Question about USA-Canada HOS and crossing the border.

The HOS stop at the border. You only have to be in compliance in the country you're in. The only things that carry forward are whatever is applicable to the current HOS, e.g., on-duty/ driving hours for the day, 70 hours clock.

As long as you don't carry a violation across the border, you're good:

• In your example you take your 10 hours off, so even if you crossed back into the US right after that, you're okay. Even if all you did was do the second part of the split-sleeper in Canada you would be okay.
• What you can't do is do the first day of a deferral in Canada and then cross back because now you don't have enough rest hours for the US.
• If you ran long enough that you did not have 24 hours off in 14 days (Cycle 1), you're okay in the US, but not if you cross into Canada (you would have to stop and rest as soon as you cross the border).

 

All good. Just remember that if that puts you beyond the 16 hour window in Canada the 3 hours off duty needed to be in the berth to extend the clock in Canada.

 

If the vehicle has a sleeper berth that meets the specifications below, the driver can split the mandatory off-duty time into two sleeper-berth periods if:

• Neither period is less than two hours.
• The total of the two sleeper periods is at least 10 hours.
• The off-duty time is spent resting in the sleeper berth.
• The total off-duty time in the day is at least 10 hours.
• The total driving time before and after each sleeper period does not exceed 13 hours.
• None of the daily off-duty time is deferred to the next day.
• The elapsed time before and after each sleeper period does not include any driving time after the 16th hour when the driver comes on-duty.
• The total of the on-duty time before and after each sleeper period does not include any driving time after the 14th hour.

I'd say yes your sleeper berth pauses the 16 hour window, as long as it is at least 2 hours long in the sleeper

 

You were good. If that 3 hours had been off duty instead of sleeper berth it would have still paused the clock in the US but not in Canada.

It would be nice if we only had one set of rules to follow.

I know many guys who won't use the split no matter the situation. It's nice to see someone using the rules to their advantage.

 

When I was running US-Canada, on my last day in the US I would take 30+ minutes breaks adding up to 2 hours so that when I crossed back into Canada all I had to rest was 8 hours.

When I was hauling pipe we only worked M-F, but sometimes I would be a little short on hours to get home in one shot on Friday, so I would do Day 1 of a deferral on Thursday night. Day 2 never happened because I would have a reset.

You're right, being very familiar with the rules let's you use them to your advantage, but ELDs certainly minimize that.

 

I have a buddy who just can't grasp that one for some reason. Every few months he'll call me up wondering why he didn't get as much time added to his clock after crossing back into Canada as he expected to. Every time it's because he took breaks less than 30 minutes that don't count toward his ten off.

ELD makes it easier to not screw up a split or a deferral but if you don't have a good grasp of the rules you don't know what it's going to do until the time comes.

 

I’m here to tell ya, dot in USA certainly fo care what you do in Canada. I just had my book checked at superior, wi scale. Questioned my use of PC while in Canada. Here’s what I do EVERY week. I take an empty trailer to the local mill and bobtail 15 miles home. Once I drop that empty I PC home. He questioned it, said it was questionable, whatever that means! Perfectly legal in Canada.