FMCSA New Carrier Review Process | Glostone Trucking Solutions

FMCSA Expanding New Carrier Review Process

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A report by the Government Accountability Office (GAO) recommended that the FMCSA expand new applicant reviews to better identify “chameleon” carriers that avoid enforcement identification by registering under a different identity. FMCSA agreed with the recommendations and in the April 26 Federal Register, introduced a rule that targets motor carriers that close then reopen under a new name to avoid enforcement. The amended administrative procedures will make it more difficult for companies with repeated safety violations to reincarnate into a new trucking business. Beginning May 29 the FMCSA will have these procedures in place to issue out-of-service orders to carriers who have a history of violations. For additional information, please see the federal register notice.

CSA Safety Fitness Determination Coming Soon

From the very inception of the FMCSA’s Compliance Safety Accountability (CSA) program, the plan called for 3 distinct phases of implementation.

CSMS – Carrier Safety Management System
DSMS – Driver Safety Management System
SFD – Safety Fitness Determination

The CSMS and DSMS have been implemented for some time now. The Safety Fitness Determination phase is now scheduled for a late November, 2012 rulemaking. The Safety Fitness Determination (SFD) rule being proposed is designed to use truck roadside inspection performance data along with data resulting from DOT auditor investigations and determine a Carriers fitness to operate. Data will be input, scored and a SFD automatically assigned. A SFD will fall into one of 3 planned categories:

✔Continue to Operate

✔Marginal

✔Unfit

CSA published BASIC sores will play a significant role in the SFD determination methodology. The SFD rule will classify BASICs as “Stand Alone” or “Non Stand Alone” according to their demonstrated relationship with carrier crash risk. The assigned SFD will be driven by a carrier’s failed BASICs, how many and which ones. How the exact methodology will work has been closely guarded and most likely won’t be divulged until the rule is published. If the methodology follows the same format of what the FMSCA last made public in 2009, SFD’s would be assigned accordingly as follows:

If one Stand Alone Basic equals or exceeds the failure threshold, an UNFIT fitness determination would be assigned. (Unsafe Driving and Fatigued Driving are Stand Alone Basics)
If one Non-Stand Alone Basic equals or exceeds the failure threshold, a MARGINAL fitness determination would be assigned. (Non-Stand Alone Basics are Driver Fitness, Cargo Related, Crash Indicator and Controlled Substances/Alcohol)
If more than one Non-Stand Alone Basic equals or exceeds the failure threshold, an UNFIT fitness determination would be assigned.
If one or more Fundamental Violations are discovered in an audit, an UNFIT fitness determination will be assigned. (For a definition of Fundamental Violations, Click Here
If all BASICS are below the Failure Threshold and there are no Fundamental Violations, a CONTINUE TO OPERATE fitness determination will be assigned.

When the Safety Fitness Determination is implemented and if the methodology follows the 2009 FMCSA plan, what would it mean to today’s trucking
industry? From data current as of April 2011, the following number of carriers would receive MARGINAL or UNFIT fitness determinations the first month
the program is operational.

BASIC Number of Carriers Above Threshold

UnsafeDriving 11,809

Fatigued Driving(HOS) 26,921

DriverFitness 3,424

Controlled Substances 546

Maintenance 18,556

Cargo 4,101

Crash Indicator 5,744

Managing CSA scores has quickly become an important fundamental of successfully operating as a motor carrier. Glostone Trucking Solutions offers several tools and expertise that can help. Give us a call at 503-607-1088.

Here is some interesting facts from www.thetruckersreport.com,