conductor

dispatcher

manager

crew member

intern

Union Pacific

Rampant cronyism and favoritism as far as jobs/trains and dispatching are concerned.

The same employees get the gravy jobs while everyone else works on their rest with no time at home and rot on trains for 12 hours or more most days.

On call 24/7/365 with no set schedule or days off.

Management lies to write you up to make discipline quotas and have absolutely no regard for you or your families livelihood.

They absolutely work to terminate you as soon as they hire you and have managers/supervisors that have been proven to be dishonest and still have a job.

The majority of management has little to no experience doing your job and have absolutely no respect for the employees or the job they do.

They tell train crew employees that they are overpaid crybabies because the company requires them to be on a short leash many hours and days in a row as well but their insurance is terrible, but they have set days off. 

You will work the majority of weekends and holidays unless you layoff sick and become subject to an attendance investigation under an attendance policy that only states that you are expected to work full time and protect your assignment.

The reason for not giving actual guidelines for attendance is that they are afraid people would follow them.

Full retirement isn't until age 65-67 after 30 years of service so if you are older full retirement isn't an option unless you work into your 70's.

Also, railroad life working on call with no set schedule forever is very unhealthy and proof of that is that the average retiree only draws 18 months of retirement before they die.

If you are considering working for Union Pacific know that you will be furloughed constantly and that their current junior employees have been furloughed for the majority of the last 5 years.

Everything is a critical rules violation and 3 strikes your out.

No matter what they promise you do not take a job with Union Pacific unless you have nothing else or can live without steady income for years and have no other options.

All of the reviews on here and glassdoor about management being dishonest and attempting to terminate you on a daily basis are absolutely true and cronyism and favoritism is rampant regardless of how much, or how good of a worker you are.

If you are not a Facebook friend and regularly suck up you will work all the worst trains and spend twice the time on trains and out of town as the suckups do and there are only a small amount of good jobs and the same people work them all the time while everyone else works twice as much for less.

While you are rotting in a train 10-12+ hours coming and going while the chosen few will ride in vans deadheading out of town and home without touching a train and make held away time for being out of town and more money, while you are working on your rest.

If I had to do it all over again knowing what I know now, I wouldn't of even considered it.

Be forewarned because if you are older like I am, it will waste your prime working years and leave you trapped seriously limiting your options.

If you are under 40, consider going back to school or taking a job that pays less with a regular set schedule where you can have a life outside working for UPRR.

On call 24/7/365 will take its toll on you and your family and relationships fast.

After the second year your friends and family won't even call you anymore about events and gatherings because you will be working, sleeping, out of town, or rotting on a train staring at a red signal for several hours waiting to yard your train.

I have never worked anywhere in over 20 years, that so inexplicably practiced such extreme cronyism and favoritism.

You will never know when you are going to work or when you will get back home, ever.

Train lineups are a joke that aren't even accurate within 8 hours most of the time.

Unless your marriage is very strong and you do not have a tendency to drink then you should avoid Union Pacific railroad like the plague.

If you get a chance, talk to a current train crew employee and the first thing that you will notice is the sunken baggy bloodshot eyes and poor short term memory due to the sleep deprivation that comes from NEVER having a schedule or knowing when they are going to work.

If you talk to a veteran train crew employee after 2 weeks of vacation time they don't even look or speak the same because they aren't sleep deprived and have slept on a regular schedule and their memory and health has begun to recover.

You have been warned so if you decide to work for Union Pacific after reading this don't blame anyone except yourself when you are constantly tired and cannot make a single appointment, family event, or be their when they need you the most.

