CSA Scores Removed from View

On December 4, 2015, President Obama signed into law the FAST Act, the first multi-year surface transportation highway bill in a decade.  It’s a five-year authorization to fund federal surface transportation programs, like the repairing and building of highways, bridges roads, etc.  States can now proceed with projects, with some certainty that funds will be available. 

Specific to shippers, brokers and carriers, the FAST Act also corrected FMCSA, the administration within USDOT charged with truck and bus safety.  As required by the FAST Act, FMCSA removed from public view much of the data generated by the CSA program, including: analysis of violations, crashes where the motor carrier or driver is not at fault, CSA alert symbols, and the relative percentiles for each BASIC score. 

Tucker Company Worldwide, and its affiliate QualifiedCarriers.com, have both consistently advocated for years that publicly facing CSA data is flawed and conveys unintended, unreliable information that shippers and brokers should not use as part of their carrier selection criteria. Congress and the President finally agreed! This represents a big win for shippers, brokers, carriers, and the motoring public.

The Highway Act Criminalizes Coercing Drivers to Break Law

Ever told a driver to be on time, or else? After October 2013, this seemingly innocent act of business urgency may bring down criminal sanctions. The new “Highway Bill”, called MAP-21, includes new and revised provisions that essentially criminalize several fairly common practices in the interest of promoting safety.

One of the handful of “game-changers” that became law with MAP-21 is the “prohibition of coercion” provision, which criminalizes certain behaviors aimed at pushing on-time performance where a truck driver must bend or break hours of service rules or other safety measures. A rulemaking from FMCSA to clarify how this law will be enforced is expected in early 2014. In any event, shippers, brokers, anyone who hires a motor carrier, must be very careful in their communications with carriers, or risk losing insurance coverage — or worse — facing criminal penalties!