The Dreaded Electronic Logs

Think about it,if you lose your CDL due to a crackhead or drunk killing themselves while your driving in violation,or a million situation variations of what is listed above,what is better ??- More $$ in the short term,or running the race till retirement,no problems...Cmon man,think bout it,& dont convince yourself you will ALWAYS sneak by...

 

You guys can have the elogs, i run regional and i am not going to park my truck for 10 hours when i'am 15 to 20 minutes from the house and yes there are alot of times i'am 15 to 20 from home and keep going till i get there, for you over the road guys its most likely a good thing but for a regional or local guy its must likely going to cause issues with getting home. When and if its mandated on all trucks thats the day i call it quites not because i run illegal but because i'am i big boy and can reguate myself and if the gov wants it they should pay to install it.

 

My company is going to e-logs, and I am far from looking forward to it. You can shine a turd any way you want, but its still a turd.
2900 utilizing 70 hours is a 41 mph average, I now get well into the 3500 mile weeks, and do it legal. I can get stopped at any point in my day and happy to hand over my logs.
So lets start by loosing miles.

Nowbody seems to point out the negative safety impact, or impact on $.
If I have E-Logs, I will have to run up against the governor all the time, just to keep my mph average up.
I have a 65 mph truck that I typically run about 62 mph to keep above 7 mpg avg. E-logs, that truck will now have to run 65 mph as much as possible just to maintain a decent avg.
I can now pretty much plan my day almost to the minute.
If weather is bad, the company preaches slow down, or shut down. but if I slow down, I lose time, lost time is lost money for me. If I run up against the governor the company loses money in fuel mileage.
If the company has 2500 drivers, and the average driver loses 100 miles in productivity each week, Thats 13 million miles a year in productivity for the company.

I think for some drivers it may be a benefit, those being ones that can't run a legal log while managing their time.

Wait till the day your tired, yet you e-logs show you have hours avail, so your company can see that, and now forces you to drive.
As it stands now, if I have been up all day, I can board up and put in the hours that I am comfortable to drive safely, but with e-logs, somebody may believe I can drive 11 hours.

Now with all that, I'd be good with E-logs, but the days of cents per mile for a wage has to be rethought.
With all this technology and big brother watching, there should be no reason these companies cant start paying drivers by the minute on duty not driving, or driving.
A few companies currently have class action lawsuits about short paying drivers on HHG miles.
That computer is showing exactly what you are doing while you are doing it and for how long. If this is company business, drivers should be getting paid for it. Then the hypocrisy of safety will not be such a factor. I'll drive 55 mph saving fuel, being safer, all that jazz, but pay me for that time.

 

Been there with the qualcomm at the last trucking company.

Always had to run with the pedal to the floor, 64 mph truck. Also had to limit the stops to fuel only. Ate alot of cold food and put off restroom stops as much as possible.

 

Oh yeah, didn't even bring up the medical issues, Doc told me before that holding it for long periods of time isn't good for you. Plus the environmental issues, will see more of those pee jugs or guys peeing in parking lots, etc. as more drivers will find not having the latitude to stop and take care of business. Each time you lift the fuel feed, stop, whiz, and get back to road speed, you loose 15 minutes, all electronically.
Then you have the whole deal with many drivers and their weight and poor diet to deal with.

 

Not to mention, you could not even consider a shower.

Stopped for one once, and in the shower, the phone rang wanting to know why the truck was not moving. They were nuts.

They wanted the trucks at the dock each night. If you stopped, and there was a shower line, you were screwed. This was in 2008 and they only used pilots. No points, just the showers. Kind of hard to get one if you were at the wrong truckstop or the dock.

As far as medically, there are issues. Thankfully, I did have any issues and made the most of the stops.

I got disgusted with the cold food and no restrooms all of the time.

 

One of my neighbors work for a company that is using quallcom for logging, he ran out on his 14 and 70 16 miles from home in Mojave anc called me for a ride leaving his tractor and trailer at the old giant truckstop for the 3 day Holiday. 20 minutes from home and he could not bring it in, this is just insane.

There needs to be some flexibility in the system.

I would never leave the equipment I'm responsible for that far away. Write me up I'm takein home.