First off this company pays an above average salary compared to other jobs without an education. It is also slow paced if you follow all the rules which everyone should to be safe. The problem is quite a few employees are in a hurry to complete the work in the hopes they can go home early or sit around doing nothing for a full days pay. This creates an environment where employees are doing very unsafe things and pressuring others who aren’t to conduct themself in the same manner. They don’t do this to new employees but as a new employee you see unsafe practices almost daily. Not all of these unsafe behaviors will end up with an employee hurt but a lot that I witnessed would if something had gone wrong. The thing is the railroad is an unforgiving industry when an injury occurs. The injuries that occur there due to unsafe behavior usually result in a severed limb or dead. Due to the severity of what kind of injuries you subject yourself to and high numbers of unsafe employees I don’t think the company pays a fair salary. The other difficult aspect of this company is that you must put them as number 1 in your life and everything else is a distant second to them. If you are single or can’t stand your family then I’d say this job is perfect for you. They place you somewhere else than where you were hired out for after training. In my case 5 hours from home. You are an oncall employee so must report within 90 minutes and have just 10 hours of required rest time before they can call you back to work again so as you can see in my case there is no way to go home. You have no scheduled days off unless you work 6 days in a row which they can reset this count if you have not been called for 24 hours to work. Basically you will have to relocate your family if you want to see them because you can’t ever really go home. If you continue to have your home far from where you report to work you have a few options to resolve this issue. First you can pay for a motel room every night, rent an additional place to stay nearby, buy a camper and try to park it somewhere other than company property because they do not allow this or do what a lot of employees do which is sleep in their car so as to not spend all that hard earned money up on lodging. The company provides free gym membership which in my opinion is for this very reason so you can go shower up after sleeping in your car. This does get better once your seniority goes up but could be several years. I didn’t experience it but employees do get furloughed when work gets slow with no idea of how long before they will go back to work. This occurs to the lower seniority employees so the risk of this gets better once you have a few years in. Management also has issues. Some of the managers make it very clear as a new employee that you are nothing to them. I had a manager tell my group of new hires we have no problem firing all of you for making a mistake. Not the best way to welcome a new employee to the company. They repeatedly beat this into you as new employee that you are walking on eggshells. There is a definite employee vs management culture here also. I did meet some really nice managers but was told by many employees I worked with not to trust any manager because they will throw you under the bus every time. The turnover is very high at this company as well. Less than half of the group of new hires I was hired in with are still employees at this company which was less than a year ago by many months. My group was pretty big so that’s a lot of employees lost by firing and resigning in such a short time. All the negatives I mentioned above is why I decided this company was not a good fit for me. You may have a different opinion or feel the money is worth all these risks and sacrifices. Good Luck!

Many spend their whole lives trying to get in to working at a railroad job, once you are in, they spend every day finding ways to get rid of you. From operational testing to hurry up and finish the train because it has to leave. If it has wheels underneath and the air test passes, highball it. The work life balance doesn’t exist, you are required to work and the balance in life will forever be rocked. You will not have specific days off, I know people whom have worked over 20 years and they are barely getting some of those nice days off. Overtime is mandatory, unless you have seniority you will work every holiday, every time someone calls in sick or doesn’t show up. If there are people on medical leave, chances are the youngest will work all the overtime to cover that job. In this industry you have to cover your a55, and when you do, you’ll be punished. Example: if you’re working the night shift and you have to take the bigger DoT truck because the other ones are out of service, you will have to do that. It is against the law but you will and if you don’t your future is going to be grim. 

Not everything is bad news though, this job is perfect for someone whom doesn’t have a family to go home to, single, anti-social people are the perfect candidates. Benefits are top tier, back in early 2000’s you didn’t have to pay a fee for insurance but our unions now work for the company so those nice perks are somewhat at a cost, you will have medical, vision and dental. Dental doesn’t kick in until you’ve been there a full year. 

Safety: once upon a time you would get a meal every month for working safe, it went from nice dinners to pizza and Whataburger every month and just recently was turned over to every 100 days as a milestone. Those still get you a meal, the real ones with steak dinners are every year as milestones. We used to have a supply room that was wide open, if you needed a vest, gloves, consumables, chains, safety glasses, ear plugs etc, all you had to do was walk in and grab some. Now, the gate is locked, only a supervisor or a manager can open the gate and when it comes to gloves, you will have to bring your old ones to get new ones and they must be deemed un-usable. They do provide really nice tools to use, Milwaukee gear and boy it’s nice !! Personal tools are hit and miss, you’ll get assigned some tools and take care of them, don’t loan them out!! They are assigned to you and you are responsible for them!!

You will work in all conditions, rain, shine, cold, ice, sleet. If it is raining, we don’t stop, if it is cold or freezing, we don’t stop. You’ll have to be careful while in the yard, so many undocumented people are there in the cars, you find them hiding, you’ll find dead people, people whom have limbs amputated by getting hit by the train, dead animals, very foul smells, leaking hazmat cars and you will come in contact with everything mentioned above. You’ll constantly find strays or just wonderful pets that some poor excuse for humans don’t want. You are not allowed to feed them, we do any ways. It’s not their fault!!

