The compliant carrier finishes last? Fleet owner and third-generation trucker Zach Meiborg explains in this editorial and graphics how unchecked ELD cheating has led to two different trucking markets.Zach Meiborg
Widespread electronic logging device fraud has split the trucking industry in two, with compliant carriers following the rules and losing and non-compliant carriers cheating to win.
It's an open secret. Everyone knows about ELD cheating, yet the industry has allowed it to fester.
As a compliant carrier with more than 250 trucks in operation, I'm pretty passionate about ELD fraud, and to me it's the first issue of our core problem in trucking. We have outdated regulation being enforced with modern technology, and it's created a divergent supply curve.
[Related: The growing challenge of shared risk in ELDs and Chameleon ELDs]
The core issue is the 70-hour rule: you can be on-duty up to 70 hours in eight days, or 8.75 hours of on-duty time per day.
Drivers have to get loaded, get unloaded, pre-trip the truck, trip-plan the journey, post-trip the truck, communicate with dispatch, fuel, and, by the way, actually still drive the truck, all within the 8.75 daily available hours under the 70-hour constraint. The hours limits significantly constrain the driver's productivity.
But the biggest issue isn't that all drivers are held to the same standard, it's that they're not.
A bunch of foreign-owned and -operated companies outside the purview of the law created their own ELDs through the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration's "self certification" model.
According to analysts, there are about 900 ELDs out there and about 750 are fraudulent and can erase hours nightly. That's the reason why hours are such a big issue.
[Related: Revoked ELD maker reveals 'huge' demand for HOS-cheat devices]
The big, U.S.-based ELD vendors are compliant and accountable. American-owned and -operated companies leave a trail of metadata in the cell phones, tablets, trucks, and transmission and engine control modules, all tracking location.
But when a foreign owned, fraudulent ELD is in a crash, the provider doesn't work with investigators, and they just shut the company. Its ELD-fraud-perpetrating customers simply move on to another one of the hundreds of faulty ELDs out there.
These fraudsters are erasing hours and running 16, 17, 18 or more hours a day. They openly advertise on recruiting websites "flexible ELDs" and running 4,000-5,000 miles a week. There's no way a solo, compliant driver can do that legally.
The cost of trucking rapidly diminishes the more miles you can spread it over, giving non-compliant fleets a distinct advantage and all the motivation they need to cheat.
A legal, compliant company might run around $3/mile. Meanwhile, an ELD fraud company can get costs down to around $1.80/mile.
In effect, this creates two tiers: compliant companies and non compliant companies, with no real enforcement. While cargo theft gets all the attention in trucking, this is a way bigger issue, with billions lost to cut rate companies each year.
Also, it's the reason our roads look like a scattered warzone.
These aren't just guesses -- at Meiborg companies, we know. We have purchased one of the fraudulent ELDs and have an open invitation for any member of law enforcement or regulator to come see how the American trucking industry is getting cheated by bad actors hour after hour.
We estimate there's 1,000,000 trucks running "flexible" e-logs today, or one in four trucks on the road running illegally today. We've also identified a single fraudulent e-log with 100,000 subscribers.
The solution is simple: Get rid of the 70-hour clock and daily drive-time limits. This proposal would keep the 30-minute rest after eight hours of driving, but scrap the 11-hour drive time limit.
[Related: Beating the '24-hour logbook' competition, with a circle of trust]
Meiborg's proposed new HOS system to simplify logs and remove incentives to cheat.
Updating the HOS to a simple 2-line operation with 14 hours on-duty and 10 hours off-duty reduces the incentive to cheat, raises driver pay, reduces driver turnover, reduces demand for parking (likely by 400,000 stalls, or the equivalent of $12 billion in spending), and brings pride back into trucking.
This is an America First approach and basic law and order, as well as something I hope trucking leaders will join me in supporting.
The ELD fraudsters are the capacity that caused the issue with Dalilah Coleman, the triple-fatal U-turn in Florida, and so many more senseless tragedies. The sad part of it is that the drivers of those trucks are as much the victims of the motoring public as they're getting treated like modern day slaves, shown only the go pedal, the stop pedal and a translator app.
[Related: FMCSA update on 'Prohibited Coercion of Drivers' amid widespread ELD cheating reports]
It's time to modernize our 91-year-old HOS rule and bring American trucking back into compliance.
Zach Meiborg is a third-generation trucker and CEO of 250-truck Meiborg Companies. He's a Governing Council Member at The Dalilah Standard and an advocate against ELD fraud.
