Podcast: Hours of Service Updates on Personal Conveyance and Agriculture

Welcome to our Quarterly Update podcast, produced in conjunction with the American Trucking Associations (ATA). In this episode, Dan Horvath, Director of Safety Policy for the ATA, discusses the recently released personal conveyance guidance and also some guidance related to the agricultural community.

Specifically, the episode will discuss some situations when personal conveyance can be used by drivers. He will also talk about some of the guidance released for the agricultural community and livestock drivers, focusing on hours of service and who is considered an agricultural or livestock driver.

Audio Transcription:
Hi this is Dan Horvath, Director of Safety Policy for the American Trucking Association and this is the quarterly HireRight podcast from ATA. In this podcast we are going to look at the recently released personal conveyance guidance and also some guidance related to the agricultural community. This was all released on May 31st and was effective that day, so we’ll dive into it and take a high level look at what the guidance discussed. We’ll start off with the personal conveyance guidance and this was in response to the December 19, 2017 proposed revisions which ATA did comment on and received a lot of great feedback. The big issue was that personal conveyance has always been a gray area and nobody really knows how to use it, who can use and when it is acceptable or not. The guidance helped clarify that, it definitely was not all inclusive, but it helped differentiate some situations where a driver can and cannot use personal conveyance. The big part of the guidance did focus on whether the vehicle needed to be unloaded or not. The final guidance by FMCSA took into consideration whether the vehicle was loaded or not and ultimately it has no effect on whether the driver can use personal conveyance or not. So, we’ll look at some situations when personal conveyance can be used. One of the biggest ones listed in the final guidance was in situations where the driver is at a shipper, they run out of hours and they need to leave the facility. They can legally use personal conveyance to leave the shipper or receiver to travel to a nearby reasonable safe location to obtain required rest after loading or unloading. This was pretty significant as we know there is delay time with shippers; however, the carriers needs to keep in mind that the driver can’t use the personal conveyance to leave a shipper and drive hundreds of miles just to get to the next location that they choose. It really needs to be the nearest safe resting location. So in a situation where a driver runs out of hours at the shipper, they can use personal conveyance to continue up the road to a truck stop, find available parking and take their ten hours off-duty there. If it would be a situation where they go off the street at the first truck stop and the truck stop is full, they could continue on because that wouldn’t be considered a resting location, since it is technically not available and the driver can find one close by. Another example of personal conveyance use that would be acceptable is if a driver is taking their ten hours off-duty in a sleeper and are asked by law enforcement to move the vehicle. This happens in some situations and the problem is that when the driver goes from the ten hours off-duty to driving or on-duty that breaks up the ten hour break. In a situation like this, the driver can use personal conveyance and that would not affect their ten hour off-duty window. There are countless situations where a driver may endure and not all situations will allow for the use of personal conveyance. For instance, in the case where a driver is about to run out of on-duty time, they cannot bypass available resting locations for the sole purpose of getting closer to the next loading or unloading point. This could be considered moving a CMV to enhance the operational readiness of the motor carrier. A similar situation would be using a personal conveyance to bypass available resting locations and travel to the other side of the city simply to avoid having to deal with rush hour traffic in the morning. The personal conveyance guidance is certainly not all inclusive. Motor carriers are urged to use it cautiously and have policies in place. It is important to remember that personal conveyance is only an option you do not have to use it. I recommend that if carriers and drivers do choose to use personal conveyance that they clearly document each personal conveyance move, so that investigators know that it is properly used. You don’t have to necessarily prove this at a roadside inspection, but it could come up in a compliance review at a later date. You want to make sure that anything you did under personal conveyance is documented so investigators know it was properly used and you are not just trying to add more hours to your clock. Avoid situations to where you are going to arrive at a shipper and run out of hours. For instance, if you have your eleven hours driving and you know you are arriving at a shipper right at the eleventh hour, you clearly know that you are not going to have enough time to leave that shipper and find safe rest. So, situations like that could be looked at that you are improperly using personal conveyance. Moving on, we’ll talk about some of the guidance released for the agricultural community and livestock drivers. This mainly has to do with hours of service that did not go into any definitions in so far as who is considered an agricultural or livestock driver. Again this mainly dealt with the 150 air mile radius exemption for current drivers and who is exempt while driving within that. So the guidance basically came out and said that while you are operating within the 150 air miles you are exempt from all hours of service requirements. It wouldn’t be until after you passed the 150 air miles that your hours of service would kick in. At that point, say you travel beyond the 150, your hours of service would start at zero and you would have your full operating ability within the eleven and fourteen hour rules. Additionally, the guidance stated that while operating in the 150 air miles, drivers who operate unladen vehicles either to pick up an agricultural commodity or returning from a delivery point would be included in the exemption, hours of service would not apply. Finally the guidance helped clarify what is considered a source of an agricultural commodity. The guidance stated that a source is not only a farm or a ranch but also includes other locations such as grain elevators, sale barns or other intermediate storage or loading facilities. Thanks for tuning in to HireRight’s quarterly podcast from ATA. Have a great day.

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