Transportation Compliance Blog
Trucking Hours of Service Management Systems - The Key Actors
Welcome to article five of ten in this series on trucking company safety systems! Past articles in this series have explored the roles of systems in trucking companies, and have also dug into some of the specific purposes safety management systems have at trucking companies.
In this article, I will be examining parts of the carrier’s safety management system that are used to manage compliance with hours of service (HOS) regulations. My intention here is not to tell the reader how to manage HOS compliance; instead, I want to show the reader the different roles within the overall management system, that not all of these roles are under the control or even influence of the carrier, and that all of these roles provide valuable input for the system.
But first, let’s briefly describe the differences between HOS management and fatigue management.
Carrier Occupational Health and Safety Systems: The Key Actors
In the trucking industry, companies frequently segregate compliance requirements with National Safety Code (NSC)-related legislation and OHS legislation. Many companies ignore their OHS responsibilities and focus on NSC; for companies that strictly operate over-the-road fleets and don’t have their own facilities, OHS may not seem as important as the on-road safety elements for the company.
Carrier Maintenance Systems - The Key Actors
In this article, we’ll take a closer look at the maintenance system in a carrier and how it relates to safety and compliance. While a preventative maintenance program is an important part of ensuring equipment remains reliable and repair costs are controlled, well-maintained vehicles are also safer to operate than their neglected counterparts.
The Carrier Safety System’s Purpose: Compliance and Beyond
In this article, I will be describing the purpose of the safety management system in a general trucking company. While the methods used by a carrier to manage safety and compliance objectives vary greatly, many of the outcomes are legislated requirements with which carriers must demonstrate compliance. As a result, major themes within safety systems will show considerable similarity between different organisations.
Trucking Safety Systems: A Series
Individual carrier operations are complex, and when one looks at how different carriers, shippers and receivers, and regulators interact in the broader world of logistics, the complexities become deeply perplexing. To coordinate the massive efforts needed to maintain our global supply chain, systems exist at all levels of organisations to coordinate labour and resources in the effort to achieve goals.