Do You Like The New 34 Hour Restart Rule?

[terrylamar]

You, Terry.... would need to actually work to be effected in anyway.

I asked a reliable source....Tim said so!

You are correct, that's why I'm not pitching a bitch. Though, it would affect me when I go to Alaska again and if I get caught out a weekend and can't get my restart in, I will catch up the following weekend. The 30 break is easy to comply with as slow as I drive.

I still have the desire to get out of trucking and open a Martial Arts School. FMCSA is hell bent to make this decision easy.

 

[Mike]

I never got a log violation on paper logs....

On E-Logs, it has become a regular occurrence.

New rules are getting closer and closer, and as has been mentioned in this thread, most are clueless as to how the new restart works.

Companies like mine, who manually dispatch drivers that use e-logs are going to have hell adjusting to this. Some of our drivers can't "count to potato", and will never understand this new rule.

Computerized dispatch won't be as much of a problem because the computer system usually won't dispatch a load to a driver without enough hours to complete the load.

 

[freedhardwoods]

I don't consider myself a dumbass agreeing to drive for a company that requires all their freight pullers use e-logs... and think you place too much emphasis on the "kool-aid" crowd.

I wasn't referring to you or anyone else here with the dumbass statement. We all see examples of what I was talking about every day.

If my current employer had been using elogs when I was looking for a job, I would have eliminated them immediately on that basis alone.

Because they installed them after I was already working here, I had to make a choice of whether to change jobs or compromise my extreme opposition to them and stay. (On that same note, every driver here does not like the elogs and would gladly go back to paper.)

To go somewhere else would mean taking a major pay cut as well as lose other benefits this job has for me, so I decided to stay and deal with the horrendous increase in stress that the elog puts on me so I can achieve some goals (that require money) in the time frame I want.

 

[Injun]

I have no more log violations electronically than I did manually: zero.

I dislike e-logs because I don't want either my company or the guv'mint up my ass. My compliance has not changed.

 

[DubbleD]

I wasn't referring to you or anyone else here with the dumbass statement. We all see examples of what I was talking about every day.

I know you weren't referring to me... but honestly do you feel the majority of e-loggers are nitwits that can't decide for themselves when they need to use a restroom?

If my current employer had been using elogs when I was looking for a job, I would have eliminated them immediately on that basis alone.

Because they installed them after I was already working here, I had to make a choice of whether to change jobs or compromise my extreme opposition to them and stay. (On that same note, every driver here does not like the elogs and would gladly go back to paper.)

I feel for you and anyone else who is employed and the employer changes the game plan on you.

Fact is.. they have the right to do so as their name is on the deed (so to speak)...

I am also extremely curious to know why all these drivers are so against e-logging. I've said this before and will say it again...

... e-log systems draw the lines that you tell them to and that is it.

All the rest of the stuff is company, BIG BROTHER stuff that your employer has chosen to pay for as an addition to the system being used.

That said.... seems the e-log bitching is directed at the wrong coordinates and once this has been realized the complaints about an electronic system that simple draws lines where the user tells it to will cease and the pointer will be directing the complainants to the door labled..

BOSS.

 

[DubbleD]

I have no more log violations electronically than I did manually: zero.....

From who/where?.. Safety? or LEO?

I had to remind the e-log guru at the Safety Orifice he didn't have the correct license and wasn't entitled to a badge a couple of times.... Sometimes these kids get all caught up in the "protect the company at all costs" game they forget the real role they play....

...Get me outta this jam! Dammit!!!

 

[Rigjockey]

I have never had a log violation by a D.O.T. inspector. I have a more then a few on computer logs. Where someone scans and feeds the logs into a computer that generates the legality of it.

Either the computer program is not right or the person feeding the logs into the scanner never took the time to look at what rule I was utilizing at the time.

If it is not a D.O.T. and I am not losing money, I don't care. I don't have the time to go in and see the log bitch and explain thing to them. I make money turning miles and using every rule as best I can.

I have not been on E-logs and that could be a learning curve for me. I log (Now days) the way I ran it. Running outlaw days are over. ( Ya I know super trucker you are still doing it and will never stop. Ray, Ray,Ray ).

