PCF Transportation Practice Leader Todd Lykke is joined by special guests Tiana Schowe, COO of meshVI, and Rob Moseley, attorney specializing in the transportation industry. Together, they explain what MVR monitoring is and how it can play a key role in mitigating risk and costs for truckers and motor carriers. Learn how PCF Transportation is using MVR monitoring to keep their business running smoothly.
For more details on everything you need to know about MVR monitoring, check out the discussion below or read the full article. To learn more about how PCF Transportation can help keep your business running smoothly, visit: transportation.pcfins.com.
Moderator: Brody Lawson
Today, PCF Transportation and some special guests will be talking about Monitoring Your Motor Vehicle Record (MVR), why it’s important, and how PCF Transportation is leveraging this useful tool to manage some of the risks that come with the transportation industry.
First, let me introduce Todd Lykke, PCF Transportation Practice Leader: Hi, Todd.
Todd Ricke
Hello.
Moderator: Brody Lawson
Next up is Tiana Schowe, Chief Operating Officer at meshVI.
And Rob Mosley, a lawyer who specializes in the transportation industry. Good morning.
Rob Moseley
Hello, good morning.
Moderator: Brody Lawson
Thank you so much for joining us! We’re excited to get started. First, Tiana, what is driver and MVR monitoring and how does it work in meshVI?
Tiana Shaw
That’s a great question, Brody. MVR monitoring is the continuous monitoring of motor vehicle violations that drivers who are operating commercial vehicles commit. For meshVI, the way we integrate into our platform is by having a seamless driver list and making it easy for carriers to bulk upload their drivers and do bulk monitoring in one go. You can see in real-time data if a driver has been convicted. So you know that your driver is being monitored in real-time data. You get a score that tells you if the driver has received a violation. It’s like golf, a bad score is not good and a high score is not good. So the lower the score, the better the driver is when it comes to monitoring. All of this is built into meshVI, in one seamless pane of glass, so carriers, trucking companies, anyone who is monitoring drivers can know in real-time if a driver has been convicted as a result of violating local laws. You know, the types of violations that carriers monitor for drivers are mandated by law, like speeding, reckless driving, running stop signs, etc.
Moderator: Brody Lawson
Ok, just like in golf we are always aiming for the low scoring sector, that’s easy to remember.
Now, Todd, trucking companies have a lot on their radar when it comes to their business, right? DOT scores, vehicle maintenance, logistics management, customer service, it’s never-ending, there’s so many things going on. So, from a priority standpoint, how important is this?
Todd Ricke
Thanks, Brody. That’s important. One way of looking at it is that it’s just part of the ingredients that go into baking the cake. When we advise clients from a risk management standpoint, what we’re always trying to do is mitigate risk. How do we shrink risk and, in turn, lower the premiums for our clients? When insurance companies price, they have to price with risk in mind, just like the maintenance on your car, or your DOT score. The better the score, the less risk you have from the insurance company’s perspective. So when you’re monitoring, when your clients are monitoring their MVR, if they find anything, like their driver’s license is suspended or they have a major violation, those are very important things from the insurance company’s perspective. And, Brody, as we all know, a lot of times drivers will raise their hand and say, “Hey, employer, what do you think? I was 15 miles an hour over the limit, I got a speeding ticket. But all of those things matter. So it’s just one piece of the puzzle. If you want to manage your company, you want to manage your costs. That’s what you want to focus on.
Moderator: Brody Lawson
Absolutely. And on top of that, Todd, what value does a carrier get from MVR monitoring of their drivers?
Todd Ricke
It just gives you a better understanding of your driver pool. It actually reduces your risk if you have a problem driver. Instead of finding out after the fact. Brody, here’s the situation. What happens if a bad accident happens and an MVR is eventually run by the plaintiff’s attorney after the fact and they find out that the driver had a suspended license? Maybe it was because they didn’t pay child support. There could be any number of reasons, but from a litigation standpoint, it’s like just letting it all go. This is awful. Now we have unlicensed drivers on the road. Why don’t we know about it? The reason is because, in most cases, trucking companies run an MVR once a year and assume everything is fine after that. They don’t know anything else, but if there’s a problem, they need to know. It could be devastating to the company and it could really put the company at risk from a litigation standpoint or from an insurance cost standpoint. The customer needs to be aware that they need to make decisions accordingly, and this is the value that this kind of service brings to the customer.
