New ELM Locators hire-Questions

**benlinus** · March 17th, 2010, 05:35 PM

Hey guys, I found this search after doing a little research on the position of a locator.

I recently was hired on to work for ELM locating. Are they a good business to work for? I'm currently a graduate student and was looking for work while in school. The pay is not great($9/hr), but the supervisor said I could probably get a raise after a few months. Benefits seem decent(tuition reimbursement is a big plus).

Is the training sufficient at ELM? Any other ELM locators on this forum?

Thanks

**benlinus** · March 17th, 2010, 05:36 PM

found this forum*...typed too fast.

**Locate This** · March 17th, 2010, 06:29 PM

$9.00 hr.. U r crazy....

**Mke** · March 17th, 2010, 06:49 PM

ben, your in the dakotas, 9 is manageable. I hope the raise comes in after you get your feet wet.

Mke

**ProfessionalLocator** · March 17th, 2010, 07:10 PM

Originally Posted by benlinus

Hey guys, I found this search after doing a little research on the position of a locator.

I recently was hired on to work for ELM locating. Are they a good business to work for? I'm currently a graduate student and was looking for work while in school. The pay is not great($9/hr), but the supervisor said I could probably get a raise after a few months. Benefits seem decent(tuition reimbursement is a big plus).

Is the training sufficient at ELM? Any other ELM locators on this forum?

Thanks

The starting pay rate, and what they pay later, is good or bad depending on the cost of living in that area. In some areas you can live on $9 an hour and in others you have to live out of your car. Rember that as a raw trainee you will not be making a profit for the firm even at $9 an hour.

**swagman** · March 17th, 2010, 08:08 PM

Good luck !!!!!!

**yahoo** · March 17th, 2010, 09:42 PM

there are some other ELM locaters on here but you will have to stay tuned long enough to find out who they are! welcome to the forum dude!!!! good luck with your new job....

**mattm211** · March 19th, 2010, 08:36 PM

ELM is the only company I've seen hiring for under $11/hr. and those 11 an hour jobs are mostly in the country locations where 11 is actually pretty decent to live on. ELM's city jobs I noticed where going for 9.50. When I got my first locating job with a pure locating firm (SM&P in '06) I started at $14. I left them for about two years and now wanted to come back and wanted to at least hit the $14-15 mark, basically at least start where i left off was my goal. I just got another job at UtilitQuest and managed to do that.

Basically it all depends on what you could live on. I worked for 8.50 at walmart once and it literally wasn't worth it..i wasn't bringing any money home in the end. Personally, I passed on all of ELMs positions they just didn't pay enough. Really i don't even think 15 is enough for the responsibility you take onto your shoulders. I applied for the local sewage treatment plant for an Odor Control Worker that started at $17/hr (a very similar job i did many years ago, but this one was no experience/degree necessary)....but there's other forums to the whole pay debate.

a few of my thoughts:
*good business - some forum posts earlier mentioned there was a company wide 10% pay decrease and they were letting go higher pay locators and hiring all new cheaper ones. is that a good business? i don't think so....
*training - pretty much always good enough to show you the basics, you're going to learn most out in the field. as long as you understand the concept of locating and how it works and you're smart enough to know what's going on you should do well.
*pay raise - if he said you "could probably get a raise" i wouldn't count on that to much, even if you did we're probably talking .25-.75 cents after 6 months probation period.
*benefits - as I've gone from job to job, and year to year, benefits have steadily gotten worse, so be happy they have any i guess. as for tuition reimbursement look into that also, the only time i checked into at one of my previous jobs the only thing they reimbursed was classes that pertained to your position, or maybe helped you advance in the company. ...they weren't going to pay for school and not get some kind of return..
*school WITH work - this can be a tough thing to do. I know someone in graduate school and she'll spend all day writing papers.. i don't know i you have the same type work for your degree, but remember.. this is really AT LEAST a full-time 40 hour job. Add in necessary overtime, heavier work loads in a day, and on-call and you can be looking at sun up to sun down...just don't always expect to get off at 6 or work 9-5.