Hours of service questions and answers

Ok here is one confusing me and I haven't used it for fear it will mess up my hours down the road. I am talking about the 8/2 split sleeper berth option. Our company runs qualcomm (new concept for me used to paper logs) and of course it will bark at you when you need to do something. But a good example is I got down to 15 minutes left on my 14. I did a post trip and went to sleeper berth. My status showed although I had 15 minutes left the total driving time was an hour and a half. My destination was only thirty minutes away. A coworker told me that after 8 hours in the sleeper you would get your remaining drive hours back. So I figured 30 minutes away 1 1/2 hours drive time I could get there before they opened take my last 2 hours to get my ten and then get the regular 10 hour reset. Well after 8 hours sleeper when I woke up I didn't have my 1 1/2 I had over 6 hours. I didn't understand what the heck was going on and didn't want to screw up my hours so I laid back down for the remaining two and then drove to destination (which traffic was light and I got there 10 minutes late but they were still closed) what is the real deal on this sleeper berth split option?

 

First, if you have a continuous 8 hours in the sleeper, your hours will look the exact same as when you started the 8, as long as the 8 isn't the 2nd part of a split break. For example, you go into the sleeper at 0100 with 1.5 hours on your 11 and .25 hours on your 14, at 0900 you would have that same 1.5 and .25, you would still only be able to drive 15 minutes before your 14 ran out.

Now as far as having over 6 hours when you get up, I would imagine at some point in the shift prior to you taking your 8 in the sleeper, you had a period of 2 or more consecutive hours of off duty / sleeper. In this situation, once you take an 8 hour break in the sleeper, it completes the 10 hour break that the 2 started, and starts your shift from the end of your 2 hour break. Now at some point in the day if you take another 2 hours off duty, than the 8 becomes the first part of the break, and your 11/14 will start at the end of the 8.

Example:

Start a shift with a fresh 11/14 at midnight, do a 15 minute pre trip and then drive.

At 0600 go in the sleeper for 2.5 hours for unloading. (AT LEAST TWO HOUR BREAK to 0830)

Drive an hour to do a 15 minute drop and hook pick up. (now 0945)

Drive 2 hours until 1145, stop at a truck stop, do a 15 minute post trip, and go into the sleeper at 1200.

At 2000 you will have an 8 hour sleeper break. Since you had a break of at least 2 hours earlier in the day, they combine to make a 10 hour break. Your current 11/14 hour clocks will have started at 0830, and would have been paused for the 8 hours you were in the sleeper. So you would have 8 hours on your 11, and 10.5 on your 14.

After this drive until 2100 for a delivery, and go off duty until 2300. (TWO HOUR BREAK)

At this point the 2 you just took for unloading completes a 10 hour break with your 8 in the sleeper. Your 11/14 clocks now start 2000. and you will have 10 hours of your 11, and 11 of your 14.

In the above example, the 8 hour sleeper is used in the calculation of 2 different 10 hour break periods. One including the early 2 hour break, and one including the later 2 hour break.

 

If he came out of the 8 with 6 hours showing, then there must have been a long enough off-duty break to count as the 2-hour portion of the split during his duty day. It would have been legal to start rolling at the end of the 8, wouldn't have messed with his hours (2 hours off-duty at the receiver would have given him a nearly fresh clock) and he wouldn't have been late.

 

That does explain it a bit when we show up to say a rig or pipe yard sometimes they will unload us quickly and sometimes the forklift operator is not even there so there are sometimes after I show an unloading time of ten twenty minutes I might be there three hours waiting to unload I guess the confusion I was having was off duty/sleeper I thought you had to show sleeper all the time to actually use the split. Makes sense if off duty and sleeper could be considered the same thing if you aren't driving or performing work duties.

 

You only have to show sleeper for the entire 8-hour portion of the split. The 2-hour portion can be any of off-duty or sleeper, or a combination of the two. Remember, the 8 and 2 are MINIMUM times for the split... they can be longer, but whatever length the "2" is does come off of your 14.

 

Used to doing logbooks, but have recently had a schedule change whereby I will begin just before midnight and finish after. So my hours totals will be spread out over two days. How do I reconcile this? If I log an hour or two on duty on day 1, the total HOS for that page doesn't reflect the day 2 numbers. I appreciate anyone's help w/this.

 

Log it like you drive it. Put the hours on the side of midnight that they belong.

 

Had to read this a couple of times for it to make sense. Must be cause i'm fairly new. Very helpful stuff nontheless!

 

Here is a question for you drivers out there, mostly city drivers. I'm having a little bit of a brain fart here. I do drive away from my home base which could be up to over 100 miles sometimes and then back to the home base.
Sometime I have to go within he city limits from my work location to load a truck, 7 miles one way from the yard to the loading point then returning back to the yard, so a total of 14 miles.
My question is, can I just stay on line 4 (on duty not driving) while i'm in within the city limits ? What FMCSA number covers that ?

Thank You...

 

Question 6: How should multiple short stops in a town or city be recorded on a record of duty status?
Guidance: All stops made in any one city, town, village or municipality may be computed as one. In such cases the sum of all stops should be shown on a continuous line as on-duty (not driving).The aggregate driving time between such stops should be entered on the record of duty status immediately following the on-duty (not driving) entry. The name of the city, town, village, or municipality, followed by the State abbreviation where all the stops took place, must appear in the “remarks” section of the record of duty status.

http://www.fmcsa.dot.gov/regulations/title49/section/395.8?guidance