Starting over a year ago, almost all commercial trucks in the U.S. have been required to use Electronic Logging Devices (ELDs) to track their time. It was recently discovered that New York State has not been enforcing the controversial rule.
When FMCSA adopts a new safety rule, it requires states to adopt the same rules. But the ELD rule was pushed through so quickly that many states had not yet adopted the rules by the time the deadline was past. New York was one of those states.
A lawsuit was brought by the Owner-Operator Independent Drivers Association (OOIDA), alleging that New York was improperly enforcing the law because in order for state police in New York to enforce the law, the ELD mandate would need to be adopted at the state level as well.
If the lawsuit had gone their way, OOIDA might have been able to prevent enforcement of the rules nationwide – or at least in those states who don’t have ELD rules on the books.
Instead, something very surprising happened. The case was thrown out by the New York Supreme Court on the grounds that New York could not have been improperly enforcing the law because they hadn’t been enforcing the law at all.
“Drivers are not being stopped, cited, or placed out of service pursuant to the ELD rule,” Judge Richard Platkin wrote.
Indeed, NYDOT says that no tickets citing ELD provisions have been issued. Both New York state police and the DMV are also confirming that the ELD requirements aren’t being enforced.
Agencies are saying that inspectors may use ELDs to verify HOS compliance, but that they aren’t able to take data from the device or cite a driver for not having an ELD.
This lack of enforcement is likely to change in the near future now that the cat’s out of the bag.
If you’ve been cited for an ELD violation (not an HOS violation) in New York, let us know in the comments!
Source: ccj, businessinsider, OOIDA
Artee says
Well, thanks for that OOIDA. I support OOIDA but this is going to do nothing but cause delays and problems for the drivers. In my experience, most DOT cops don’t know how to navigate eld’s. Hell, I would bet that most drivers don’t either, beyond what they need to do on a daily basis.
Willie Bristol says
You are so right
Giovanni Socci says
You d be surprised,I ve come across different LEOs in different states and they are catching up at breaking neck speed,one LEO told me that they are all being trained on ELD’s be it Qcomm,PPLNet,JJKeller and whatever other program there is….there is money to be made.
Gus says
You must have a really bad record, I have talked to one dot revenue collector in the last three years
Bruce says
Yeah. ThanksOOIDA for letting the cat out of the bag. Total idiots. Bet they felt really smart when the judge brought them up to date what was really going on. Jaw drop 😂
Joel Long says
They ARE giving violations for not having “inspector instructions” on an ELD. We have one right here on my desk.
Alex says
So if your driver would have them they’d let him go without checking his HOS
Gus says
The HOS are on the screen there is nothing to check, one look at mine are I can print you a copy from the machine.
Jeremy Williamson says
Wasn’t cited in 8/2017, but the NY trooper definitely knew his way around on an Omnitracs. Made sure I had my instruction card, extra log book, and thoroughly went through my graph and questioned some off duty drive time from a few days prior. Guess like always, it’s ultimately up to the man standing there with you.
Garett says
I had a driver get stopped and then go up one aide of him and down the other for editing his eld due to malfunction. The driver didn’t get an oos ticket but did get cited. I’ll have to go dig the paperwork up to see exactly how those crooks had it written.
Allen Carter says
My truck does not go to the 13 Mofia states & the Gold Coast Qreer state.
James says
Good for you.
Cris says
You are like me, you probably go to Florida.
Tom Hughes says
“Mafia” is exactly how to describe those idiots.
Rolando Mota says
I don’t think any state is actually checking the HOS on ELDs to be honest. Back when it was paper logs the drivers at the company I work for used to get HOS violations quite often. We rolled out ELD four years ago and now, nothing. Zero violations! Our CSA scores for HOS is perfect. I love it!
Buck says
Quit the whining they’re here to stay so suck it up or get out of the industry
Willie Bristol says
Until Wal-Mart has a problem
Craig says
Gladly, your industry sucks, regards
The Rail industry
Jeremy says
The outfit I work for operates several “rail float”trailers and has even more “slider rail” trailers.We’re loading and unloading rail industry equipment all day long.Things like Mark III”s,Mark IV”s and ballast regulators right onto and off of the tracks.It’s like the saying goes,”If you bought it,a truck brought it.”
