Fleet Management News & Business Info | Commercial Carrier Journal
Issue link: http://read.uberflip.com/i/140569
UPFRONT See you on the flip side Hours-of-service changes take effect July 1 F unny thing about reporting news in magazines: From the time we send the issue to the printer to the time it reaches your hands, a lot can happen. [Shameless plug: Of course, you always can go to ccjdigital.com to get all the industry news as it happens.] Such is the case this month. On July 1, as the printer was busy churning out this issue, the new hours-of-service rules were slated to take effect. In case you've been hiding under a rock the past 18 months and haven't heard, the major changes to the HOS rules include a 34-hour restart that incorporates two consecutive 1-5 a.m. periods and a mandatory 30-minute rest period after the first eight hours on-duty. I would like to be able to write that the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration realized the holes in the data it used to justify the HOS changes and rescinded its order, or that Congress heard industry pleas and stepped in at the last minute to issue a stay of the effective date of the rules and ordered FMCSA to conduct more research. Of course, those two scenarios playing out in the next two weeks were highly unlikely as of this writing, and so it appears that by the time you do read this, your fleet operation already will be operating in a new world of HOS realities that already include the need for more drivers in an already tight labor market, lost productivity (up to 4 percent – or $1.4 billion – by some estimates) and greater emphasis on scheduling and routing procedures. There is a glimmer of hope that by the time you are reading this that something positive did happen on the HOS challenge front. In March, a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit heard arguments by parties on both sides of the HOS fence. "The existing rules have a proven track record, and the agency's purported reasons for tinkering with them were baseless," said Prasad Sharma, general counsel BY JEFF CRISSEY for the American Trucking Associations. "We're hopeful the judges will see through the agency's mere pleas for deference and after-the-fact explanations for a rule that was agenda-driven rather than evidence-based." The court isn't operating under a deadline for a ruling, but there was a chance it could come down before HOS changes were to take effect. Then in mid-June, ATA representatives testifying before the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee's panel on highway and transit implored Congress to intervene on the trucking industry's behalf. "The industry will lose operating flexibility and productivity, and the rules will increase driver stress and frustration," said Steve Williams, chairman and chief executive officer for Maverick USA and past ATA chairman. "Though the resulting impacts to the industry and the economy are difficult to measure at this stage, it is clear to me that productivity losses are inevitable and that operating costs will rise." Williams went on to say that it is "bordering on impossible to accept FMCSA's suggestion that corresponding benefits will result from these changes and that they will somehow offset all the costs." As slow as the wheels of progress (or regression, depending on your stance) move in our government, it was doubtful that anything could be done in the 11th hour to delay the rule from taking effect. Here's hoping I was wrong. JEFF CRISSEY is Editor of Commercial Carrier Journal. E-mail jcrissey@ccjmagazine.com. 6 COMMERCIAL CARRIER JOURNAL CCJ_0713_UpFront.indd 6 | JULY 2013 6/20/13 3:59 PM