FMCSA'S 'Return-to-Duty' Program: Off-ramp to a Goat Trail to a Dead End

sonofsilence · Oct 21, 2023

bryan21384 said: ↑

Try these folks.

We are hiring Company Drivers

Yes it's a Chicagoland company. I know everybody is going to #### on this idea but I don't care and you shouldn't either. You should try to do what's necessarily to keep your skills up if you really want to get back to a good place.
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Thanks a lot for this, but the company requires 2 yrs experience. I've only 10 months.

bryan21384 · Oct 21, 2023

sonofsilence said: ↑

Thanks a lot for this, but the company requires 2 yrs experience. I've only 10 months.
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I'd try them anyway. Let THEM tell you no. Sometimes companies move the needle if they need/want drivers bad enough.

sonofsilence · Oct 21, 2023

bryan21384 said: ↑

I'd try them anyway. Let THEM tell you no. Sometimes companies move the needle if they need/want drivers bad enough.
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10/4 good buddy. Will do.

Dennixx · Oct 21, 2023

sonofsilence said: ↑

FMCSA’s ‘Return-to-Duty’ Program: Off-ramp to a Goat Trail to a Dead End

I just read an article in truckdriver.com’s September newsletter titled “American Substance Abuse Professionals (ASAP) has ‘Miles of Gratitude’ for America’s Truck Drivers.” I would really like to know where ASAP came up with “85%” as the number representing their “success rate returning employees back to work.” Since being “cleared” to “Return to Duty” by my “Substance Abuse Professional (SAP)” 99.9% of trucking companies I have contacted in search of a trucking job have all told me, unequivocally, “No. We don’t hire SAP drivers,” and believe me, thus far I have contacted many, many trucking companies.

Perhaps ASAP is basing their 85% success rate on “SAP” drivers with “Designated Employee Representatives (DERs), as they claim, falsely, on their website. If such a thing—"Driver ‘Employee’ Representative”—even existed, that might make sense, but what ASAP describes on its website as a “Driver ‘Employee’ Representative (DER) is a misrepresentation. Actually, US Department of Transportation (USDOT) uses the acronym “DER” as shorthand for “Designated ‘Employer’ Representative.” DERs work on behalf of the employer, not the employee and the truth is that truckers whose employers fire them for failing to remain at drug testing facilities get no such representation. To the contrary, what we get is—effectively—blacklisted.

My former employer, Western Express Inc., fired—then flagged me in the Clearinghouse—for “failure to remain at a drug testing facility” for what would have been my first “random” drug test. I was NOT on drugs or alcohol.

What happened was that upon my arrival at the “drug testing facility”—an Urgent Care clinic on the side of a highway next to a shopping mall up in Massachusetts—a testing facility “service agent,” otherwise known as a “receptionist,” told me “You have to fill out papers from your employer” [for ‘authorization’ to take the drug test]. Up to that point I had always been told in such clinical situations “sign here, take a seat over there,” but in this instance, that didn’t happen.

Indeed, when the COVID-mask-wearing service agent behind the counter at the “drug testing facility” told me “You have to fill out papers from your employer”—papers that I did not have, and which I believed I could not get—my initial thought was “OK, great! See ya!” But then, as I was turning to leave, it occurred to me that to cover my ### I had better call my DM and tell him I needed “authorization” [to take the test]. He didn’t answer his phone, his voicemail box was full, as usual, and as usual, it would not accept messages. So, then I texted him for the “authorization,” saying “I need authorization to take test. This is becoming a bigger pain in the ### by the minute. Call me before I just say #### it and head for the nearest truck stop” (I had parked my rig—an International pulling a 53-foot flatbed trailer—'creatively’ in the afore-mentioned shopping mall parking lot (which was packed with morning shoppers) and which, enroute to the place, my DM had directed me to saying, “There’s a ‘huge’ shopping mall parking lot right next to the place. Aughta be plenty of room over there.”) Yeah, right.

When I got back to my truck, I saw a message from my DM on my ELD that I had a lumber load waiting for me to go pick up eighty miles away, at which point I turned to my twenty-year-old “developmentally disabled” son who was traveling with me (my copilot), and said “Well, let’s giddee up!”

It was not until I reached the lumber yard that evening that I saw the text message from my DM on my phone containing a link to the “authorization” form, a so-called “e-scan,” and it was not until a week later that my DM called me to tell me “yeah, um, about that drug test you failed last week, well, I’m afraid I have to terminate you for that.” And I was, like, “dude, what the #### are you talking about? I didn’t fail any drug test! to which he replied “well, technically, failure to remain at a drug testing facility is the same as a positive drug test.…”

At that point—it was a Friday, and I was about two hundred miles from home—I immediately called a Guthrie Clinic near my hometown, Ithaca, New York, and scheduled an appointment for a comprehensive DOT drug and alcohol screening, at my own expense, which, of course, turned out to be a total waste of money. The test results came back negative, but FMCSA don’t give a #### about that.

