Dot audit coming!! Help please!!

We were asked how big the the lettering for the numbers on the truck had to be.

 

First and foremost - don't panic - just RUN! Just kidding there. Try to smile (and not laugh out loud) when they "gig" you on something so stupid that you really want to just day WHAT! I got gigged because the medical examiner marked the medical exam as renewal instead of pre-qualification. I got gigged over not writing the truck/trailer information on the outside of the folder - year, make, model, VIN, tire size and unit number - even though the folder had a label on it with the year, make and model and each inspection sheet inside the folder had all the information on it. It has to be written on the front of the outside of the folder. They just had me randomly pull out some trip sheets with fuel tickets and looked them over and fortunately the ones I picked were fine.

Oh, and they didn't "gig" me but suggested that I get a file cabinet with a lock on it for driver files and employee files. Since my husband is the driver and I am the employee and our office is in our house there seemed to be a concern that we might have somebody visit who felt bored enough to get into the file cabinet and read our files.

You can prepare and prepare and they will keep looking until they find something so just don't get too worked up about it. None of these horrible disregard for the "rules of the road" to keep us from passing but enough to get a letter from the DOT advising I needed to correct the issues that were found.

 

I was the same way and after it was over I was like why did I stress so much

 

I don't think that online audit is the real one, at least it wasn't for us. We (the place where I'm working) did that one a few months ago and today we had a real audit. She came to the place of business and spent hours going over files. We have three trucks (car carriers) and seven drivers.

She was an officer, not an administrative person. I mean patrol car, gun and everything, and very stern demeanor at first. Once she saw things were pretty much in order she relaxed, but it was very stressful at first.

She pointed out a few things and even failed us on maintenance records, but we passed overall. She said now we will be left alone unless something triggers a compliance audit, which according to her would go even deeper.

That OOIDA checklist helped a lot.