Cleared Driving Record

As a safety director of a small trucking company I will answer your question. When you talk to the trucking company of your intended first driving job, be honest with them and inform them that your license was suspended (month/year) and the reason why. Most MVRs will show the reason, how many days it was suspended for and the cause of suspension. I just hired a driver (26 year old) that has one year and one month of past verifiable driving experience in the last five years and within a ten year period, his license (class D) was suspended three times (all for failing to pay tickets). Is it a concern for me...sure it was. I spoke to the applicant and heard his reason(s) for the suspensions, pulled his MVR while he was in my office and we talked about his need to pay the citations or get an attorney to help defeat or reduce the citations to something else.

I submitted the applicants name, driver's license number and date of birth to our insurance agent for insurance review and they spoke to me about the same thing. I explained to them that I spoke to him about it and have in place a company-wide system that we automatically pay all citations that the driver receives (personal/commercial traffic citations only) or want proof that they retained an attorney to fight the citation. This is our way of "checks-n-balances" to ensure that the driver has no outstanding tickets while they are employeed with us. And trust me drivers' we have a way of seeing any citations you may receive out there from home so don't hide them while your employeed, just a waste of your time and effort.

Anyway, the insurance company knows our policy and with our perfect (no bad DOT inspections/accidents) in two years...they green lighted the driver to be allowed to be placed on our insurance.

So the moral of the story is...be truthful and honest with the company(s) you apply with. Its up to them if they want to hire you regardless and if one says no...trust me...they is plenty of other companies that will be willing to hire you.

 

Great to hear that...as for California regulations I have no direct knowledge in but per FMCSA regulations you will need to state on any application that you were supended (month/year and reason) regardless of what actions your home state does later. Most carriers only honestly care about alcohol, drug and those serious traffic violations on the applicant/drivers records anyway. When a suspension on ones driving record does become serious is when a driver has it due to grave violations of alcohol or some other serious violations (railroad crossing, speeding in excess of 10 or over, following to close, cellphone bans, etc) within the last three years...read 383.51 for the complete list of serious violations. Most things over 5 years don't carry alot of weight when it comes to applications or insurance carriers (minus alcohol, drug and out-of-service violations). Hope this helps you and good luck on the new career choice.

 

Good luck getting a job and paying for the schooling. You'll need it. A lot of it.

 

DWLS is really no big deal. Had a friend of mine get hired by CR England with that on her record. Just be honest about it.

 

STOP! DO NOT even talk to a school until you apply and get pre-approvals at several carriers. Do this even if you never plan on working for them! Get 3 - 5 preapprovals before wasting your money at a school. Schools are there to put you in a classroom and get you the skills to pass a CDL road test... Trucking companies operate on a whole "nother" level than just the basic skill requirements. Suspensions are not good! Suspensions may disqualify you from getting hired at a LOT of places.. look before you leap and prepare to hear no a lot.