Lastly! 

If you can work in a company that has all the flaws above, you are an indeed a railroader. It is the best job you will ever have! 

Outstanding Career for Those Ready to Commit

Union Pacific is not just a job. It’s a career in the truest sense of the word.

From day one, the company’s culture of safety is unmistakable. Safety is not a slogan here, it’s a lived value that drives decisions, training, and daily operations. The commitment to providing a safe working environment is real, consistent, and taken seriously at every level. If you care about going home safe at the end of the day, you will feel supported.

The benefits are strong and meaningful. Medical coverage for you and your family begins just 30 days after you start, which is a huge plus. Dental and vision follow later, and while they take more time to activate, the overall package is solid and dependable. The pay is fair and competitive for the workload and responsibility, and for those willing to put in the time and effort, it can support an entire household.

One thing you should know going in: training, training, and more training. Union Pacific invests heavily in its people. Training is ongoing no matter how long you’ve been with the company. This isn’t a place where you’re thrown in and forgotten. Growth, learning, and advancement are actively encouraged, and employees who want to move forward are supported.

The career opportunities are vast. Whether your path leads to management, logistics, operations, or other transportation-related roles, there are real chances to advance. Advancement often comes with movement, sometimes to a new city or region, and that’s part of the reality. Travel across the U.S. is very real, and so is the opportunity to build a long-term career that evolves over time.

That said, this job requires honesty about the lifestyle. Long hours happen. Time away from home is real. Living out of suitcases and hotels is part of the job at times. You will miss holidays, weekends, and family events. To succeed here, you need the right mindset and a strong support system at home that can operate with or without you. This career asks a lot, and it’s important to be mentally prepared for that commitment.

Union Pacific can provide a very good living, stability, and long-term growth. But you should understand that in many ways, you are marrying the job. If you are ready for that level of responsibility and dedication, the rewards can be significant, both financially and professionally.

For those who are prepared, motivated, and willing to put in the work, Union Pacific offers a career with real structure, real opportunity, and real pride in what you do.

If you're someone with a heavy machinery background who doesn't have many other prospects for making good money, then railroading may be for you. There is money to be made working for the Union Pacific Railroad, but it is blood money. The work-life balance is rough, but expected. They warn you about the long hours, remaining on call in order to make your full wage, and working nights, weekends, and holidays, and how it makes strains family life. That is understandable for a healthy wage and benefits, but the company has definitely done everything possible to make it feel as if its not worth it at all. 

Railroading used to have a work culture and railroad lifestyle that went along with it, and that culture largely helped railroaders cope with the rigors of the job. Union Pacific corporate management is doing everything they can to remove freedoms, perks, and even everything fair about this career.
Union Pacific has decided to hire a consultant to implement "Precision Railroading," which is the attempt to run a railroad like a warehouse, with high efficiency, and every day preplanned, with as little man power as possible. Union Pacific hired hundred of conductors from 2018 through 2019, telling them they will make good money and that there's little chance of furlough. They were almost all furloughed immediately, and the company knew this. These young men, and some older, left good paying careers because they believed there would be a future with the UP. Instead they took on financial burdens, some with families to care for.  

My hiring class was given our "release to start" date which is a promise of hire, and told to now put in our two weeks in our previous jobs. The union pacific HR rep then emailed us that our training date was pushed back a month, then a month more, and more and more. I waited 6 months before the Union Pacific started our training, 6 months after the promised date. Because I still had faith in a future career, I didn't hold them liable for my hardships I endured, but I never felt like the UP made it up to me. The Union Pacific Railroad should be held liable. I am not alone in feeling this way, but the Union Pacific knows they can deflect responsibility onto other smaller people. The Human Resources person who was responsible for organizing new hires and communicating all that bad news to us was laid off shortly after. 

I have since resigned from my position and pursed a career that I'm very excited about. Although I miss the work, former coworkers, even a few of the managers who were good people, I thank the Union Pacific Railroad for being so poorly run that I knew to waste no time seeking other opportunities. If someone looking to work for this company finds my review and changes their mind, then I'd feel like I did my job sharing the truth.

