Fleet Management News & Business Info | Commercial Carrier Journal
Issue link: http://read.dmtmag.com/i/725427
60 commercial carrier journal | september 2016 BUSINESS: STOKING THE LOG FIRES effect in which officers give only scant attention to their e-log during inspections. The phenomenon has been so prevalent that a participant at a 2012 American Truck Histori- cal Society show in Tennessee was observed with a "powered by e-log" message painted on the driver-side door. But the operator was not using e-logs. In two states where hours enforce- ment is heaviest, Oregon truck-en- forcement program manager David McKane and Major Jay Thompson of the Arkansas Highway Police both deny a selection bias affecting small carriers. They also believe sophistication of safety programs at larger carrier levels, with personnel dedicated to emphasizing compliance among drivers and other staff, might well be a more likely culprit for their lower violation rates. The enforcement disparity by fleet size is partly a result of evolv- ing regulatory matters. It could hold greater importance as an intensify- ing dynamic plays out at the inter- section of hours recording and regs enforcement. Last December, Congress pulled from public view the CSA Safety Measurement System's categorical percentiles and alert symbols, pend- ing a review and possible revamp of the program. But the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration continues to move forward with its long-planned Safety Fitness Determination safety rating system. That system would lean in part on roadside inspec- tion/violation data to make the ratings. The system would replace today's Satisfactory, Conditional and Unsatisfactory ratings with a single Unfit determination. Any carrier not labeled Unfit would be presumed fit to operate. Most small fleets, meanwhile, are waiting out another rule. FMCSA's electronic logging device mandate is set to require use of ELDs in Decem- ber 2017. With the clock ticking, many mid-size and large fleets have made the ELD transition or at least started. Most small fleets are delay- ing, hoping that the Owner-Oper- ator Independent Drivers Associa- tion's legal challenge to the mandate will succeed. Oregon's McKane estimates "that about 20 percent of the carriers we contact use some sort of electronic log. That in and of itself does not prevent logbook violations." As evidence, McKane shared a photo/scan of a cell-phone message indicating an e-logging fleet's back- office manipulation of a driver's In 2015, carriers with fewer than 20 trucks, while accounting for fewer than 20 percent of all trucks on the road for-hire, received 60 percent of all hours-of-service violations. Use of electronic logging devices, which have proliferated among larger carriers, appears to play a key role in compliance. TOUGHEST STATES FOR MOVING VIOLATIONS FOUND AT ROADSIDE Delaware Speeding Indiana Speeding Illinois Speeding Oklahoma Speeding West Virginia Speeding Michigan Speeding Idaho Speeding North Dakota Speeding Tennessee Speeding New Mexico Speeding 25.4% 16.3% 22.1% 15.3% 16.6% 10.6% 14.1% 11.1% 12.9% 8.1% 12.8% 8.2% 12.1% 7.4% 10.9% 5.1% 10.9% 6.8% 10.4% 6.8% % is share of all violations Moving violations totals have been falling the last two years in the federal system, according to CCJ's most recent analysis. However, with a decline in overall violations, the national aver- age of moving violations as a share of all viola- tions, 4.6 percent, held steady between 2014 and 2015. As shown here, speeding accounts for the majority of moving violations in all the most intense states for traffic enforcement but for North Dakota, where speeding violations are less than half of the total. Smaller carriers, bigger violators Shares of all hours-of-service violations issued in 2015, by carrier size. 1-4 trucks 28% 5-9 trucks 17% 10-19 trucks 15% 500 and more trucks 5% 20-49 trucks 17% 50-99 trucks 9% 100-249 trucks 7% 250-499 trucks 2% Source: RigDig Business Intelligence