Despite FMCSA Administrator Anne Ferro’s claim that the transition to new Hours Of Service rules will “go smoothly,” new studies continue to emerge detailing just how severely the new rules will change the industry… and how much it will cost all of us in doing so.
A new study released by the American Transportation Research Institute has detailed just how horribly the FMCSA has miscalculated the figures concerning the upcoming HOS changes. The discrepancy? $322 Million.
The figure cited by the FMCSA states that the industry will see a gain of $133 million dollars per year due to the HOS changes. They claim that these savings comes from a multitude of sources including costs associated with damage caused by accidents both to vehicles and infrastructure. The ATRI study however says that not only will the HOS changes not help, they’ll actually end up costing the industry $189 million per year.
The ATRI also said that these were “conservative” measurements based mostly on the time that average drivers will be losing. Also taken into account in the ATRI study are other factors that the FMCSA ignored such as lost work hours, the limiting of driver productivity, increased congestion on roadways, increased restart times and other costs.
Also cited in the ATRI report is that the whole basis for the FMCSA’s 34 hour restart provisions comes from bad logbook data. The problem is that the only logbook data that the FMCSA collects is from companies who are currently undergoing compliance reviews and safety audits, meaning that the records they keep are highly suspect and often don’t adhere to current HOS rules at all.
For the full report published by the ATRI, click here.
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Figures don’t lie………. but liars can figure. I trust the gov’t. (especially the current version) as far as I can personally throw anyone in it…… a pleasant,but unlikely, notion.
Appropriate that drivers aren’t covered by the Fair Labor Standards Act. The gov’t just cost me more per year then any company EVER has in my 43 years of driving (and not running over folks due to “fatigue”).
Cudos
Personally people, I’ve had enough. I’m tried of the Gov being soooo far up my butt they can taste my breakfast. Everything I own is paid for. I took a local job so I don’t have to bother with this HOS BS and all the rest of the crap OTR driver put up with these days. Making half the money, but I don’t care. I’m home every night and now I actually have a weekend off.
I started back in 1989. It was at the tail end of it, but back then it was a brotherhood. If you broke down you barely made it out of your truck and you’d have three truck’s stopped trying to help. All the common courtesy is gone out here. It’s now every man for himself these days. The industry is being flooded with immigrants for Mexico,Russia and India. These people work for next to nothing, which is helping to kill the market.
The federal government have us so regulated and handcuffed half the time we work for free. There wasn’t anything wrong with the original HOS, 10/8. I drove for five hours stopped for a couple of hours and took a shower if needed, ate a meal. Drove for five more hours and slept for six. I was never fatigued or sleepy. We are more regulated than an airline pilot.
I’m waving the white flag. Good luck to everyone out there and god bless. I’ll be at the house sleeping in my own bed.
I already hung it up. I too got tired of being away from home , paying ridiculous prices for my meals, being expected to run the hours per the E-Log, sometimes past, then having to explain why went over. I decided to stay at home. I can eat with out paying thru the nose, I can go to bed when, I want to, I sure don’t have to worry about explaining why can’t find a wide spot in the wee hrs of the morning, just to explain why !! I also remember the 10/8. I got more rest and was more ready to drive when, I got up. I was not fatigued, I have run under all the new rules, but, I refuse to run under the new ones, so I quit. I now sleep each night in my own bed, my health is improving and have much better, wholesome food..I too wish all the remaining drivers god luck in your journeys and hope that you too find out when enough is enough.
And you know what this report is going to do? Nothing! The FMSCA is going o ram this down our throats ,”To protect the Children”. The answer is simply that that cannot have people who know nothing about trucking, be allowed to mandate anything about it or create rules and regulations to govern it. The restart was fine and was one of the best things they ever came up with. How can taking more rest be bad? because of the potencial of a VERY small number that will use it to drive some extra hours.
The Drivers working for free issue will never go away, because too many Drivers will not rock the boat and stand up for their rights to be paid for what they do. There is nothing else I can say, but if I can make more money being a local driver , having less stress and actually have a life outside the truck and being home every day and off weekends than I could being gone for several days/weeks working 70 hours a week. Then I believe that something is wrong. If these companies really wanted their turnover to go away, start paying $60,000 a year, and I said START. A 70 hour work week should pay more than 40-45k, in my opinion.
On 10-18-05 I just got hired as a company driver. All I knew were 10/8 logging. This one fellow was hired same time as I and helped me study 11/14. I was glad it went up but now its reduced where I lose $50 to $75 per day in pay? Next time they need caviar, I hope they understand why its delivered a day late. Need to put off that party until all the construction is finished in Northeast, sets back my running time, need break. Will they forgive me or just hire another company to deliver on time? You see, it doesn’t matter. You will lost hours, contracts, daily pay, and all because they tampered with HOS. If the newbes want to run by HOS, then let them, but if customers need dependable, fast trucks, they should get them. Gone are the days of 1980.
I came off the road to work closer to home due to family problems. The family problems have cleared and the job I took is an hourly wage. I make more being home every night and saving money on food, etc. than I did when I was OTR. I’m glad I did when I did because of too much BS drivers are being forced to swallow. Thankfully the new HOS will not affect me as much as OTR. Good luck drivers.
