Company research tool (safestat)

[bigrigjoe66]

http://ai.fmcsa.dot.gov/SafeStat/SafeStatMain.asp?link=


This may be posted here somewhere but here it is again. This tells the story of the companies you want to know about. The main two reports are driver safety and equipment safety. The lower the score the better. A score of 100 is the worst you can get on this list. You can see the inspections and violations so just find your company and look around.

My previous company was a 85 on equipment and a 99 on drivers. I have never had a ticket or any other violation ever (car or truck). It was a company of only 4 trucks and 1 current driver and 2 old drivers created the high scores but I suffered. I got inspected or at least pulled around behind every scale in the country. I was treated like a criminal and talked to like a child many times by the DOT.

Most, well all companies have quirks and not everyone will make it and/or be happy. That being said take these post with a grain of salt because most people here complaining are probally at fault. Think about this. There are thousands of drivers and hundreds maybe thousands of companies as well. There are only a few hundred people here and on other boards whinning and crying. That means there are alot of people happy and making a living. Read these post and use the above site to find the real story. Not trying to make anyone here mad but that is just my opinion. Goodluck

[bigrigjoe66]

http://ai.fmcsa.dot.gov/SafeStat/Car...t=a2&PageNum=1


Here is the link to the list page of companies if you have trouble with the search page. I stated above there are probally thousands of companies. Well on the list page at the bootom it says 1,108,929 records found. And I can't find a company to pull for.

[GMAN]

I am glad to see you post about safestat, bigrigjoe66. I don't think most drivers understand how much their behavior can impact their carrier or their career. Any time a driver is shut down or ticketed or fails an inspection it can impact their carrier's safestat score. The smaller the carrier the more your behavior can affect the score since infractions are calculated on the total number of units compared to the total number of infractions. As you stated the higher your safestat score the greater the likelihood that you will be inspected or checked. A carrier's safestat score also affects their insurance premiums. The more a carrier pays for operating costs the less they have to pay drivers and the less competitive they will be. If your carrier is taking more time with safety issues then they are probably attempting to reduce their safestat score or keep it from going any higher.

[matcat]

Safestat should be one of the first places anyone looking to get into a company should check out. Espially the smaller companies, if they have a high driver safety and high equipment safety scores, chances are they are a very bad choice! BUT for those with not so perfect histories, it can also be a tool to find a company that is willing to hire black sheep... but it will be a rough road if you do it that way :P

[GMAN]

I disagree to some extent on your assumptions, matcat. Just one or two events can greatly impact a small carrier whereas it may take many similar events to have any impact on a large carrier. The safestat score can be an indicator, but I would not base my entire opinion on this single factor. I think most smaller carriers strive to keep their equipment up. The driver aspect of the safestat will likely tell you more about the quality of the drivers who work for that particular carrier.

[charged]

My dad has a poor safestat score. It is 96 vhsea and a 74 for drsea, vhsea is vehicle safety evaluation area and drsea is driver safety evaluation area. He's had 5 vehicle inspections and was tagged on three with out of service and 8 driver inspections with one as out of service. No crashes or anything. Unless he goes in and asks for inspections on a regular basis his numbers will not come down. To my knowledege this ahs not affected his insurance carrier or rates. It does get you on the ISS-D list which they say makes inspectors overly cautious and they inspect with a fine tooth comb and more often. His ISS-D score is a 83, inspection warranted.

[chris1]

That's 60% OOS for vehicle. Someone needs to take better care of the equipment. SEA scores are being phased out and replaced with SMS methodology. At least that will put the trucks that have avoided inspections near the top of the list.

[GMAN]

One thing I have noticed in checking several safe stat scores with people whom I know. Several of them have gone up considerably even though there have been no violations or OOS on either equipment or drivers. The reason is insufficient data. In talking with the feds in Washington, those scores went up due to a lack of inspections rather than anything the carriers did or failed to do. A couple of them went from 10 to 93 or 94 for no other reason than no inspections. I think that they raised those scores to encourage the dot to bring in those carriers to inspect them. There seems to be a push to inspect everything with 18 wheels, no matter what your previous safety score. One went up in the 90's and recently dropped back down in the 40's. Nothing changed. There were no inspections or violations of any type during that time.

I think you will find as many or more of the larger carriers with high scores than smaller carriers. I checked several of them over the last several months. I was rather surprised at some of them. That is one reason many of them are canceling owner operator contracts and terminating drivers who have too many moving violations or problems passing inspections. Safe Stat is supposed to be replaced with the new CSA program as it comes into effect.

