ELDT Nation, an online CDL education provider that offers two-hour CDL Class A theory courses for $23, has been issued a Notice of Proposed Removal by the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration.
On October 18, ELDT Nation contacted Overdrive offering to write articles about FMCSA's emergency shutdown of 110 "sham" CDL schools. Many of ELDT Nation's online competitors had been shut down, and now ELDT Nation marketed itself as an FMCSA-approved course.
Those schools were shut down because DOT found they had graduated 10 or more students who later got English language proficiency violations. Many of those schools have since been reinstated to FMCSA's Training Provider Registry.
[Related: CDL school fires back after 'emergency shutdown' from FMCSA, White House anti-fraud task force]
Overdrive spoke to an ELDT Nation representative on October 29, and learned of the company's rapid rise after the shutdowns. "We absolutely have" seen "an increase in our sales directly related to" the shutdowns, the representative said.
Asked how ELDT Nation ensures its students, who take the self-paced class online entirely, can proficiently speak English, the representative said that since the website and all emails are in English, students "wouldn't be able to get through onboarding" if they didn't speak the language.
But what about translator apps? Surely there are plenty of ways to translate online content or have someone else complete a course on your behalf.
"That is a good point, and to be honest it’s probably something we need to tighten up more," the representative said. "There are definitely exploits that could be manipulated there."
Later, Gabriel Ruimy, the founder of Qosmos.ai, an online education platform that owns ELDT Nation, said "no one can take our courses and pass the assessments without speaking English."
"The average pass time for our Class A/B ELDT courses are three to four hours," said Ruimy. "Since the course is self-paced, we don't control how long a student spends on the materials, only that they must complete the prior lesson (videos + quizzes) before progressing. As such, we've had a number of students pass it in about two hours."
Ruimy didn't answer follow-up questions about translation apps, or how exactly the platform ensures the applicant speaks English.
As for how a CDL Class A theory course covers all 30 modules in just two hours, Ruimy said some students take more or less time, but that he'd cracked the code on delivering CDL theory at lightning speed.
ELDT Nation's competitors are "pretty subpar in terms of their quality offerings," he said. "70% don’t offer video modules" and the "better pedagogical way is to deliver that through videos."
Neither Ruimy nor the other representative mentioned ELDT Nation had received a Notice of Proposed Removal from FMCSA. FMCSA requires providers with pending removals "to notify current driver-trainees and driver-trainees scheduled for future training of the proposed removal."
Ruimy said ELDT Nation has "educated nearly 30,000 students in the last year" and that he talks to customers who love the product every day.
Other ELDT providers expressed doubt the class could cover theory subject matter necessary in just two hours, and three training providers ELDT Nation listed as clients said they no longer used the service.
"ELDT Nation lists Class A theory at 3 hours for $23 and Class B theory at 6 hours," said Shawn Gresham, a certified driver trainer and 17-year Class A CDL holder with a violation-free record. "Class A is the bigger license. By their own numbers the harder course takes half the time. Three hours is our pre-trip inspection unit by itself."
[Related: The problem with truck driver training: School owner urges stronger regs, audits]
Gresham's theory block is 45 hours, with 30 classroom units plus a two-hour final, out of a 160-hour total program, however it's not an online course like ELDT Nation.
"Is two hours enough? No," Gresham said. "Two hours is less than our single pre-trip inspection unit (3 hours) or our hours-of-service unit (2.5 hours). You can't cover 30 required topics in two hours You can click through 30 topics in two hours, and that's the difference."
Online-only training providers Overdrive spoke to were equally dubious about the two-hour class.
Overdrive contacted three CDL schools ELDT Nation reported as clients. One denied using or knowing of ELDT Nation. Another had only used ELDT Nation briefly as a backup while its other CDL theory provider got back in the TPR, but had nothing negative to report. A third said ELDT Nation was "horrible."
Brent Griffith, owner of Rapid CDL Denton, said "I had no choice [but] to use ELDT Nation" after his preferred theory provider was briefly shut down. ELDT Nation's user interface "froze all the time," he said. "Once I submitted a student it cost $23 bucks, but if [the confirmation email] didn't go to their email, they can't just resend it."
Repeat submissions required another $23 payment, Griffith said. "Every second student had to pay $23 again."
Griffith said he put about 100 students through ELDT Nation while he was between providers, and wouldn't recommend it. "It’s a money-grab class," he said. "It absolutely does no training for the students, no test prep, nothing."
Ruimy said often students wrongly input their name and details, sometimes leading to FMCSA rejecting the TPR submission. Ruimy denied any students were ever charged twice, and said ELDT Nation has a "systematic and algorithmic" way of submitting all completed paperwork to FMCSA.
Ultimately, Ruimy said, "some people have good experiences, some people have bad ones," directing Overdrive to his Google reviews, which are highly positive.
FMCSA Administrator Derek Barrs has vowed to crack down on inadequate and fraudulent CDL schools, which under the current model simply "self certify" compliance.
Under Barrs, FMCSA launched unprecedented in-person audits and a widespread cleanup effort on the TPR, leading to nearly 10,000 schools removed, but industry insiders say bad actors remain and many removals have proven to be inactive schools.
As for a two-hour CDL Class A theory course, Gresham notes there's no rule against it.
"The problem is federal ELDT [regulation] doesn't set a minimum number of hours," he said. "It's proficiency-based. So a provider can run a two-hour online theory course, have the student pass a quiz, and legally report it to the Training Provider Registry."
CDL theory classes represent only one step in the process. Applicants through ELDT Nation, or any other school, still have to pass a written test at the DMV and get a Commercial Learners Permit for further behind-the-wheel training.
FMCSA did not say why ELDT Nation had been issued a Notice of Proposed Removal, but Ruimy said he was cooperating and expected to be back in good standing soon.
[Related: FMCSA seeks emergency action to block 'chameleon' CDL schools]