The Trucking Industry
Gary says
I guess the US government likes making the roads unsafe. Implementing this dumba** rule without doing a damn thing about driver pay and the pay structure only made things worse. Of course I’m whining. How much worse will it get before they realize you can’t throw things at the wall and just go with what sticks.
DonM says
ELDs should be banned. Making a man work like a Hamster on a treadmill in hopes to best utilize his allotment of allowable working hours is unsafe and criminal.
Unless you are going to impose a nation minimum wage that a driver can be paid for being in the road and away from home, drivers will always be racing the clock. Not a good situation in a real life application.
Thomas says
U said it very clear fully
Mike R says
We have always raced against the clock that’s part of trucking the only thing that’s different now is we have to race against the clock legally. No more throwing that log away and starting over or running 2 or 3 logbooks at a time unless of course you’re in the live stock or bee transport then nothing is changed your free to drive illegally all you want. It all boils down to if you don’t police yourself someone else will and that’s what the government is doing policing a group who can’t police themselves I’ve always said that drivers or there on worst enemy and it’s true the radar Detector was taken away from us because so many drivers drove like lunatics without regard for public safety they passed mandatory drug testing because so many drivers thought it was perfectly fine to drive stoned without regard to public safety now there making 90% of us to use eld’s Because of so much falsifying of logs. So suck it up buttercups because you all did it to yourselfs
Willie Bristol says
👍 they are trying to do that
Trevor says
True Dat
Nathan says
We have six tractors and get inspected all the time, but I can’t think of any ELD specific violations or tickets, plenty of verbal griping though lol.
Drew says
Yes don’t worry about it we only have a few years left to work anyway after the show on 60 minutes revealed the the robot age coming in the next 10 yrs 50% will be the unemployment rate and truck drivers are one of them to be replaced
Jack says
ELDs are unrealistic. These people or this Cabal are treating us like pets!… I agree that they enforce some sleeping hours..but that’s all the ELDs should do!… It should have one single button that would let them know that we slept 8hs(not 10!) on 24hrs period!..I’m losing between 22k to 27k a year because of ELDs. It made trucking life so much harder. I’m tired of this shirt.. I’m tired of listening drivers lamenting about it and not taking action.
Doc says
Way to go New York!!!!! 👏🏻 Even that state thinks the ELD is a stupid rule!
Glenn James says
Eld rules are necessary for the driver,road service .if it were left up to driver,they would run there heads upside the wall for money.safety is #1.theres no matter degrees in trucking fellows, leave it up to the professionals,be happy someone pays you to do a job for them.remember if you breathing you achieving.
TheRealTrucker says
Shut up stupid.
JohnnyBoy says
hahaha
Mr. Curmudgeon says
There you have it. The only thing missing is all upper case. I don’t mean in the response, I mean in the word real. Supertrucker mentality floats to the top again.
John j walker says
Ooida is jus another bogus agency to get ur money. This move was to get money out of ny state but it will jack everybody else up. We need to quit dishin money out. Do ya know how much ooida top officials make? 100k plus a year
John j walker says
Concerned driver
Mike Mascow says
ELD’s???
What’s an ELD???
Drive old iron. Dont need one.
JohnnyBoy says
Amen Brother
Daniel says
It’s amazing when a massive state like NY pretty much sends the message it’s not something they’re willing to enforce.
Les says
Talk about shooting yourself in the foot, sounds like the OOIDA stabbed a lot of owner ops in the back on this one
Shaun says
Another OOIDA lawsuit thrown out- what a surprise
J.R. says
I been stopped twice since the eld rule started, in PA and in Jersey. Both times they said to me “you running paper logs still?” I said “yes sir” and they never even asked to see my log book. Maybe I just got lucky or I don’t think they’re enforcing eld’s at all around here, NY NJ PA.
Christain Ford Innes says
Hello……………………….
If these elds are rigidly unfudgeable, why is this necessary. Because they are not.
We need to stop focusing on splitting hairs here and talk on the illegality of this ‘rule’. It violates title 42 of the United States Code. http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/2516, which emphatically and clearly states that electronic gps tracking is ILLEGAL unless applied for by authorized Law Enforcement and only by proving that this tracking is because of investigation of murder, robbery or drug dealing. Trucking is not a crime. New York’s Attorney General needs to get with this and file suit with all the other AGs to demand this law be revoked. Forward this to him………….please.