The idea of senior employees (20 plus years) are absolutely not taken into consideration. If you offer suggestions on how to work safer, or more efficiently such as needing locomotives that can actually stop when you apply the breaks, or complain about the leaking oil, or even leaking gas from locomotives (Nov, 2019), you are told to use the unsafe equipment or you will be terminated for insubordination.  

The great managers are kept in low level positions. Sad to say, but many of my coworkers including myself feel bad for these truly personable, self driven great leaders who because they do not push crews to the local high level managements standards, are kept at a low position. They should be the highest paid managers, instead they are denied promotions (already two rounds of cuts and demotions due to restructuring for management). The AVERAGE TIME for new managers before they LEAVE the company is ONE YEAR. It has been this way for years, and Mr. Frtiz as well as his executive team have not intention of fixing the issues that DRIVE AWAY TALENTED MANAGERS. Please, do not join here being a manager and be forced to move to some far away, small town city where the company needs you- ALL TO HAVE YOUR POSITION CUT. 
PLEASE- do not apply to be a conductor, or anything mechanical as the UP has stated they are trying to REDUCE CREW STARTS, which means less trains, which means the need for less employees.  The Union Pacific has publicly stated they are PLANNING FOR AUTOMATED TRAINS ALREADY. Google it if you do not believe me. This used to be an amazing job, where you would come in and work as hard as you could, to get the job done then go home. Now, no matter how hard you work, even if there is NO WORK to do they will keep you for 8 hours as MANAGEMENT believes they pay up for "a full 8 hours", this is not true! Look it up in the MOP upper line agreement (our contract). 
We have literally been forcing our customers to rail. With precision scheduled railroading (PSR), small companies are being cut out of our business model. In fact, our company brags about adjusting customer behavior. Again, google some articles about this! We are driving out customers trying to adopt PSR to merge with the CSX to become a transcontinental railroad. We have lost so much talent, and so many lives unnecessarily all over the false belief that longer trains, and less crew starts is the "only" way to railroad. 
HR department is almost nonexistent. If you have a problem with your healthcare, you are in trouble (like my family). If you have a problem with employees being harassed your only recourse is to consult the local union, but the bad/bully managers continue to remain employed.

Typical day.. Until you are called for a train or a yard job, you sit at home ready to go work unless you can predict when they might call you to come in.  Trains have a lineup you can watch by signing in to the system and if your in the yard you will watch a listing of all the jobs for the day and try figure out what job you will be needed for.
Then once you go in, on a good day, you will go right to work.  But sometimes you will sit around waiting until things clear up before you can get started.  It can become very tiring before you get started because you have been sitting around for a while.  When you do, you can be sure that you will be at work for a whole 12 hour shift.  Some days are better than others.

With managers, they are not helped out much and seem only to work by trial and error.  They are put in a stressful situation and tend to project that stress upon the employees they oversee at times.  But for the most part many of the ones I have worked with have been fair to me.  I understand that for them it is their job and they were trying to do the best they could with what the had to work with.

The people that you worked with were all good people and just wanted to do their work and go home at the end of the day.  Everyone knew how you felt when you were there because they all deal with all the situations you were dealing with at one time or another.  No one ever really gave you a hard time or made thing difficult if you needed guidance.

Hardest part of the job was the schedule.  If you like money and didn’t have someone who wanted to see your face every day, It a good job for you.

What I enjoyed the most about the job was the people around me along with a decent salary.  Even though you can find that there are other jobs out there that do not require the odd hours, not making you feel like you have no life and never being sure when you will be working. 
On the brighter side, when you were at work you were around like kinds of people that were in the same mindset as you.  

The biggest downfall I see with railroad is the uncertainty of when or if you were going to have full time work. It seems that they have a larger influx of employees depending on what part of the year it is or the economy.  That is what made me think I should seek other opportunities.  I have never worked for a large, union based company before and it has opened my eyes to what I will looking for in the future and how better to prepare myself for the future.

