On Tuesday, June 23rd, Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration chief Jim Mullen said his agency is looking into potential violations regarding rate transparency among brokers.
The statement comes from the FMCSA’s session at the Truckload Carrier’s Association’s Virtual Safety and Security Meeting. The event was moved online due to the coronavirus pandemic.
The “Changes”
We have written about how there was clamoring for new regulations regarding broker transparency. Instead of jumping to add in new rules, Jim Mullen instead hopes to better enforce those already on the books. He said, “[there are] maybe five to ten allegations. … We’re investigating those. There’s been a notice of violation issued to a broker that didn’t provide it and we verified that the motor carrier didn’t waive it.”
While the FMCSA has no intentions to add more regulations about this subject yet, Mullen has also stated they will be researching the tendency of brokers to require carriers to waive their rights to review the records, or risk never doing business with them again.
The words Mullen shared comes after a massive protest in Washington D.C. in May, where truckers gathered along Constitution Avenue because they felt the government was quick to enact and enforce regulations that hinder truckers like the ELD Mandate, but not ones to protect them.
Conclusion
The FMCSA has been in the news often recently. Whether or not this is good is up to the reader, but it is highly unlikely many truckers will complain about the FMCSA planning to better enforce regulations currently on the books that are intended to protect truckers. Whatever the case, Jim Mullen’s announcement at the Virtual Safety and Security Meeting shows that the FMCSA hears what truckers want and is at least trying to make things equitable in the trucking industry.
