2013 New Hours of Service Regulations and State Self Certify

Evening all. Lets first dive right into the new-ish HoS regulations. The first change that we’ve seen is to the 34 hour restart rule. As of July 1st 2013 we can only do 1 restart every 7 days. And you also have to have 2 time periods between 1 and 5 am. What does this mean in english? It means that you cannot start another 34 hr restart until the same day and time you took it the week before. So if you started your last 34 on Saturday at say 5 pm. You cannot start your next one until the following Saturday at 5 pm. The other thing to consider is the 2 time periods between 1 and 5 am. So if you start Saturday at 5 pm your reset won’t complete until Monday morning at 5 am. Where many drivers will complain about this I find the new rules pretty good. After all if you spend your home time on a 34 hour break you get more home time which is always a good thing.

Pro tip: If you start your 34 hour break later in the evening you will maximize your time. For instance if you start your restart later in the day such as between 7 pm and 12:59 am you will spend less time on your restart and leave more time for your driving.

The other new HoS rule change is the 30 minute break. This rule says that you must take a 30 minute break within your first 8 hours on duty. The break must be logged off duty. This rule is pretty straight forward. I”m not a huge fan of this rule, but the department of transportation didn’t consult me :).

Pro tip: If your day is mostly going to consist of driving you can burn your 30 minute break anytime after your 3rd hour of driving and with 8 hours left on your 11 you can slide right through and be more productive. I also try to link my break with loading/unloading time or after logging a fuel stop. You might be surprised how fast it goes!

Lastly, we have self certify and medical card submission. The deadline for self certification has passed in most states, if you haven’t done this you can google “self certification (your state)” and it will take you to the information. All you have to do for self certification is to select which type of the 4 different classifications of driver you are. It takes literally 3 seconds. Then you get instructions on the website or via snail mail on how to submit your medical card to your state so that it can be combined with your license. The deadline for submission of medical cards is different in the different states. This date has come and gone in a lot of states as well. And there are some states that have started to enforce the new rule. This means you get shutdown and have to figure it out if you haven’t done it. Sounds like an inconvenient costly proposition to me.

Thanks for the read! And be safe out there!