Charlie says
Take it easy on OOIDA, maybe they didn’t catch this one but they do fight for us. Go join the Against Trucking Association and where that gets you.
Trevor says
👍
les_gvt says
everyone is still missing the entire point on ELD’s- these are nothing more than the 1st step into tracking your usage of all POV’s and taxing them at the federal level for the miles they are driven
Super trucker says
This just shows how much power the tech giants have in the government. Money sure does go a long way
Ryan says
I enjoy reading your comments, I work for a company that is spearheading the Autonomous Truck Program. and we are hoping to roll them out in 5 years. While the OOIDA has apparently shot themselves in the foot with this latest snafu… one only needs to remember that they are a dinosaur and just like the T-Rex they are in the process of going extinct. Like most of you drivers who have brought the need for autonomous trucks with the bad driving habits and the bad safety practices. Best thing I can say to the safe drivers is find a company who is going to go autonomous and get trained up because its a reality and companies will need trained engineers to monitor the units and possibly still drive them. When the shift occurs a lot of drivers will be on the bread line due to an inability to adapt.
Paul Thomas says
I’m not really worried about autonomous trucks in my segment. Will they be able to drive 3 miles down a muddy road without getting stuck, load two pickups on a stedeck trailer, and come back out to the blacktop?
Can they chain down a 40 foot hay cutter? Will they be able to blindside around the back of a barn?
Yeah, I didn’t think so.
Trevor says
Scary true.
Hollywood says
Keep Dreaming
Steve says
Moderately humorous. See the problem with people like you is, you’ve never actually been in the cab of a truck. And even if you have, it wasn’t cross country for weeks at a time. You just assume that if you build it, it will work properly. You don’t take in to account the weather, traffic, and human beings who will do anything they want at anytime, including LEO’s who come across 3 lanes of traffic at 80 mph to get off at an exit ramp at the last minute. Good luck preparing for that.
Also, how are your autonomous trucks going to fuel themselves, add fluids, add air to tires, etc.
Also, how is your driverless truck going to tailgate a load, strap or chain down cargo, open and close doors etc.
Your system will be good for one thing and one thing only. Moving dry vans and refeers across corridors like 10, 40, 70, 80, 90. But have fun with the traffic in LA, Chicago and The Northeast.
This will help the mega carriers who can’t find enough English speaking people to steam up a mirror.
They have money to spend on the new trucks that will need to be speced out for autonomous systems.
But you’re not taking the human presence out of the equation completely.
I’ve been driving for 10 years. I hate it at this point. There’s a lot of old timers quitting too. You’re only an option to an ongoing driver shortage that continues to grow for various reasons.
Good luck though. Looking forward to seeing your autonomous trucks on their sides on TV. Hopefully they don’t kill anyone. Because if they do, you’ll be responsible, not your CEO. So you’ll be paying restitution and doing time, not him or her.
Toodles, tough IT guy with skull avatar.
Buckskin says
Hopefully some teenage nerd will come up with a new app to get around this Eld BS.
Deacon Blue says
I live in TX but I do 95% of my driving up in the northeast. I’ve never had any issues with the troopers in any of those states. Those cats are pretty cool I reckon. They rarely ever pull folks over for speeding. It’s a rush hauling a$$ with the 4wheelers up there. There’s a certain type of mindset and skillset to be had for fitting into the traffic flow. Hell I ran outta time a couple yrs ago around 8:30pm just outside Leominster Massachusetts so I just pulled this mutha way off the pavement onto a flat grassy area and crashed out…. bout 2 hours later this trooper was knocking on the door….I says to him hey boss I’m sorry man I ran outta time. 🙄 he says yeah I kinda figured, there’s a couple mom-n-pop joints in town that don’t show up on GPS or Google so come on and follow me and I’ll get to a safer place to park than this. 😄 The cat led me a short 3 to 4 miles and then he just pointed out a lil old pub style joint with a few big rig spots and then he waved and boogied on down the road. Man I tell yall what. There’s some cool cats up there wearing the tin star. I’m gone.