Top 5 Tips for Preventing a DOT Audit
Serious accidents, frequent violations, and high CSA scores can trigger a DOT audit, which opens your business up to scrutiny from the Department of Transportation AND the potential to lose your operating authority.
More than 1,500 carriers have used our online DOT training to prepare their drivers and mechanics and build a better safety culture in their company. We’ve compiled their Top 5 Tips to Prevent a DOT Audit and a handy DOT Audit Checklist to help you stay out of trouble.
1. Train Frequently & Consistently
2. Enforce Participation
3. Document Everything
4. Keep an Eye on CSA Scores
5. Test for Drugs and Alcohol
Bonus Tip: We can make online DOT training easy!
What’s Involved in a DOT Audit?
DOT safety training is an essential part of making sure a motor carrier is operating safely. Inspections by the Department of Transportation, likewise, are performed semi–regularly to make sure companies are within regulations.
Motor carriers are monitored for an 18-month period upon issue of their Provisional Certificate of Registration. During this time, the Department of Transportation will audit the carrier to determine their compliance with DOT regulations.
DOT audits are also triggered after an accident or upon receiving a poor inspection during a roadside stop. Audits can be triggered by bad CSA scores, as well. The DOT also performs random audits of carriers, which makes it a matter of “when” not “if” your company will be audited.
The DOT’s Safety Auditor will be looking for signs of compliance with DOT safety training and maintenance, as well as licensing, driver qualifications, hours of service accountability, controlled substance testing, hazardous materials compliance, and financial responsibility.
Failing the DOT audit can cause your company to be put on Conditional status, meaning your trucks will be stopped more often and subjected to more inspections. Not only is this annoying for drivers, it’s also deadly for delivery times. Conditional status can also make it harder to find clients willing to work with you.
How Ram Services Survived Their DOT Audit with Infinit-I’s Online DOT Training
One of our clients, Ram Services, had a fatal accident several years ago. In the previous 12 months, they’d only had one other recordable accident (non-fatal).
When they failed a DOT audit as a low-mileage carrier, they were forced to appeal. The DOT field officer asked them to provide training records, an agenda from their last safety meeting, a sign-in sheet, and their Accident Countermeasures Plan.
Because they were an Infinit-I client, our client success team was able to pull the information together quickly and easily.
Get the same online DOT training for your company by signing up for a demo
Our Top Five Tips for Preventing a DOT Audit
Over the years, we’ve put together hundreds of online DOT training videos to help our clients through inspections. Here are our top five tips for surviving a DOT audit:
1. Train Frequently & Consistently
Having your drivers be pro-active with online DOT training is a big step to building your company’s safety culture, but it’s also vital for surviving a DOT audit.
In an increasingly remote industry, motor carriers may have drivers all over the country, so getting that training out to employees can be troublesome. Most training is also time-consuming, keeping drivers off the road and decreasing profitability (especially for new hires).
Pat Landreth, V.P. of Human Resources and Safety for Ozark Motor Lines, touched on this point in a recent interview:
“Now, more than ever, being able to train a remote workforce has presented new challenges across our industry, but we all still face one collective problem: training our drivers. The Infinit-I Workforce Solutions has allowed Ozark Motor Lines to streamline our orientation from 2.5 days to 6 hours, and our new hires are able to complete their online training remotely before the drug and alcohol results are in.”
2. Enforce Participation
Having a workforce that participates in the safety culture of your company is integral to any safety program. If your drivers have an indifferent attitude towards their DOT safety training (or just plain refuse to do it), you could find yourself in hot water come audit time.
Another client, Logistics Warehouse, simply made training mandatory and held their drivers accountable by assigning online DOT training with Infinit-I.
“We got buy-in from most of the drivers, and we were willing to actually let some go because they wouldn’t do the training. We just said ‘Hey, this is important. You gotta get these done,’ and now they know it’s mandatory.”
3. Document Everything
Being prepared to show proof of DOT safety training and mechanical inspections is part of what an auditor will be looking for.
The inspector will also expect to see any receipts for repairs. Roadside inspections that lead to violations will be documented, and being able to show that you took them seriously by getting necessary repairs done will show your compliance with DOT regulations. Ideally, you should have receipts for the last 12 months ready to show in case of an audit.
Your Daily Vehicle Inspection Reports will also be called for. DVIRs should catch any defects in your fleet and being able to prove a proactive approach in maintenance can go a long way towards showing a DOT auditor that your company is operating safely.
online DOT training makes it easy to document and report with the press of a button.
4. Keep an Eye on CSA Scores
Keeping track of your company’s scores with the FMCSA can serve to avoid an audit and to prove your commitment to safety in case a DOT auditor comes knocking.
The FMCSA keeps track of violations from categories like Unsafe Driving, Crashes, Hours-of-Service Compliance, Vehicle Maintenance, Controlled Substances and Alcohol, Hazardous Materials Compliance, and Driver Fitness. Violations can stay on records for months or years, and the only way to take them away is with time and clean driving records.
Staying on top of these areas with safety training can keep scores down and keep the DOT from selecting your company for an audit. Most scores (except Crashes and Hazardous Materials Compliance) are publicly available through SAFER Web.
Get our content trucking catalog and see how our industry-leading library of content can improve your company’s scores.
5. Test for Drugs and Alcohol
Drivers aren’t the only employees who need DOT safety training. Safety managers should also stay on top of training for drug and alcohol testing.
This one goes hand-in-hand with one of the FMCSA violations above. It can be difficult for some safety managers to call for drug or alcohol testing of an employee, but it’s a necessity for drivers who are representing your company and may put others at risk on the road.
Drivers (and employees including mechanics and warehouse workers) should be tested randomly and regularly to show a proactive approach to your safety culture. Drivers should also be screened for drugs and alcohol after an accident, with no exceptions. An annual query should also be made for all drivers through the drug and alcohol clearinghouse.
A driver in Texas was charged when his concrete pumping truck veered into the opposite lane and struck a school bus and passenger vehicle. The crash killed a 5-year-old student on the bus, as well as the driver of the passenger vehicle, and left several other students injured. The truck driver, Jerry Hernandez, later admitted to law enforcement that he had marijuana and cocaine in his system. Hernandez also had a criminal record and was listed as “prohibited” through the FMCSA’s clearinghouse, though his CDL was still valid. His employer had not verified his status before hiring him.
Bonus Tip: We can make online DOT training easy!
Preparing and protecting your company during a DOT audit is a big job. Fortunately, INFINIT-I is here to help.
More than 1,500 carriers have used our online training platform to prepare their drivers and mechanics to ace DOT audits and build a better safety culture in their company.
Our learning management system includes record-keeping and reporting functionality to make proving DOT safety training easy during an audit or an appeal. We have an industry-leading library of content to help train your employees on a variety of topics including our CSA Basics series, drug and alcohol training, hours of service, and more.
Don’t leave your company vulnerable to an audit. Give Infinit-I a try by
Get in touch with our sales team 866-224-4676 and see for yourself!
