Truck drivers say an electronic device that measures how many hours they drive each day sometimes leaves them stranded just 30 minutes from home

• Truck drivers are paid based on mileage, but can only drive for 11 hours a day.

• Electronic devices record driving times, but truck drivers say it may be too restrictive.

• They say the restrictions could leave them stranded 30 minutes from home or stuck in a high-crime area.

It wasn’t low wages, long hours or lack of benefits that pushed Brian Pape out of the trucking industry.

Instead, it was a tiny device that measured how many hours he drove each day and told him when to stop.

“That’s it,” Pape told Insider. “I sold the equipment and I was gone.”

Truck drivers can work up to 14 hours a day and drive a maximum of 11 hours. They can’t do it all in one go: after eight hours of continuous driving, they must take a 30-minute break.

These laws have been in place for years, but in 2017, the Department of Transportation stopped using paper logs written by truck drivers and instead introduced electronic recording devices, called e-logs, that track when truck drivers drive and take breaks.

Truck drivers largely say they support hours-of-service regulations, but electronic logs have sometimes been too stringent and left drivers stuck close to home or a truck stop.

“If you’re 30 minutes away from home and you get to 11 hours, you have to close your business or you’ll automatically get a business hours violation,” Pape said. This can result in fines and may jeopardize your truck driving license.

Pape said that before the introduction of electronic logs, he sometimes exceeded the 11-hour limit by about an hour to reach a specific destination, but never “to an unsafe level.” Other truck drivers gave Insider similar comments.

Mark Rumps, an Indiana truck driver who runs the Trucking Answers YouTube channel, said some companies have even deliberately avoided using electronic logs by purchasing and refurbishing trucks with engines manufactured in 2000 or earlier because they are exempt from electronic logs .

Pape said just two weeks of using e-logs convinced him to quit driving after about 13 years.

Other truck drivers are leaving the industry because of low wages, long hours and poor treatment from trucking companies, which has caused chaos throughout the supply chain.

Colorado truck driver Brian Stauffer said electronic logs were one of the reasons he quit long-haul driving, likening it to “trying to put a round peg in a square hole.”

Stauffer said “rampant” work hours rules often don’t match drivers’ biological clocks. He said there should be exceptions, for example if a driver reaches the 11-hour limit in a high-crime area and doesn’t want to park there overnight.

Most truck drivers are paid based on miles driven.

“Driving time is miles on the road, and miles are dollars,” said Doug Watters, a Mississippi truck driver who has been in the industry for nearly 30 years.

Stauffer said the hours-of-service policy “forces” truck drivers to drive even when tired and to drive at high speeds to increase mileage.

However, truck drivers say that before electronic logbooks were introduced, some drivers cheated on paper logbooks and still drove recklessly to maximize mileage.

Rumps said E-Logs holds trucking companies “accountable” and means they stop pressuring drivers to take more loads when they hit their limit.

Dispatchers and trucking companies “now know they will be held accountable if there is any evidence that they forced a driver to do something out of the ordinary,” Watters added.

Truck drivers said electronic logs are more convenient than paper logs, and Rumps said they ultimately just reinforce rules that are already in place.

“The same working hours apply,” he said. “Drivers were just violating them all the time to get home.”

“If you are violating your working hours, it means you are not being paid appropriately,” Rumps added.

Are you a truck driver with a history? Email this reporter at [email protected].

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