I started driving commercial vehicles in 1986. The good old days when truck drivers were looked up to. It is so disheartening to see what the industry has become today. Having done some training of new drivers coming out of the truck driving schools scared the hell out of me. The breed of truckers that are getting behind the wheel today do not have the same respect for the profession and it is exacerbated by the “big” companies that don’t care who they put behind the wheel. As long as you have a fairly consistent heartbeat and breathe in and out once in a while, they will hire you. Then you have the Federal Government messing things up more and more. The clowns making these decision are so stupid they couldn’t find their butt with both hands and one of them up it. I had to come off the road to take care of a disabled parent and was looking forward to getting back on the road. Thanks to this administration and incompetent derelicts in cabinet posts, I’ll stay local and not have to worry about learning new HOS crap every other month. EVERYONE with a CDL, regardless of class, should take a vacation at the same time. Show those people that hate trucks and truck drivers so much what happens when they don’t have the freight where it’s supposed to be.
This is just going to turn into a bunch of angrier and angrier truckers on the road. Persecute a guy enough and he’ll lash out at somebody. Put the majority of these 4-wheelers into the mix, with all of their selfish pushing and shoving and aggressive driving, and you’re going to start seeing 4-wheelers in the ditch, where some angry truck driver put them there.
It is turning into an “Us Vs Them” scenario out here. More and more cars on the road, until the automotive traffic congestion is becoming unbelievable, but with the same lax traffic enforcement standards that police have always demonstrated towards them. It is making drivers of cars become increasing bolder, and very much more disrespectful towards truck drivers.
Crank up regulations against 4-wheelers. Force THEM to be safer! Pound for pound, there are MILLIONS of more tons of cars than there are trucks on the road! I see these signs everywhere about how many highway deaths there have been this year. Somewhere around 900 up near Chicago. Want to guess what percentage of those deaths were caused by 4-wheelers?
We are politically convenient targets. We’re big, we’re scary, we can do a LOT of damage if we’re involved in a collision. But each and every one of us drives over a hundred thousand miles every year, or very close to it. Mile for mile driven, who do you think has the larger number of vehicle crashes per mile? The math is there. All one has to do is scroll back a few months on this very website. Nonetheless, we are mercilessly scapegoated by every politician who is looking to make a name for themselves.
I see people in cars, all the TIME, with cell phones plugged against their ears and roaring down the highway at 10 miles per hour over the speed limit. I constantly see people not wearing their seat belt. I am ROUTINELY cut off by 4-wheelers when I need to make lane changes – because of oncoming traffic, service vehicle or police on the shoulder, or just because I am coming up on slower moving traffic.
The MAJORITY of people in cars are selfish, self absorbed and dangerous! Help US by making THEM pay closer attention to safety rules, PLEASE lawmakers?! We’re BEGGING you!! Please stop picking on US! We’re only doing our jobs! Please help us be safer by making our work place safe for US – by making the 4-wheeling public answerable just as strictly as WE are answerable! PLEASE! HELP US!!!
Anybody who believes the HOS changes will save money need to go back to school and take some basic math. Give me a breakdown so I can see the dollars and “sense” for that calculation. Oh, I forgot they don’t have to justify it….. just trust them. If it turns out to be Erin (which it will) they can just refuse to discuss it.
anne ferro and her cronies are way off base and out of control. this is what happens when a bunch of bookworms and brainiacs start applying theory to the real world. these rules make absolutely no sense and do more to interfere with me getting my job done and delivering on time than to “…help ensure my and the public’s safety…” or whatever they jabber on about.
for instance, in an ideal world, these new rules might make an ounce sense if we didn’t also have to deal with all of the “…union mentality…” and hourly folk out there at the customer loading docks, border crossings (i am US, but run Canada), shippers, receivers, dispatch, etc. who waste away time from our clocks because they can only work in slow gear and get the same pay no matter what – or refuse to take a load early even though there are empty docks, etc.
this all is in addition to the screwed up paperwork, having to scale loads, beat up, rusty old trailers with bald tires, bad wiring, and tandems that don’t want to move – but that we have to get fixed before rolling out of the gate, wrong directions on the gps, weigh stations and everything else that we deal with that eats up our days and takes from our 70.
maybe these idiots will start to realize the errors of their ways when the shelves in their local grocery stores and home depots, lowes and malls are not fully stocked and start to look like the former soviet union because we are not “…legally and safely…” allowed to transport all of the stuff that we bring to them when they demand it. they can’t have it both ways – a 24/7 on-demand lifestyle with a 9-5 delivery schedule.
i think that all this will do is increase my “…running late…” macros due to HOS and even though this is ultimately going to be the companies’ problem with regard to planning, it will surely get passed down to us in terms of fewer bonuses, more write-ups and service failures.
no good can come from any of this.
If all drivers just parked for 2 days you would see a change
” If you broke down you barely made it out of your truck and you’d have three truck’s stopped trying to help.” that was so true back in the day, same thing if a motorist needed help but now with the hours of service regulations, there is not time on the clock to stop.
And I have to agree with John, most drivers are uninformed and there are still a lot that have never used a computer much less a smart phone. unfortunately with MORE regulations being considered for example, EBOR’s, crossing the line detectors, cameras facing the drivers, and possibly biometric detectors in the steering wheel for drivers to just say, “I’ve had enough” before they realize that they went overboard with the regulations.
I got out of the truck seven months ago and I miss driving, however, I don’t miss the BS and I don’t miss being scared every time I go through a weigh station praying that I didn’t burn out a lightbulb since the last time I checked and hope the guy behind the glass is not in a bad mood.
but then again, maybe this will just be another job that “Americans won’t do…”
Would be nice to organize a nationwide strike but nobody will actually have the balls to take part and put a stop to this nonsense.