[chris1]

Carriers are being assigned to a peer group. 1-5,6-14 ect. Number of inspections,OOS inspections,bad inspections(write ups that are not OOS) ect. are assigned to that group.

[GMAN]

Carriers are being assigned to a peer group. 1-5,6-14 ect. Number of inspections,OOS inspections,bad inspections(write ups that are not OOS) ect. are assigned to that group.

I have heard about the peer groups. I don't know when they will be ready to implement that part of the program. It is more equitable than throwing small carriers in with major ones.

[charged]

I have heard about the peer groups. I don't know when they will be ready to implement that part of the program. It is more equitable than throwing small carriers in with major ones.

Is this because small carriers are probably on average inspected more and have more violations than large carriers due to use of older equipment?

[Bigmon]

Big carriers contribute more money to DOT fundraisers and political campaigns.

[GMAN]

Is this because small carriers are probably on average inspected more and have more violations than large carriers due to use of older equipment?

Not really. As a percentage of the total trucks in their fleet, small carriers could have a higher percentage of violations than mega carriers. But I don't think small carriers do a worse job of maintenance than larger carriers. In fact, most small carriers that I know try to keep a close eye on their trucks. I also know some large carriers who skimp on some of their maintenance.

I think the main reason for the groupings is because of the way violations affect smaller carriers as compared to large carriers. For instance, if a 2 truck carrier has 1 out of service violation then they have 50% out of service. If a carrier that has 2,000 trucks has 1 out of service then it would barely show up as a blip. For it to have the same impact on the carrier with 2,000 trucks, they would need to have 1,000 trucks put out of service. It makes sense to put carriers into peer groupings.

[chris1]

Peer groups are for CSA2010 scoring. Combining driver and carrier scores for a group. I always liked the 1-2 truck carriers that have a 50-100% OOS. They always keep the equipment up to snuff except that one time they were inspected. Who are they kidding. Odds are pretty high that the one time they are inspected there is an OOS issue. SMS methodology will cause them to have more inspections by way of no/not enough contact. Doubtfull that their scores will improve much.

[GMAN]

It isn't always the carriers who can control whether a driver gets shut down due to a maintenance issue. I have only had 1 driver who EVER got shut down for a maintenance issue. I have always tried to make sure my trucks are up to speed when it comes to maintenance. The problem comes in when the driver doesn't do his job and tell the carrier there is a problem. A carrier cannot make repairs unless they are aware of them. The one driver who was shut down did not do his pretrip and apparently had not been doing them for a while. The reason he was shut down could easily have be repaired had he informed me about it. I have no doubt there are many other instances where the driver just doesn't do his job by inspecting his equipment. I have been driving for almost 40 years and have NEVER been put out of service for logs or maintenance issues. There is absolutely NO reason a driver should be put out of service if he is doing his job properly.

The reason the CSA 2010 came into being is to force drivers to do their job. If they skimp on their pre trip inspections or fail to do the job they are paid to do then they will now share in the consequences with their carrier. If they don't change their behavior then they will eventually be someone that most carriers will not hire. I have already spoken to several carriers who are getting rid of owner operators and drivers due to too many violations.

[chris1]

Jeez calm down. I can't see where i used you as an example. I merely commented that the only time some are inspected they have OOS issues. What are the odds of that?

[GMAN]

I am calm. I didn't take your comments as being directed at me personally. I understand what you are saying. There are some running out here who could care less about doing their pre trips or taking care of their equipment. Some will only do the bare minimum. I would like to see those taken off the road. I think the main problem is not with the carriers but the drivers who fail to check their equipment. There are some carriers who don't take care of their equipment as they should, but for the most part it is the driver who should be held accountable. The new rules will place more of the responsibility on the driver. Previously, the driver could slack off and it would only affect the carrier. Now, he will share in the points.

[chris1]

We have 30-35 new carriers call every day. One truck driven by the owner and a high percentage have 1-2 inspections and 1-2 OOS,revocations,ect so it's not just a company driver issue.

[GMAN]

I am surprised that there would be so many owner operators who have that many violations, especially OOS. I know a major carrier who has about 1,000 trucks. It is a 100% owner operator company. Their safety score is 94 due to safety. There are some who have that high of a score because of insufficient data. It would bother me to have that high of a score due to safety. I don't recall how many OOS they had, but it must be very high.

[chris1]

It's the 1-2 truck companys that seem to be the worst. You would think if their OOS was so high they would try to get more inspections to bring the % down. It isn't just the OOS,if you go through the "good" inspections you find the same non OOS violations over and over. At least the larger carriers work at keeping a low %.
BTW that safety score has been a non issue for a few months now.