Let's face it. E-logs will come down for everyone one day. That's a fact! So again, Logging it the way you ran it.

Any difference? No! If you happen to run over your hour, You hope and pray you don't get inspected in the next 7 days. On Paper logs you hope they don't find a discrepancy.
For when D.O.T shows up to the company? The will have to edit those logs and hope they covered their tracks. Just like you had to do.

 

[Injun]

From who/where?.. Safety? or LEO?

Yes.

I have fewer discussions with Safety over my correctly logged and legal use of HOS than I did. That's because the system is programmed with the laws and won't flag me for something that looks funny, but is perfectly legal.

 

[Tazz]

I have had cops look at logs 15 minutes over and ask why. During an audit it' s gonna come out, during an accident investigation it's gonna come out. Why bother lying?

That is both on paper and elogs. Our new log guy lost his argument over "correcting" my last one. They settled for just putting a note in about some traffic when the simple truth was I had the exit for Beaverdam wrong in my head and by the time I realized it I was caught with no parking except to go 12 minutes over.
Cest la Vie right?

 

[Duck]

Yes.

I have fewer discussions with Safety over my correctly logged and legal use of HOS than I did. That's because the system is programmed with the laws and won't flag me for something that looks funny, but is perfectly legal.

I think I remember you having conflicts with Swift's log department because you walk around the store or something when unloading, and when you get back to the truck you edit your log to change it from On duty to off duty or something, ...which is legal but makes Swift mad.

Oh, .. and I heard from someone on here that Swift requires a 30 minute pre-trip? What the hell is with that?

 

[DubbleD]

I think I remember you having conflicts with Swift's log department because you walk around the store or something when unloading, and when you get back to the truck you edit your log to change it from On duty to off duty or something, ...which is legal but makes Swift mad.

Oh, .. and I heard from someone on here that Swift requires a 30 minute pre-trip? What the hell is with that?

yeah!

What Duck says.....!

 

[Duck]

yeah!

What Duck says.....!

Quack?

 

[DubbleD]

Quack?

just trying out some new inflammatory remarks from a book I'm reading.

 

[Injun]

No, Swift does not require a 30 minute pretrip. Just log it the way it happens. Even on paper, I logged 15 minutes most of the time. Occasionally, I logged 30 minutes. Never had Swift ask about it.

I did have a DOT guy ask whether I could demonstrate a 15 minute pretrip. I said, "Probably not, but I can show you a 22 minute one." He did not ask me to prove it.


I had to take an individual log class over some perfectly legal 8/2 splits, wherein there were two 2 hour periods logged between eights and which two counted for legal purposes. The answer is, they both do, but it depends on which part of the log you count from. It looked funny, but there was nothing wrong with it.

 

[freedhardwoods]

I know you weren't referring to me, but honestly do you feel the majority of e-loggers are nitwits that can't decide for themselves when they need to use a restroom?

Maybe not a majority yet, but a very significant number.

I feel for you and anyone else who is employed and the employer changes the game plan on you.

Fact is.. they have the right to do so as their name is on the deed (so to speak)...


I am also extremely curious to know why all these drivers are so against e-logging. I've said this before and will say it again...

... e-log systems draw the lines that you tell them to and that is it.

It doesn't even come close to drawing the lines I want it to.

All the rest of the stuff is company, BIG BROTHER stuff that your employer has chosen to pay for as an addition to the system being used.

The reason the company I work for has trucks is to haul their own material. Delivering buildings to customers has priority over everything else. We haul steel and lumber to make more building packages back to our yard on a regular basis, but if an outbound load has to go, they will bring us back empty just so that load can get there a few hours quicker.

The only reason the company “chose” to put in elogs was government extorsion. If they put in little black boxes so the government could take away more of our freedom, they would substantially reduce the horrendously large fine after our audit.

That said.... seems the e-log bitching is directed at the wrong coordinates and once this has been realized the complaints about an electronic system that simple draws lines where the user tells it to will cease and the pointer will be directing the complainants to the door labled..

BOSS.

