Will the FMCSA Begin Ranking CDL Drivers?
Rumors continue to circulate that the FMCSA is discussing the idea of including drivers in the ranking system under CSA, and making that driver safety data public.
The FMCSA is said to be seeking the necessary authority to rate CDL drivers as part of the next highway bill.
A source within FMCSA stressed that making public the driver percentile rankings in the CSA BASICs “has always been the long-term vision.” Currently, drivers are not ranked against their peers in the BASICs, and data from drivers’ inspection histories is only accessible officially by prospective employers through the Pre-Employment Screening Program.
A recently released five-year plan (2011-2015) was released by the FMCSA. It made no specific mention of the concept of ranking drivers, suggesting achieving this goal could be more than five years away. However, the plan does refer to continuing development of “a methodology to assess the safety fitness of drivers to further identify unsafe drivers who should not be in the industry.”
Making driver safety data and rankings public may be a bigger project than FMCSA and Congress will feel is worth the trouble, says Joe Rajkovacz, government affairs specialist with the Owner-Operator Independent Drivers Association (OOIDA).
Regardless of the outcome, this is certain to be an extremely contentious topic.
I encourage you to express your thoughts on the subject by commenting on this post.
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