Truckers and Travelers

Hello, Fellow, Drivers!  I hope you are moving along with holiday plans that you’re looking forward to.  I saw this article in the latest issue of Land Lind Magazine by OOIDA, of which I’m a member.  It seems that in 2010 to get trucking authority you will have to be aware of these new high tech additions to the FMCSA’s enforcement of trucking authority compliance.  I want to share this article in three parts.  So for the next two days, I will be posting another part of this lengthy article on my blog. 

I also wanted to ask my faithful readers if they had any specific topics that they would like to see covered here on this site.  Please feel free to email me at truckersandtravelers@gmail.com.  I welcome your questions and comments.  The goal with this blog site is to have a place for drivers to find valuable information that will help with your trucking business success.  Enjoy the read and remember to be safe out there!

December 2009/January 2010

Cover story:FMCSA takes enforcement to the digital age in 2010

By Jami Jones
Senior editor

 With technology morphing the way we live our lives at warp speed, it’s no big surprise that the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration has decided to go high-tech with its compliance enforcement.

Currently, the odds of being hit with any substantive on-site compliance review are somewhere between slim and none. Because of the lack of staffing and the cumbersome nature of plowing through mountains of paperwork, each year FMCSA officials are able to conduct compliance reviews on fewer than 2 percent of the motor carriers in the U.S.

Enter the technology knight on a white horse – CSA 2010 – short for Comprehensive Safety Analysis 2010.

Back in 2004, FMCSA officials started developing a data-driven system of analyzing all inspection reports on motor carriers and drivers to identify trends of non-compliance.

The mega database system, with all of its algorithms and programs, will spit out monthly safety ratings for companies and drivers. Those who crop up with numerous violations – ranging from the not-so-serious to out-of-service – will pop up on FMCSA’s compliance radar.

That doesn’t necessarily mean you’ll get a full-blown on-site compliance review. Depending on the severity of the rating, you could get anything from a letter telling you to straighten up your act to the dreaded on-site review that likens to an IRS audit.

Companies will have a chance to get it together and report back to FMCSA to keep a good safety fitness rating. There are three proposed fitness ratings in the 2010 program: “unfit,” “marginal” and “continue to operate.”

The overall concept is simple enough but, as with anything, the devil is in the details – and with CSA 2010, there are a ton of details.

The program can be broken down into the data, the math behind the number, enforcement, safety fitness determinations, and the possible hiccups that motor carriers and truckers could encounter along the way.

The following is the first in a series of articles that will explain the ins and outs of the new enforcement program bearing down on the trucking industry. 

The data

It seems like nowadays everywhere you turn, some group, business or government entity is collecting data on you.

Credit agencies record your every financial move. Grocery stores track your every purchase with their “shopper cards.” And now FMCSA is going to collect every single mark made on your inspection reports – for both the company and the driver – and from crash reports.

FMCSA will calculate the safety performance of motor carriers – which includes owner-operators running under their own authority – based on seven Behavioral Analysis and Safety Improvement Categories. Those seven categories, dubbed BASICs, and the federal regulations they relate to are:

Unsafe driving (Parts 392 and 397);
Fatigued driving (Parts 392 and 395);
Driver fitness (Parts 383 and 391);
Controlled substances/alcohol
(Parts 382 and 392);
Vehicle maintenance (Parts 393
and 396);
Cargo related (Parts 392, 393, 397
and hazmat); and
Crash indicator.

Data from those seven areas will be collected from inspections and crash reports.

Things will change dramatically in how information from inspection reports is handled. While the current system only calculates a compliance rating based on “out-of-service” and moving violations, that won’t be the case with CSA 2010. All violations included on inspections will be entered and considered– no matter whether it was an out-of-service violation or not.

Another significant change from the current enforcement system is that FMCSA is aiming to hold companies and drivers equally accountable for their roles in safety and performance. So CSA 2010 will also be collecting data on individual drivers.

Records on individual drivers will contain data gleaned from inspection and incident reports. The data will follow the driver no matter how many companies he or she works for.

Access to a driver’s profile will not be restricted to safety inspectors, who will have roadside access to those records. Motor carriers are also going to be allowed to review a driver’s record in the pre-employment screening process. That access will start in December.

FMCSA’s goal with the new driver data collection is to target enforcement on individual drivers with serious violations, such as driving while disqualified, driving without a CDL, making a false entry on a medical certificate, and chronic hours-of-service violations.

The system will hold 24 months of citation and violation data on motor carriers and 36 months for drivers.

All of this data will be housed and maintained by a third-party vendor, not FMCSA. NIC Technologies based in Olathe, KS, was awarded the contract in mid-October.

According to FMCSA, if a motor carrier wants to review a driver profile, they must obtain a privacy release from the driver. Drivers who want to review their own profile must contact the third party vendor or file a Freedom of Information Act request with FMCSA.

NIC’s press release announcing the awarding of the contract stated that the company anticipates charging motor carriers a subscription fee of $100 per year for access to driver profiles and a $10 transaction fee for each record pulled. Drivers will not be charged the annual subscription fee; however, additional fees will be charged for fax or mail requests.