EOBR “myths” discussed

EOBR and fleet management suite maker Qualcomm’s regulatory man Dave Kraft brought together two trucking fleet reps — one from a large-ish fleet, one from a smaller one — to break down what Kraft called seven common “myths” about electronic onboard recorders for hours of service recording/monitoring, or electronic logs. Though the discussion presented little in the area of news, I thought it offered an interesting further window into how some carriers are thinking about EOBRs, at least those who’ve installed them as of today.

If Kraft is right, implementation of the full mandate that was written into this year’s MAP-21 highway bill is a ways off. At the beginning of the talk, he revised his speculative forecast for the proposed rule’s likely release in March 2013, which we reported on in August. He said that, realistically, a proposed rule would be likely by ”mid-2013. There’s so much work to do on the technical standards.”

A final rule? “Probably late 2014,” he said, though the “mandate legislation [in MAP-21] said a final rule should be in by October 2013, but … I don’t think that’s a realistic timeline.”

Full required implementation industrywide, Kraft noted, will be “at least four-five years after the final rule to get it all rolled out.”Find highlights from the online seminar following. Fleet participants on the call were as follows:

**Allen Lowry, safety director for Central Refrigerated Service, based in Utah
**Vincent J. Dinino Jr., fleet safety manager for Emerson Express Co. of Rochester, N.Y., with 80 trucks or so.