Truck driving has become a popular job for felons. This can be a life changing career with long term potential and benefits. Freedom on the open road can provide comfort and security as felony job.

According to a recent study, the U.S. trucking industry is now coming out of the recession and is growing at a rate of 4 to 6 percent. By the end of 2011, the industry will need to hire around 200,000 additional drivers.

This is good news for ex convicts who are looking for felon friendly jobs, with some exceptions. There are two types of felonies that will stop you from becoming a truck driver:

1. Distribution of, possession with intent to distribute, or importation of a controlled substance.

2. The use of criminal force such as with a gun or knife.

The hiring of truck drivers is highly regulated by the Federal Motor Carrier Association and if you have one of these two types of felonies you won’t get hired by any trucking company. If you have another type of felony on your record you can still drive a truck and find companies that hire felons.

Before companies that hire felons will consider you, you will have to get a Commercial Driving License (CDL) to become a professional truck driver. There are hundreds of truck driving schools all around the US that can help you get your CDL but before you spend your money on training, call some trucking companies first and find out if they are willing to hire you when you get your CDL. Some truck driving companies that hire felons may even offer to train you for free.

Tips for getting a truck driving job

• Be honest about your record. Assume that all companies will do a thorough investigation of your past driving, criminal and employment history.

• A clean driving record with no recent traffic violations is a big plus.

• Call up trucking companies and not driving schools. The schools just want your tuition money but a CDL is useless if you can’t get hired.

• Try the smaller local companies if you have no luck with the big ones.

• If you get tired of randomly calling companies up, go to a local truck stop and check out their bulletin board. There are normally quite a lot of ads posted.

• You could also approach some of the drivers at truck stops, buy them coffee and ask them if they know of any trucking companies that hire felons.

• There are approximately 500,000 trucking companies in the U.S. so don’t give up if the first few companies don’t respond favorably to your inquiries.

Truck driving can be a great felony job. You must have the desire to go the extra step in order to qualify for high paying felony friendly jobs. We hope that these tips will aide you on your search for truck driving jobs for felons.