Next, I tried to “appeal” the flag Western Express put on me, because, after all, I was NOT on drugs or alcohol. It’s called a “Part 10 Privacy Act Review,” and the link to initiate the review is hidden deep inside FMCSA’s Code of Federal Regulations (CFR), where I would presume most drivers who have ever been flagged by their employer rarely venture. It took me a couple of days to find it, initiate it, and I probably would never have gotten a reply to it from the “Clearinghouse Team” had I not sought the help of Georgia Congressman Buddy Carter’s Savannah, Georgia office. In any case, months after I initiated the review—it’s supposed to take “a week to ten days—I finally got a reply from the “Team” saying, essentially, “not knowing you were not supposed to leave the testing facility was no excuse for leaving” [the testing facility].

It was at that point that I realized the only way I would ever get my trucking career back was to go through this so-called “Return-to-Duty” process, which meant—although I was NOT on drugs or alcohol—hiring a Substance Abuse Professional (SAP). That was five months ago. I went through the program, got “cleared” by my SAP to Return to Duty, and now not a single trucking company I have called so far has been willing to hire me. “No. We don’t hire SAP drivers,” they all say. (Coincidentally, the other excuse I have heard a lot from trucking companies for not hiring me is that I lack experience. When Western Express fired me I had accumulated ten months experience behind the wheel, from the first day of CDL-A school up to the minute I got fired), and of course, I understand why trucking companies avoid SAP drivers like the plague—risk, insurance issues, damage to reputation, the hassle of having to deal with yet another layer of corporate-state bureaucracy—just as I understand why most trucking companies only hire drivers with “at least a year’s experience.”

Nevertheless, my question is this: Why does FMCSA have a so-called “Return-to-Duty” program that no trucking company—for good reason—is bound to honor? What’s the point? to feed a flourishing industry of SAPS on the hopes of truckers whose careers, dreams and lives it has needlessly dead-ended?

I am still searching for that one trucking company owner who will believe me when I say I was NOT on drugs or alcohol, and that will give me the shot I deserve to avenge my professional reputation and re-enter my trucking career.

Sincerely,

James Thomas Lukasavage

Trucker Forever
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You can complete the RTD protocol as determined by a SAP on your own dime but w minimal experience and a year of testing and not driving, you may be relegated to a lower level company or a 1099 outfit. Tough time currently for new drivers.

Dennixx · Oct 21, 2023

bryan21384 said: ↑

Man... you caught a bad break here. I feel bad for you, but you'll have to face the facts and understand that you made a slight error in judgment. True enough, inexperienced drivers don't know that leaving a facility can cause a refusal or fail, but drivers that come into the industry know enough to understand that you are subject to randoms and you gotta have these tests. I think your impatience messed you up here. If you had waited just a little but longer, you'd still be working.

You gotta stop blaming your DM. It really ain't his job to supervise you out here, as he ain't your supervisor per se. Driver and DM is more like a partnership. If anything, the DM works for you. A company the size of Western Express, it's probably more on safety to orchestrate the drug test.

Finally, the regs may say a company can hire you after SAP. The regs also say a dirty drug test keeps a driver out for 3 years. That also means that it isn't a foregone conclusion that a driver that completes SAP will be able to get on with a reputable company. Per the recruiter where I work, any drug amd alcohol issue stops them from hiring a driver for 3 years, even if they wanted to. That isn't limited solely to drug tests. It could be DUIs, and other issues of that sort. They have the right to turn down a driver that has a fail or refusal on his or her record. They may not want to deal with the headache of frequent drug testing. Many companies hide behind that 3 year rule. That's absolutely the minimum you'll have to wait to get on with the majority of companies. Some will make you 5, 7, 10 years. Some will never touch you.

All that being said, now that you have finished SAP, it will be difficult, but not impossible to find some work. You'll have to be prepared to work somewhere that may not be the best in the world. I failed one in 2011 and it took me 8 years to get back to a reputable company. It wouldn't have taken me so long had I been informed of the 3 year rule. 7 months after I failed, I got a local job with Dr. Pepper/Snapple. Try to get a job in foodservice or hauling beverages. Just be honest on the application. Take a look at some 1099 jobs as well. It's definitely not the best route, but you can earn some money and gain experience at the same time. Get on somewhere, stay out of trouble, and work on gaining some patience. You'll need that in trucking. Good luck to ya driver.
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5 years on the books

sonofsilence · Oct 22, 2023

Dennixx said: ↑

You can complete the RTD protocol as determined by a SAP on your own dime but w minimal experience and a year of testing and not driving, you may be relegated to a lower level company or a 1099 outfit. Tough time currently for new drivers.
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I keep hearing "1099." I'll look into it. Thanks.

MarkoBravo · Nov 20, 2023

sonofsilence said: ↑

I keep hearing "1099." I'll look into it. Thanks.
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Yes 1099, might be able to get on a decent OTR company as lease/purchase driver, which is usually a 1099 position, and drive national or dedicated regional. Check with Hill Bros Trucking Inc. Omaha, NE.
My buddy drove lease for them in their Drayage division hauling to Oakland every week making 2k direct deposit Fridays.

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