Hire a class 3 truck driver in Greater Montreal
A straight-truck role fills faster than a semi-trailer role, because the Class 3 licence is earned without a mandatory training program: the pool is wider. The sorting happens elsewhere, on handling, city driving and direct contact with your customers. This page gives you a job description to copy, eight interview questions and what actually derails this hire.
Job description to copy
Replace what is in brackets, then post it as is.
Class 3 truck driver
Location: [city], Greater Montreal · Schedule: [day / evening / night], [number] h per week
Pay: [to be set] (benchmark: median $25.20/h in Quebec, $23.68/h in Montreal (Job Bank))
Responsibilities
- Drive the assigned straight truck on the day’s run, in the city as much as in the suburbs.
- Run the pre-trip inspection when leaving the yard and report any defect before taking the road.
- Load in stop order and confirm quantities against the order slips.
- Deliver and pick up freight at customer sites, with or without a loading dock.
- Use the tailgate lift, the pallet jack and, where available on site, the lift truck.
- Get delivery slips signed and bring returns, pallets and paperwork back to the yard.
- Keep the hours of service record current, or the logs that apply when the exemption holds.
- Flag delays and missed deliveries to dispatch during the run, not once back at the yard.
- Represent the company at the customer’s door: the driver is often the only employee they meet.
- Bring the truck back to the yard, fuel it and hand in keys, paperwork and returns.
Requirements
- A valid SAAQ Class 3 driver’s licence.
- Fewer than 4 demerit points, no suspension or revocation in the past 2 years.
- The F endorsement if your trucks have air brakes, the M endorsement if they have manual transmissions.
- The ability to lift and move freight across a whole run, not just at the first stop.
- Knowledge of the Greater Montreal road network and ease manoeuvring in laneways and tight lots.
- Keeping the hours of service record, or the logs that stand in for it.
- Working French to speak with customers and read delivery slips.
Assets
- Forklift training already completed under section 256.3 of the Règlement sur la santé et la sécurité du travail.
- A transportation of dangerous goods certificate still within its validity.
- Experience with temperature-controlled freight or food distribution.
- Familiarity with a dispatch handheld and electronic signature at delivery.
- A Class 1 licence, to cover a semi-trailer run when the schedule allows.
What we offer
[benefits, insurance, shift premiums, training]
Class 3 truck driver pay benchmark
| Region | Median | Offered in postings |
|---|---|---|
| All of Quebec | $25.20/h | — |
| Montérégie | $25/h | $29.25 (236) |
| Montréal | $23.68/h | $28 (174) |
| Laval | $25/h | $30 (58) |
| Lanaudière | $27/h | $26.72 (64) |
| Laurentides | $27/h | $28.95 (105) |
Median published by Job Bank (NOC 73300) and median offered in job postings (6 months, February to August 2026); in brackets, the number of hourly postings.
Eight interview questions
- Describe your last typical day: how many stops, what kind of truck, what freight?
- How do you load the box when you have twelve stops and the first customer’s goods are at the back?
- What would make you refuse to leave after your pre-trip inspection?
- Tell me about a delivery at a customer with no dock. How did you get the freight down?
- A customer refuses half the order on delivery. What do you do, in what order?
- Do you have the F endorsement, and which air-brake trucks have you driven?
- How do you back into a dock in a narrow laneway with nobody on the ground to guide you?
- In which cases must you keep a record of your hours, and in which cases are you exempt?
Timelines and difficulties
The Class 3 pool is wider than the Class 1 pool, since no program is mandatory before the SAAQ exams. The bottleneck sits elsewhere. First, handling: plenty of licence holders want a role where they do not take the freight down themselves, and a posting that stays vague on this attracts people who leave as soon as they find out how much lifting there is. State the average parcel weight, the number of stops and whether there is a tailgate lift. Second, the trade competes with itself: the straight truck is a stepping stone to Class 1, so an experienced candidate may leave you for a semi-trailer. The nightly return to the yard is your strongest argument, on condition that you write it into the posting. Third, verification: the F endorsement and forklift training are earned separately from the licence, and résumés routinely confuse the three. Look at the licence rather than the CV. Job Bank rates the group’s outlook in Quebec as limited, which does not put a line of qualified candidates at your door: demerit points, the medical file and availability for an early start rule out a good share of them before the interview.
We run this search for employers in Montreal, Laval, Longueuil, the North Shore and the South Shore. Our recruitment service: logistics and supply chain
If the placement does not hold six months, we replace it.
The replacement is on us. You do not pay twice for the same role.
A role to fill?
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