New law leads to change in driver hours-of-service regulations

December 26, 2014 By    

An appropriations bill passed into law in December includes language that suspends enforcement of the Department of Transportation’s (DOT) hours-of-service requirement pertaining to its latest restart provision for commercial truck drivers.

Specifically, DOT’s Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) suspends requirements regarding the restart of the 60- or 70-hour limit that drivers were required to comply with beginning July 1, 2013, according to information on the FMCSA website.

The regulations required drivers of commercial motor vehicles using the 34-hour restart to take two consecutive periods off between 1 a.m. and 5 a.m. and limited the restart to once every 168 hours, or seven days.

But the Consolidated and Further Continuing Appropriations Act of 2015, enacted on Dec. 16, 2014, eliminates this requirement through the duration of the annual spending bill – Sept. 30, 2015.

The legislation also directs DOT to study the effectiveness of the restart provisions in place before and after the July 2013 change, according to Transport Topics.

Click here for more information about hours-of-service regulations.

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