Pegasus TransTech

ATA’s Abbott Cites CSA 2010 Safety Score Flaws

FMCSA Investigator Says HOS Will Be Stressed

April 26, 2010

Clearwater Beach, Fla.  -- An American Trucking Associations (ATA) representative told carrier executives here that upcoming CSA2010 rules will rely on inconsistent state accident reporting and that carrier safety performance scores will be based on a flawed formula.

Rob Abbott, vice president, safety policy, for the American Trucking Association made his remarks to carrier executives gathered for the 2010 Pegasus TransTech Users Conference at the Marriott Sand Key hotel in Clearwater Beach, Fla. Pegasus TransTech provides TRANSFLO^®, TRANSFLO Express^®, and other technologies that speed the billing cycle and help carriers go paperless.

At the same conference, Cynthia B. Witty, safety investigator for the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration, said that enforcement under the new rules would stress compliance with hours-of-service (HOS) rules. If a carrier is found to have numerous HOS violations, “I’ll be coming in for an audit,” she said.

Witty also noted that current out-of-service criteria at roadside inspections will remain substantially unchanged with CSA2010.

Abbott said the ATA generally supports CSA2010, but finds fault with some of its features. For example, he said, CSA 2010 safety scores will be based on reports from FMCSA inspectors, state agencies, and sometimes from regional authorities.

However, Abbott noted, only those agencies that participate in the federally funded Motor Carrier Safety Assistance Program (MCSAP) will report violations, and most law enforcement below the state level is not part of MCSAP.

That means accidents in some states are far less likely to be reported to the FMCSA than in others; that will result in uneven enforcement under CSA 2010, he explained.

“Carriers with operations in high reporting states may find it harder to maintain good CSA 2010 scores than those who operate in states where reporting is low,” Abbott said.

According to Abbott’s presentation, states that most consistently report truck accidents to the FMCSA are Indiana, Kansas, Missouri, and New Jersey. Those four states report between 80% and 90% of truck crashes. The lowest proportion of reporting comes from Florida and New Mexico, which report fewer than 30% of such incidents, and Mississippi, which reports between 30% and 40%. State reporting data was gathered and published by the Transportation Research Institute at the University of Missouri, Abbott explained.

The same information shows that variations exist among other major trucking states, such as California at 50% to 60%, Ohio at 40% to 50%, Pennsylvania at 70% to 79%, and Texas at 60% to 70%.

Abbott also said the formula for arriving at a CSA 2010 safety score is flawed. At its most basic, he explained, the formula divides the number of carrier violations by the number of DOT registered trucks in the fleet – without regard to miles actually driven.

“That can hurt efficient carriers with high equipment utilization,” Abbott said, “because they travel more miles and do more work with fewer trucks.”

Conceivably, Abbott said, a carrier could improve its safety score under CSA 2010 simply by adding trucks to the fleet.

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