Truck Driver With A History Of Substance Abuse Causes Highway Accident

During my career as a fleet manager, I have managed large fleets of 3,000+ vehicles including light-duty cars, trucks, and commercial vehicles. I have worked with many commercial vehicle fleets as a consultant and have taught general safety and department of transportation classes through the fleet management association. Department of transportation regulations only require that a carrier to determine the motor vehicle report shows the driver is properly licensed and/or qualified to operate their vehicles. Qualifications can be based on company policy or federal standards. Best practice is to have a motor vehicle report point system to measure driver safety, but specific standards for motor vehicle report review are not required under the department of transportation standards. State points systems apply toward disqualifying a driver. Company policies usually check at least three years, even for non-commercial drivers. But some go farther back to five years. Some state laws require commercial drivers to be enrolled in the department of motor vehicles pull notice program which notifies participating employers when an employee’s driving record is posted with a conviction, accident, or department of motor vehicles action. It identifies drivers who have a negligent operator status, have been convicted of vehicle code violations, or whose licenses have been suspended or revoked. The trucking company in question should have been looking at a three-year motor vehicle report at least every 12 months and they should have received a pull notice when the infractions noted occurred. Action should have been taken to address the infractions, for example, another motor vehicle record review, remedial driver training, probation, or dismissal.