Rest breaks need to stop on-duty clock

I disagree with this whole premise. I am of the opinion that the 14 hour rule has made the job safer. Back when there was no 14 hour rule, and we had 8 hour breaks, my day usually went like this:

06:00 check in at receiver.

09:00 leave reciever empty. Go find a truck stop or some place to wait
while dispatcher finds you a load. Stop clock.

12:00 quallcomm goes off. you're dispatched. Load picks up this
afternoon. Delivers 400 miles away at 06:00 tomorrow. you drive
to shipper.

13:00 Arrive at shipper. Stop clock.

19:00 You are finally loaded. You've been up since 05:30. You tried to
get a few winks while you were at the shipper, but you had to
keep one ear open listening to the cb so you would here them call
you for a door. Finally, you stuck it in the dock. It's 4 pm now,
you're not really tired, so you stand out in front of your truck and
chew the fat with another driver.Later on you try to grab a nap
but it's kind of hard with a forklift slamming in and out of your
trailer once every 30 minutes.

20:00 You sign the paperwork, seal the trailer doors and head for
receiver. 400 miles. you got 10 hours to get there. You've been
awake all day, but hey you have time to stop and get a 2 hour
nap in on your way. No problem, you logged all that dock time
the time waiting to get dispatched as sleeper time, just like your
dispatcher told you, so you can turn in a legal log.

02:00 George Noory is on the radio and he is getting blurred and
muffled. What in the hell did he just say? I can't remember. Man
I wish I could find a place to pull over so i can take that 2 hour nap
I said I'd take.

04:00 Couldn't find a place to pull over, so I went ahead and drove to
receiver. No one here. Set my alarm for an hour and a half from
now and get my night's sleep.

06:00 Check in at receiver. Repeat the entire process for the next 4 days until
they give me my load home.


The 14 hour rule shifted the costs to the carrier. Before it, they simply didn't care if you got delayed at a dock for 5 hours or more because they expected you to log it as sleeper time and get the load there at it's appointed time. I worked for three different companies before the rule change and I don't think a driver would have lasted a month at any of them if he wasn't willing to play ball and deliver on time. The 14 hour rule made it the carrier's problem, because it took that option away from the driver, costing the carrier money in lost productivity. They started doing something about it. As a result, if you work for a carrier who has any brains, they started charging customers detention time. They bought more trailers so more loads were drop and hook. The major carriers took steps to lessen dock times. I've been pulling freight for a few years now, I've noticed a difference. Giving us the ability to stop the clock will only open up the hole so they can take advantage of us again.

 

MrMustard- I couldn't agree more. Also it helps give drivers the chance to make more money. Smart companies know that we make money for the company when the wheels are turning. With the fourteen hour clock companies don't want us wasting time at docks whether sleeping or hand unloading.

 

Company, Company,Company- There's estimated to be 3,000,000 trucks in the U.S. If you took the 10 biggest trucking companies in the country they would account for maybe 20% of the trucks. The rest of the industry is made up of small companies that don't do drop and hook or can't. Yeah if you are doing drop and hooks the 14 hours are fine, BUT what if you're not. If you have to do live load and live unload (like so many trucking companies do) the 14 hour rule is NOT repeat NOT a good thing. Shippers and receivers are not obligated in any way adapt their schedules to the HOS rules. People say on here they will have to. Wanna Bet. Who's gonna make'em? DOT,FMCSA, They are a private business. I can just see someone walking into a shipper and say "Ok,you are going to change your schedules to accomodate the HOS rules!" The reply would not be printable in Hustler! I for one hated the 10 and 14 simply because I don't want to spend 8 hours in bed. Hell, I don't sleep 8 hours in bed at home, let alone a truck! I'll bet if you did a survey you would find out that most drivers with 4 or more years experience will tell you they don't like the new rules, but who cares what the drivers think. ATA don't,FMCSA don't,DOT don't, etc etc etc. What a screwed up industry!

 

When Swift, Schneider, JB Hunt, etc, start throwing their weight around and playing hard ball with Pete's Gocery Warehouse, the unloaders there start changing their practices to avoid getting charged detention pay then every truck that pulls into Pete's Grocery Warehouse benefits.
I ain't saying things are perfect, but the waiting times have improved. For instance Family Dollar, I go in there all the time. Prior to the rule change I've sat there for 18 hours before, now I'm in and out of there in a little bit more than an hour.

 

Let's face the facts. The only people who dont want the current HOS regs are people who are losing money. These drivers mistakenly believe that the only way to make more money is to drive more miles! The HOS REGS ARE NOT THE PROBLEM! It's this crooked pay per mile scheme that is screwing up trucking. If we dont get caught or run into someone, we get a bigger paycheck when we break the law. Safety be ######! Pay per mile not only encourages lawbreaking, it rewards it, and jepordizes everyone's safety! If they were really concerned with safety, drivers would be paid salary or hourly for every hour ON DUTY.
IMHO, we need to quit fighting the current rules, we cant win that fight anyway, and focus our energies on getting covered by The Fair Labor Standards Act so we get paid by the hour with overtime after 40 hrs.

 

Another issue that never gets addressed is being detained for hours on end at a receiver or shipper. If there was a law stating that any shipper or receiver that detains a driver more than one hour will automatically be charged 300 dollars an hour and the driver got 25 percent of that and it was enforced, you'd see the waiting game come to an end real quick.

 

Mrmustard...you're spot on. I've driven under all the HOS changes and the best change was when they went to the 14 hour rule. If you have to have a "nap" during the day, take it. Nothing is stopping you. Actually I think if you need a nap, after only working a few hours, maybe you should go see a Doctor about why you're tried all the time.

 

I don't even have a dog in this race. I work on a dedicated account and my trailers are all preloaded, drop and hook. But prior to the rule change it was a heck of a lot more of a common site when you pulled out of a truck stop to see some fool flipped his rig over off the road after falling asleep at the wheel. On any given 100 mile stretch on I80 in Pa, or I81 in Va, you could find one just about every morning.