Fit or Unfit? FMCSA keying in on problems with 'Conditional' safety rating limbo

With an FMCSA regulatory update session just concluded at MATS, one thing that stood out was that the agency didn't mention a plan to advance a rulemaking around its safety rating system for motor carriers. FMCSA Associate Administrator Larry Minor, however, speaking to the specialized carriers' Specialized Transportation Symposium just a month ago, revealed potential to begin a rulemaking process to possibly change the system as early as this year.

Should the three-tiered Satisfactory, Unsatisfactory, and Conditional rating system remain? Minor asked SCRA attendees, characterizing the fundamental early question any move toward a change would ask. Or: Should a two-tiered, "Fit or Unfit" system be adopted?

That’s what some small fleets and associated advocates have been calling for for years, as so very many have sat in that Conditional limbo -- some even for decades -- after an adverse review, despite efforts to improve. It's only gotten increasingly difficult to then get FMCSA out to any carrier's site to do the only thing that can result in a Satisfactory rating in today’s system -- a fully comprehensive on-site audit, generally, though there have been limited exceptions to that rule, particularly during the COVID-19 pandemic: https://www.overdriveonline.com/regulations/article/15064263/dotissued-safety-ratings-more-scarce-in-2020

In today's edition of Overdrive Radio, we'll hear more from Larry Minor in his talk at the symposium early this month to specialized carrier attendees. As it concerns FMCSA's failure to mention the safety rating issue here at MATS, ongoing through Saturday, April 1, maybe regulators believe owner-operators really could care less about ratings and how they’re conducted. It's safe to assure them they’re off the mark, there. While few one-truck owners with authority are likely to ever be rated, the same business issues that arise for small carriers from a Conditional rating -- difficulty doing business with many brokers, to name one -- hits them equally.

The smallest of small carriers, too, like holds less capability to get the feds back out to their place of business for a follow-up audit to potentially move them back to the Satisfactory category.

We’ll hear from Minor also on the DOT’s National Roadway Safety Strategy and FMCSA’s place within it, about how the Entry Level Driver Training program is going, about getting that program more effectively interoperable with state licensing agencies, about the late-fall ELD regs questions asked, about the notion of Universal Electronic ID for every truck (asked for by CVSA). And speed limiters, of course, and changes to Drug and Alcohol Clearinghouse reporting requirements of states.

Also in the podcast: Drop for a bit of fun, too, with Rob Howes, executive vice president and chief testing officer of the company that bears his name, Overdrive Radio sponsor Howes. A bit more lengthy talk over interesting results of a Howes company survey we’ll visit in a later podcast, but Rob filled us in for this one on just what’s happening for the company here at MATS, likewise plans for the next Howes Hall of Fame announcement.

Hear Overdrive Radio's interview with owner-operator Angelique Temple, the last member inducted, in the December 9, 2022 edition: https://www.overdriveonline.com/overdrive-radio/podcast/15304180/hazmattank-veteran-driver-now-on-her-own-meet-angelique-temple