Old school versus Elogs

Loves.

 

If you run legal it dont matter paper or E-logs,right ?

 

I've done both. Old school paper(as many logbooks as you needed to get the load there on time) and e-log. I hated going e-log at first until I found out the advantages. They log to the minute, not the 1/4 hour, you don't have to try to find out where you are if you stop in the middle of BFE out west, they automatically calculate your hours, keep track and display exactly how much time you have left.

When I was learning how to use the system, the company I was working for had us doing both paper and e-log, the paper being the official log. I always had 2 to 3 hours more at the end of my 8 days on e-log simply because of the to-the-minute logging. Fueling, 5-8 minutes, drive 25 miles, it logged exactly the amount of time, no rounding up to 30. You'd be surprised how much time you can accumulate a minute here, 2 minutes there. Another perk, pull into a scale where they are spot checking, they see the e-log sticker on the door and wave you on your way. In 2+ years I used them over there, not once did I get checked for logs while e-logging.

 

Honesty here.

I ran like an illegal dog for 25yrs. Zipping up and down the road.. slept when I was tired.. went home and the lack of a book didn't stop me.

Almost 2yrs ago we went electronic and I swore that I would quit , but I promised my great dispatcher that I would try it before flying the coop.

For the most part, I don't mind it.

I get plenty of rest. I FEEL BETTER than I have in years.
When I get home I have energy to be with my family and not lay around like a couch potato, napping and grouchy.

I don't worry about approaching a set of scales and what my book looks like.

My time is kept on minutes now... not 15 minute blocks. BIG BONUS over a 70hr week.

Drawbacks?? The loads that take 11hr n 15min to get to that require you to leave an extra ten hours early. THAT SUCKS.

Being within an hour of the house on Friday or Saturday morning and your 11 or , even worse, your 70 expires. IT HAPPENS.

Overall... I like them. There are drawbacks, but TO ME, there are more positives than negatives.

 

The to the minute calculation is where I can see a definite advantage. Especially in my pre and post trip. They want us to log both, so I end up losing at least 10-20 minutes a day off my 70 hours. They also want us to log at least 15 minutes on duty when we scale. If it's not busy, I can hit the scale, park, run in, get my ticket and be back to the truck and rolling (if I don't have to slide axles) in 5-10 minutes tops.

 

Wonder how many of you would like them elogs if they tighted up the GPS on them where you move fifty feet it starts logging no more cheating sitting at a shipper or receiver backing into docks loading or unloading and elog still showing off duty. Or how about the time you take truck in shop and mechanics take out for test drive and don't tell you and it happens to be a weekend and nobody in safety is there to reset mechs screw up so you spend 20 plus hours off duty. Just some experience I had with elog no thanks. And yes I use my truck for personal use some times when home and its none of dot business what I do when not working. And sorry if iam half hour from house I'm going home don't care what some #### computer says.

 

You're right ,there. That would suck.

For the most part , we can ease around the lot OFF DUTY without tripping the duty status.

Tightening up the GPS standards would definitely change my opinion greatly.

As for the mechanics moving the trucks... when we're not in possession of the vehicle, we LOG OUT of the system so any movement isn't related to our duty status.

I try not to end up 30 min from home and have to stop. When i see this is unavoidable , I generally stop early to keep from enraging myself.

There should really be a way to borrow from the next day , once a week, in those circumstances.

 

Mandated elogs. Just another day closer to total government control. They just keep dummying everything down to the lowest common denominator. In the end it will be only 1000+ truck fleets in this country driven by people earning minimum wage who should be flipping burgers for a living. And the highways will be the worse off for it.
You know it is coming. And I am sure it is just the tip of the iceberg.

 

A lot of companies have a 1 mile to 1.5 mile distance set on the elogs before they turn on. Thus, many eloggers park close enough (the night before) to the shipper or receiver so as to avoid the logs from going on-duty when they're ready to show up.

They will drive to their location, check in and might have to wait quite a while before they can dock. After they dock, they wait until the forklift driver bumps the trailer, then go on-duty, show a pretrip, arrival and dock time of 15 to 20 minutes before going into sleeper berth status.

I know a couple of guys that were busted at the scale house for doing that. All the inspecting officer has to do is to call the the shipper or receiver and ask the precise time when the truck checked in and cross reference the elog. They got put out of service for 10 hrs each for doing that.

Sux, but it's true...

That's only one example.There's lots of cheating eloggers out there

Elogs kill your 70 hour clock when shippers & receivers don't expedite their end of the deal. In addition, traffic snarls throughout a work week eat up your 70 on elogs.

 

That blows I always flag my post trip.