(Our) BOSS isn't the problem. He doesn't want elogs. It is costing him a lot of money that he shouldn't have to spend. We weren't bothering anyone before the government stuck their nose in. Our company used to have very high hiring standards. Since installing the qualcoms, they have had to lower their standards which reflects in their customer service.

Government is the problem. They keep giving the big companies money to hire dumb as a rock people to drive trucks so the government can be so far up those drivers ass that they see everything from the governments point of view. That is how we are getting the ever increasing number of dumbasses that soon will be a majority.

This is only one area of many that the government is sticking their nose in where it doesn't belong. There are brainwashed dumbasses everywhere that think the government is the answer to everything.

Our founding fathers got fed up with this kind of interference 240 years ago, and the decent, patriotic people in this country are getting fed up with the very same thing again.


And before someone even starts - You don't understand the foundations of this country if you think the government is headed in the right direction.

 

[Mike]

I did have a DOT guy ask whether I could demonstrate a 15 minute pretrip. I said, "Probably not, but I can show you a 22 minute one." He did not ask me to prove it.

Been there, done that, over a 7 minute pretrip on my elog. My answer was a but different and angered the officer. Basically told him I didn't have to.

 

[Injun]

freedhardwoods your company was audited and severely fined for log violations, if I'm reading you right. In order to mitigate these severe fines, your boss decided to install e-logs, when he could have paid the fines instead. But this is not my point.

You claim the company's hiring standards have dropped. It seems to me the hiring standards were already piss-poor if they hired people who didn't understamd HOS enough to properly falsify their logs and NOT GET CAUGHT. It's really NOT that difficult, if you know what you're doing. You may have never been caught, but there were a few rocks with lips who did, or your company would not have been audited in the first place.

I AM NOT an advocate for guv'mint meddling, but we all know the parameters under which we must operate.

 

[freedhardwoods]

You claim the company's hiring standards have dropped. It seems to me the hiring standards were already piss-poor if they hired people who didn't understamd HOS enough to properly falsify their logs and NOT GET CAUGHT. It's really NOT that difficult, if you know what you're doing. You may have never been caught, but there were a few rocks with lips who did, or your company would not have been audited in the first place.

I AM NOT an advocate for guv'mint meddling, but we all know the parameters under which we must operate.

You have a different perspective on what's important in an employee.

The man that owns this company was raised Amish, and quit school after the eighth grade to go to work. He became a Mennonite and started his company with a pickup truck and a couple employees in 1973. Last year his company grossed $120 million.

You hear "the customer comes first" all the time, and at many businesses, it really doesn't mean anything. This man actually means it. It is his policy to go to extreme lengths to keep his customers happy, and that is why his company has grown every year since he started.

Since the drivers that deliver to the customers are the ones that have the most contact with them, they want people that are dedicated to keeping the customer happy.

Many of the drivers here really don't know much about logging, and had never used a computer until recently, but they are loyal, hard workers and that is all that was ever asked of them. Before the audit, the company didn't really care how a driver filled out a log book as long as we got the customers material to them when they wanted it.

When CSA came about, I told my supervisor a couple different times that he needed to teach these guys how to fill log books out right, but he just let it go, and about a year into CSA, we got audited.

Now that we have the Qualcomms, they are finding that most of the people that are willing to be "button pushers", are more interested in getting their paycheck than actually caring about customers, so to put drivers in the trucks they add because of the elogs and growth, they are having to consider much lower quality people than before.

I don't know what the fine would have been (probably a few hundred thousand dollars), but when you consider all of the costs involved with the elogs, I really believe it would have been cheaper to pay the fine.

 

[terrylamar]

Government screws up everything it gets its hands on.

 

[Injun]

"...started his company with a pickup truck and a couple employees..."....and turned it into a multi-million dollar enterprise.

Back the timeline up eight years and you'll be telling the story of Jerry Moyes, who, by the way, also resisted e-logs as long as he could. He was singled out based on his company's size, not on his refusal to teach a bunch of nincumpoops how to log.

Any fool can read HOS and figure it out. It speaks directly to the quality of employee the company chose to retain. Your boss' company is one of the reasons the rest of us are stuck with e-logs. He should have hired teams if his freight was so time sensitive and if he really was more interested in customer service than money.

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