ELDs: Ready or Not, Here They Come

While most owner-operators are ready for the ELD mandate, many are unhappy with the electronic logs, and blame them for a loss of productivity and a resulting decline in income, finds a recent DAT survey of 645 carriers and owner-operators.

In addition, it’s harder to find parking for trucks, driver detention remains a problem, and shippers don’t seem to be taking driver hours of service into account when loading and unloading, according to survey respondents.

Among the survey highlights:

• 91 percent of carriers comply with the ELD mandate.
• 81 percent have already installed ELDs, 10 percent are exempt from the mandate, and two percent planned to comply by the April 1 deadline.
• 53 percent started using ELDs fewer than three months ago.
• 77 percent report that at least one in five of their loads involve detention of more than two hours.
• 87 percent say it’s harder to find truck parking since the mandate took effect.
• Only 2.8 percent describe themselves as "likely" or "very likely" to leave the trucking industry.