With all the hype about mandatory E-Logs how many of you drivers will leave the industry?

IF you were running legal before then what changed....?

 

if I m reading it right, Only fleets with 3 or more trucks will be using E-logs, and everything older than a 2000 year truck is exempt, I dont see a whole heck of a lot of people changing careers, Some wont even be here in 2017. So you know how things are.

 

Nobody will quit over e logs. I swore up and down that when the company i was driving for went to e logs that i would quit. Well, i didnt quit. I talked the talk but didnt walk the walk. But ya, e logs suck.

 

Where does it say in the reg that fleets of 3 trucks or less are exempt?

 

Speak for yourself. Last carrier I was with told the O/O's they'd be moving forward with implementing elogs in the O/O trucks as they had with the company fleet. Within a week, +30% of the O/O's tendered their resignations and went elsewhere. I was one of them. It was enough of a shock to that company that the safety director had to scramble to close the barn door before we all left in order to save his own job. They pushed back the implementation by 6 months and the company took on the entire cost instead of pushing it off to the O/O, which of course made the company owner none too happy, but the FMCSA regs are very clear that a clause forcing the O/O to purchase any product or service through the carrier as a condition of entering into the contract is forbidden. For them to say "you have to buy these devices from us and then pay us for the subscription as a condition of continuing running for us" was both a breech of contract AND a violation of the federal regulations.

The carrier I went to will allow me to get my own numbers and continue running their freight same as I currently am, so if the time comes where they ask me to install one of those silly things, I have the option to file a few papers, write a couple checks, and keep doing what I've been doing under my own numbers where I would then bear 100% of the responsibility for the elog or paper decision...and I'd stick with paper. If the above post is correct (and I haven't looked into whether or not it is, just saying IF it is) then as a 1-truck fleet, I wouldn't have to even though my truck is a 2001. I have no reason to spend $1500+ on a device and then pay another $40+/month to do exactly the same thing as $1.99 will get me at the truck stop. Worst case scenario, I remove the front drive axle, plate it for a lot less than 80K, and use it to pull the gooseneck horse trailer around when the wife and I want to travel...and as a private vehicle, it wouldn't fall under the FMCSA's jurisdiction. Then I would do whatever else I felt like doing for a paycheck in any other industry I choose to go into..or get a 1999 or older truck to remain in the job I love if I choose to do so. Bottom line, I won't be running an elog in my truck.

 

I was thinking more from a company drivers point of view.

 

I run as legal as possible. Do I shut down 10 miles from home because the 14 hour clock (or 16 hour clock once per week) ran out? No. I don't do it now, and I won't do it with an elog either. I go home every night, and nothing is going to change that. On paper, it isn't that big of a deal. On elogs, it would be a bit more obvious. Will I care? No. I'll fight it and exercise my right to a jury trial. Good luck finding 12 reasonable people who will say I should have paid for a motel 10 miles from the house...especially around here, where everybody is either a trucker, has family who drives a truck, farms and has trucks, or understands that sometimes excrement happens at work and a guy just wants to get home to his family 10 miles away. Lawmakers can pass whatever laws and regulations they want to, but without the consent of the people, those laws aren't worth the paper they are printed on. Jury nullification is a beautiful thing.

 

Brother this is the epitome of a beautifully written post. High five.