Fmcsa in 2015

I was given a CDL (From a class 1) by just showing up at the DMV and paying the fee. I have been grandfathered on quite a few things... guess I'm getting old!

 

There is a small (5 truck) company local to me that has looked at the cost of going to E-logs/EOBR/whatever the heck they're calling it today. They determined that if/when this legislation goes into place, they will simply stop running in the US on the date they become required unless an economical solution comes to market. The owner of a local 100 truck company has told his employees that when this goes through he will sell his entire outfit to Day and Ross and retire and his office and shop staff will be laid off.

The combo of E-logs and the Ontario/Quebec mandated 65 mph speed limiter has proved to be the final nail in the coffin for some truck owners I know. I find it particularly asinine that just because I run in Ontario and Quebec sometimes, I can no longer travel at the speed limit in several other Canadian provinces or many US states.

The last company I was leased on to required E-logs. Without fail, every time I crossed the US-Canadian border northbound near my house, the system would flag me for excessive speed when I drove the next 12 miles to my shop. The E-log software being used thought I crossed into the next municipality another 16 miles away and logged me at 108 mph. I had to argue this with the safety and compliance department of the company EVERY MONTH even though the data dump from my unit showed that I never exceeded 65, and couldn't if I wanted to due to the ECU being set to 65.

Even if E-logs actually worked the way they're supposed to 100% of the time, which they don't, there's still the issue that as a rule, WE DON'T WANT TO BREAK THE HOS REGS. Ignorant shippers and receivers FORCE us to break the HOS.

 

with those elogs, there is no way we gonna get home sooner and get from PA to IA in one day. I heard some articles that elogs, it increases harassment.

 

I couldn't imagine being on e-logs nowadays. If they gave you a way to stop your 14 hour clock like you used to be able to it might become more bearable for some drivers. I was thinking about selling my book of business to a competitor and going back out on the road because I missed it. Nothing burns up a 14 hour clock better than a slow lumper, and since you can't stop the clock anymore they can get you in trouble. I might get myself in trouble out there when I start chasing lumpers with a tire thumper to put their ### in high gear so i don't get a HoS violation.

 

I agree the Shippers and receivers are our biggest issue i had a shipper take 3 hours to load pretzels on the truck last week because they wanted to load 7 trailers at once. I ran out of time even on paper i couldn't fudge it , but this and parking is a major issue. I've been in the industry 5 years I'll admit i'm still green but im open to pretty much anything and for me i don't see the elogs as an issue based on my current business model. My carrier doesn't dispatch me they don't even talk to me unless i have a issue with their customers

YOu shouldn't have to like them at all but the fed likes forcing stuff on us no matter how much we fight it. Unfortunately we have to be open to change

If I'm logging off duty i'm either napping while getting load or not working. If i need a break I stop and take it, I rarely use my full 14.

I dont run my nuts off unless im planning to go home. We work similar hours if i push more hours its because i mismanaged time or dealt with absurd amounts of traffic.
I will completely agree with you when i first started with the logs OTR i struggled because i forgot about the fact that i cant' really cheat the system. If I got delayed due to whether the customer has to deal with it I'd call them long before i realized i wouldn't make it. As a company driver sitting a entire day would really suck , as a O/O I'm taking the trailer in and dropping it if they tell me I have to sit another day as a result of weather, I dont make a penny for sitting around, my carrier can resolve that issue with the customer. THESE CARRIERS ARE MAKING A KILLING OFF THE DRIVERS.

I can agree with that last section honestly we need less rules and a better HOS policy the current one sucks. Elogs arent they way to increase safety increasing pay and making these shippers and receivers accountable is.

 

On the other hand, carriers that have already made the switch to e-logs stand to make a killing due to already being accustomed to diapatching within the limits of the HOS. My carrier has been on e-logs for quite some time now, and as a driver I have yet to run into any type of harassment from dispatch. On the extremely rare occasions a load comes across that cannot be done legally, a simple phone call into the office fixes it.

As Clint Eastwood said in "Heartbreak Ridge", React, Adapt, and Overcome.

 

Carriers that run E-logs now have, Lease operators, company solo drivers, and teams to handle time sensitive freight. If there solos or lease operators have any issue delivering in time, they swap loads with someone who can. They have that type of network.

Theses type of company's repesent 30 percent of the trucking industry as a whole. So what happens when you hurt the other 70 percent? You hurt the economy. Rates go up, cost of living goes up. How can anyone think this is good, or improve safety?

The government can't even do their job. They have the worst business model of all time! Why should they screw with mine, in the name of safety. I could think of 10 different things that would improve saftey, but this is not what this is really about, it's control!

 

Elog is not our answer. We shall rebel. Elog's doesn't elinimate cheating. There is some ways of cheating elogs also. IMPEACH Obama. Screw you goverment and fmsa. It's not equal. Soon or later, we'll take the road back to our truckers hands.

 

It would be nice but I don't think it will ever happen. I've been watching for it and it just seems to get farther and farther away all the time. Everyday we lose more and more until we have nothing left. Slowly but surely we are getting there.

 

Yeah, we are slowly getting there until we'll finally get our big advantage over fsma and government.