God forbid you get sick or injured in the 30 years it takes to retire I have been with the company for 3 years went out on a medical issue because they pulled me out of service. I was having a off day, I almost passed out from standing suddenly and my vision blurred a little bit. I told my manager that I wanted to remain with someone for safety sake and finish my shift. I went on my rest days came back to "you have to go see a doctor and get cleared" blah blah blah. So I went to a neurologist, cardiologist they tested me for everything under the sun and said your healthy as it gets. 7 months later still cant return to work but they released me with a huge list of restrictions this has made it where the rail road retirement board doesn't have to pay me sickness benefits. Because I have been released I am no longer sick just cant perform any jobs. In turn due to my restrictions there isn't a job that I can do. Its like a loop hole to not pay you, firing you for no reason without firing you. Now i have to see if I can file unemployment and I am  going to find a company that isn't completely worthless. I worked my tail off my whole life heavy equipment huge military vehicles even rockets for a stint and the rail road is an easy gig if you can deal with the garbage and being a scrub for years with no seniority working holidays nights and weekends.  Whatever you do don't confide in a manager for any reason just clock out and go home they will nail you to the wall and you will be SOL. I hope another sector of the railroad finds an edge on this company and buries them I have never hated any HR services or medical personnel so much there completely inept. You cant even talk to a health care professional it ends with hr sending them a ticket online and nothing ever comes of it. I hope I can scare some of you away from the pay my 30ish a hour has probably been more like 15 since I have been out so long. I really wanted to continue to work and get my seniority but now I just want the company to fail miserably. Rant over good luck out there.

Union employees (agreement) do not get the same benefits as non Union employees (Non Agreement).  

Railroad retirement is the best perk of the job. IF You are fortunate enough to earn 360 service months you can retire with full benefits at the age of 60.  Depending upon whether or not your spouse pays into social security or not your spouse is also awarded a pension benefit at the same age worth around 50 % of what the employees pension is.  The pension is awarded to the spouse and employee without having to do 30 years of service.  After 60 service months you are vested with the Railroad retirement board and qualify for a pension at the age of 67 (62 reduced). 

Insurance is cheap $230 for the entire family for medical dental and vision. 

NO 401k match unless you are supervisor level up in which case its a 6% match.  In 2021 they introduced the option to purchase company stock with 5% match.  (Share holders are their top priority NOT EMPLOYEES)
 
No Sick leave
Bereavement is a joke but they do pay 3 days
Vacation is awarded January 1 each year as follows:

1 year 40hrs
2 year 80hrs
8 year 120hrs 1 8hr personal day
17year 160hrs 2 8hr personal day
25year 200hrs 2 8hr personal day

NO paid in lieu of or rolling it over.  Use it or lose it. 

WORK LIFE BALANCE 

The work is stressful and puts wear and tear on your body.  Agreement employees are usually on call 24/7 even if they are scheduled Monday Through Friday. The company is very understaffed and has made it VERBALLY CLEAR it is expected of employees to do more with less.   If you look on the companies website you will see several of the same jobs offered.  They will furlough (lay off) when they need to boost the share holder value and have no concern for your family or personal life.  

I could write a novel on this company and the way it treats its employees.  If you feel you can handle being laid off and the stress that comes with the job you accept then apply.  If you value your family and want a career with great work life balance don't bother applying.  If you know anyone that works for any railroad or see a railroad worker and are curious about the life style that comes with the job ASK them if they value their job or if they wish they chose a different career path.  








Constant revolving door of managers, managers are overworked and under paid. 60-70 hour work weeks, no work life balance, say goodbye to all your hobbies and your family because the railroad will own your time. Omaha has no control over the field managers, the turnover is the worst I have ever seen. Cutting hundreds of jobs walking people out of the headquarters this is normal UP work life from year to year a long career with UP is a person accomplishment!

The field is filled with chaos insufficient management coverage, everyday the crews were lined up with work and it would consistently change throughout the day. Frustrating them and causing a chaotic work environment. The crews and first line managers were constantly micromanaged which was the driver of the frustration to the crews as any senior manager would walk in and change the Manager/ yardmasters plan. No autonomy for the crews to do their job constantly being tested on rules so much that it hurt production.

Managers backstabbing, no team building, every man is on their own.
Managers and crews are under constant threat of being fired, overworked, managers and Omaha do not listen to feedback to improve jobs. Crews have stopped even trying to communicate with management as their concerns fall on deaf ears.
Control and command management style is very much alive and well and they are the ones getting promotions. Good ole boys club they form alliances to further their careers and help each other advance.

Serious divide between the crews and management when it comes to trust. Crews work hard for the more part get no personal recognition. Each department is compartmentalized, doesn't work well as a team especially when management is finger pointing whose failure they believe it is on any given day.

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