While the Commercial Vehicle Safety Alliance (CVSA) maintains rigid, objective standards for out-of-service violations, the human element of inspections means errors can still occur. According to CVSA Inspection Specialist Jeremy Disbrow, carriers shouldn't just accept a questionable ruling; if a fleet believes a violation was cited incorrectly, they are encouraged to formally challenge the finding.
Speaker 1:
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Speaker 2:
Did you get dinged during road check? If you don't think you deserved it, let's talk about data queues. Hey everybody, welcome back. I'm Jason Cannon and my co-host is Matt Colt. CVSA's 2026 road check campaign just ended and history suggests that a little more than 20% of trucks will be parked with an equipment problem and about 6% of drivers will be parked with probably an hours of service issue.
Speaker 3:
But inspectors are human and humans do make mistakes and that's what a data queue is for. Bear in mind that there have been some fairly significant changes to the DataQue process, but those won't take effect until September.
Speaker 1:
I was an inspector for many years and I can tell you I made mistakes. We all do. We're human, right? So if there's a violation you believe is incorrect, submit a DataQue. It's a pretty simple process that you can do on FMCSA's website if you've never done it. It gives you an opportunity to explain why you think the violation was incorrect and then I would strongly encourage you to attach every supporting document that you can to support your case upfront. So if you have pictures of the violation or more importantly, our operational policies, CVSAs on our website has all of our operational policies listed there and they tell inspectors how they should be documenting inspection violations. So for instance, like if I had three ID lights out on a truck, our inspection guidance says that's just documented as one violation because it's part of the same cluster.
But inspector could forget that and they could write it up as three separate violations. So I would attach that operational policy to my data queue and say, per this operational policy, it should have just been one violation. That's just one example. But the more you can do to support it or use the regulatory language to support it and say, "This is what happened," it'll help you.
Speaker 2:
And if you're not satisfied with the response that you get, just keep pursuing it until you've exhausted all of your options.
Speaker 1:
If you didn't get the answer you wanted on your first submittal of a data queue, you can resubmit it again and it'll usually go up the chain within that agency. So the data queue process is run by the states. It's overseen by FMCSA, but the state that issued the violation is who's going to respond to you. So usually it goes back to the inspector or their supervisor first. They may uphold the violation, you can submit it again and it'll usually work its way up the chain to have a different set of eyes look at it to make sure that everything is correct. So be persistent, be professional. And the biggest thing is be honest. Do not ever, I know this should go without saying, but don't submit false information. Don't take a picture after you repaired it and send it in because most officers have body cameras now.
What it looked like originally is going to be on their body camera and now you're submitting false information and you'd be surprised how often that happens and it really shouldn't.
Speaker 3:
Immediacy is your friend with a data queue. For one, you want to go into it while it's still fresh. So as soon as you gather all the relevant supporting documentation, go ahead and file your data queue. Also, the longer you wait, the less impactful the outcome will be if the fleet wins the challenge.
Speaker 1:
You have three years to submit a data queue after the violation is written. That being said, the violation has the most points at the beginning. FMCSA kind of has a graduated scale and as time goes on, you have less points for that violation. So it's best to do it early, especially because it's fresh in the inspector's mind at that time too. And so it gives you better results, but ultimately you have up to three years. The biggest benefit, I guess, to doing it early is it gets those points off of your SMS score earlier so they're not impacting you negatively. So I would encourage you to do it quickly, but if you notice it two years down the road, you can still work on getting that taken off. So if I write you an inspection today and it puts, let's say for sake of argument, 50 points on your SMS score, it'll remain 50 points and then at a year it decreases.
As time goes on, that point system decreases. So that 50 points will automatically be lowered in the system to say 30 points or whatever it is. And then after more time goes by, it gets lowered again and then eventually after three years, it completely drops off your record. So in other words, if you get a 50 point inspection, it's not going to remain 50 points on your record for the entire three years. It drops in value over time, so it's not hurting you as severely. It gives you a chance to redeem yourself if nothing else. You made a mistake, you fixed it, so it starts lowering the point value on it until eventually it just drops off.
Speaker 2:
For more information on the changes to the DataQue system in the months ahead, check out the link below in the description. That's it for this week's 10:44. You can read more on ccJdigital.com. While you're there, sign up for our newsletter and stay up to date on the latest in trucking industry news and trends. If you have any questions or feedback, please let us know in the comments below. Don't forget to subscribe and hit the bell for notifications so you can catch us again next week.