Moderator: Brody Lawson
Yeah, absolutely. I mean, if you could give us a concrete example, that would be very clear. Thank you. And I’ll turn the baton over to Rob. As Todd touched on briefly, from a legal standpoint, what are the risks and benefits of MVR monitoring?
Rob Moseley
The only risk is not acting on what you know. So the only risk is knowing that a driver is unqualified and keeping that driver on the road. But there is no risk in taking an unqualified driver off the road. In terms of benefits, there are benefits, as Todd and Tianna mentioned some. But if you do an annual review under Rule 391-25, it could be 11.5 months before you look at this driver again. And then that driver could be suspended or have some kind of violation for 11.5 months, and some kind of remedial training or some kind of disciplinary action could be implemented. But you didn’t know about it. That’s the benefit. You’re no longer in the dark.
Something we hear sometimes is, “I’m going to look at the CSA and see if there were any violations.” But the answer is, “No, you won’t find them,” because the CSA won’t tell you that a driver has a suspended license unless you get pulled over and they tell you that your license was suspended 11.5 months ago. And there are a lot of local laws and regulations that are in the MVR that aren’t in the CSA. There are a lot of benefits and very little risk to having a program like this in place. It’s very helpful.
Moderator: Brody Lawson
That is indeed the case and exactly what you described. So now let’s look at it from the motor carrier’s perspective. What are some ways that motor carriers can take advantage of MVR monitoring?
Rob Moseley
Well, as Todd says, motor carriers will have a better understanding of the drivers that are in their fleets, but by having this kind of ongoing monitoring, in a litigation situation it’s always better to say, “Of course, we knew about it and we did this in response to it.”
So if a driver has a violation or gets suspended in any way, knowing about it, responding to it, and taking action shows that you’re addressing that issue. But the stories that are really interesting to me are the stories where we can say we’ve gone above and beyond what’s required by regulation. Federal regulations only require this static check once a year. And we actually have a continuous monitoring process, where we’re continually reviewing driver records in real time, which is really important. The stories where we can say we’ve gone above and beyond what’s required by regulation are the stories that we want to tell.
Moderator: Brody Lawson
All that sounds great, but of course, as is often the case in business, it all comes down to the bottom line. So, Tiana, how much does MVR monitoring typically cost?
Tiana Shaw
That’s a great question. We can tell you what it costs, but the bigger question is, how much does it cost to not monitor your MVR? Rob has the answer. The actual cost is about $2 per driver per month. That means monitoring your drivers’ MVRs would cost you $24 per year.
The bigger question, and I pose it to you Rob, is, Rob, how much would it cost to not have MVR monitoring?
Rob Moseley
Absolutely. There’s no comparison to the cost of being in a litigation situation and finding out that you had drivers that weren’t qualified and you could have known but you didn’t. And also, as Todd was talking about, when you go to an underwriter and you’re trying to give a presentation explaining why the underwriter should be interested in you. That’s another story to tell just to show the underwriter. Look, you just ran the MVRs of all our drivers and you found nothing outside of what we already knew.
Meanwhile, Todd tells the underwriters, here’s a risk, we want you to hold them, and they create a list of 25 drivers, and they run an MVR and say the two drivers listed here are currently suspended, and they’re not doing the underwriters their best. So, like Todd said, there’s another benefit of knowing the driver, knowing the vehicle, and being able to show the underwriters and the plaintiff’s attorneys that you understand the vehicle and you have solid control over it.
Moderator: Brody Lawson
Finally, we’ll hear from Todd about how PCF Transportation is using this tool to help their customers.
Todd Ricke
Well, we offer that to our clients and that’s a big benefit of using PCF. We have a lot of clients who have never heard of this from other agencies when we suggest it. You’re like, I never thought this was possible. So this is a big value. So we help not only from a litigation standpoint, but also from a cost standpoint. And as I said before, all of this translates into mitigating those risks and managing costs for our clients long term and short term.
Moderator: Brody Lawson
Absolutely. Thank you so much for sharing your wisdom and giving us just a little bit of insight into MVR and its benefits. It’s really interesting and I think it will be beneficial for everyone who listens.
Thank you for joining PCF Transportation to discuss the importance of MVR monitoring for motor carriers and drivers.
To learn more about how PCF Transportation can help keep your business running, visit transportation.pcfins.com Thanks for listening.
For more information about PCF Transportation, transportation.pcfins.com.
