16 Hour Exemption and Coercion

Well, you can only do it once...so, maybe you have to pull a 16 everyweek to keep job?

Def intended to reach safehaven, as you mentioned...
Maybe yu get a dispatcher reprimanded, retrained or fired...seems like a loosing scenario

Im always fighting to get my work done everyday, they wont let me use a 16 to fetch another load...Even when I ask

 

Are you talking about the 2 hour safe haven exemption for OTR drivers or the 16 hour rule for local drivers?

 

As I understand it.
You must depart from and return to the same location everyday for the previous 5 days.
It can only be used once a week.

Took this directly from the March 2015 FMCSA Truck Drivers Guide
What Is the 16-Hour Short-Haul Exception?
If you usually come back to your work-reporting location and go home at the end of your workday,
you might be able to use the 16-hour short-haul exception. This exception allows you to extend the
14-consecutive-hour driving window to 16 hours once every 7 consecutive days. In order to use
this exception, you must do the following:
• You must return to your work reporting location that day, as well as for your last 5 duty tours. A
duty tour is the period of time from when you come to work to when you leave work. It is your
“workday,” the time between your off-duty periods of at least 10 consecutive hours.
• You must be released from duty within 16 hours after coming on duty.
• You must only use this exception once every 7 consecutive days (unless you took 34 consecutive
hours off to restart a 7/8-day period).
You may not use this exception if you qualify for the “Non-CDL Short Haul Exception”
explained earlier.
This regulation is found in Section 395.1(o).

 

First of all are you local or OTR? Local yes the 16 hr is valid once a week
https://www.fmcsa.dot.gov/regulations/title49/part/395

Now that being said, as soon as you said you are too tired dispatch should have dropped it as you do have the law on your side from https://www.fmcsa.dot.gov/regulations/title49/section/392.3

What needs to happen is you need to talk to a manager or if large enough safety guy so that dispatch stops pushing to run fatigued. If they don't, yes there is the coercion rule is there but in reality the only option is to quit and get a job that is not trying to kill anyone.

-Steven

 

In a recent thread there was discussion regarding this rule; some points made in that thread may have already been mentioned above. Here is the link in case it is helpful: http://www.thetruckersreport.com/tr...-in-this-situation.313270/page-5#post-5195945

 

Well, keep in mind that there are now laws relating to coercion specifically in driving hours. It's a new law.

 

The rule was made for local drivers dealing with ordinary slow shippers/recievers once per week as MR.G described.

Surely everyone expects the conversation to end when you say your too tired. However that doesn’t cover your arse entirely. Meaning your dispatcher could put you on his own 'light duty' list and block you from a full weeks work <--I'm not saying, just saying.

In your latest post, yes I believe your correct. You could lawyer up and sue for every imaginable cost related to leaving and finding new employment. But that requires so much proof its unattainable without a full team of lawyers, for a job that pays ~$50-60k/yr... your better off in small claims or just letting it go.

I know being right is worth something, but I don't see this as the fight to die (go broke) over.