls the attorney he is yelled at by an over aggressive legal assistant about his tuition bill that is now somehow over $7k.  i dig out all of his old promissory notes, all of his contracts and the information on when they stopped taking payments, and go up to Stevens once again.  This is where I find out you tuition is not forgiven after one year.  Tuition is actually upwards of $8k and Stevens charges 1/2 of that to the student as long as you work for them until your half is paid off (3 years On their payment plan). After your year commitment to Stevens is up you can pay the remainder of you half and leave the company; however, if you just leave, they bill you your balance plus the half they were going to forgive plus 18% interest plus attorneys fees. Going back remember they stopped taking payments from my husband after just one year, so what should be nearly paid off I now find out is still $2995 due to Stevens. (Or over $7k if we don't go back to Stevens). The student center did tell me in writing that they will just forgive the loan in full due to the several mistakes made (payments stopped and it going to collections when my husband was on med hold) when he returns to work this month.  Our problem is we are not at all sure we want to stay with a company that the right hand does not know what the left hand is doing, that sends out threatening letters that are not correct nor should they have gone out in the first place, that can let someone not pay on a debt for over a year and a half and then demand payment in full when the unsuspecting party is off work due to injury on the job! If he does not go back we are stuck with $7k in tuition debt that we believed was paid in full. If he does go back they say they will take care of him, but how can we trust them after so many mistakes?