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Written by: The Deerfield Team
The Compliance, Safety, Accountability (CSA) program is the cornerstone of the compliance and enforcement efforts of the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA). CSA collects data on carriers’ safety performance nationwide and targets the FMCSA’s enforcement intervention resources at the most noncompliant and unsafe companies.
Rather than rely on FMCSA’s team or law enforcement partners to track millions of CMV companies and commercial driver license holders, the scientific CSA model allows the FMCSA to use data from state partners across the country and correct issues before they cause crashes and cost lives.
CSA is made up of three parts:
Until 2010, FMCSA relied on a data-driven analysis system called SafeStat. While SafeStat successfully identified carriers at risk for crashes, it proved to be too simplistic. Additionally, it did not focus on behaviors of CMV drivers, which the FMCSA Large Truck Crash Causation Study showed needed serious attention. Today the FMCSA uses the Safety Measurement System (SMS), its new “workload prioritization tool.” ¹
The tool continues to undergo improvements. In September 2015, the Safety Measurement System (SMS) Methodology was updated to reflect stakeholders’ suggestions.
The SMS incorporates motor carrier data from safety-based violations, State-reported crashes, and the Federal motor carrier census to evaluate motor carrier performance in safety metrics. It turns this data into quantifiable performance ratings that can helps identify which carriers should be prioritized for interventions, specify the exact issues of a carrier or driver, and track the improvement or decline of safety issues. The SMS makes motor carriers’ CSA safety and performance data available online, so that the carrier and other interested parties can look up the information themselves.
The SMS categorizes data into seven Behavior Analysis and Safety Improvement Categories (BASICs), whose usefulness has been demonstrated by multiple studies: ²
In a 100-page appendix to the Safety Measurement System (SMS) Methodology document, you can find all the violations used in the SMS, along with the corresponding Federal Motor Carrier Safety Regulations (FMCSRs) or Hazardous Materials Regulations (HMRs) section. The appendix also includes a numerical violation severity weight. Texting, calling, reckless driving, and operating a CMV while fatigued earn the maximum violation severity weight (10), while infractions like unlawful parking or leaving a parked truck unlocked have the lowest violation severity weight (1).
A second appendix outlines all the changes made to the SMS over time, including two violations added to the Dangerous Driving category of the SMS with a severity weight of 5: inattentive driving and failure to maintain lane.
The FMCSA hosts a dedicated webpage just for CSA. Here you can find FAQs, news, motor carrier safety and performance data, and resources like toolkits specifically for motor carriers, drivers, state partners, and other stakeholders.
As always, we are here to help you any way we can. Please don’t hesitate to call or email if you need us.
The Deerfield Team
800.233.6428
info@deerfieldadvisors.com
References:
1 https://csa.fmcsa.dot.gov/Documents/SMSMethodology.pdf
2 https://csa.fmcsa.dot.gov/about/basics.aspx
SOURCES:
Aquila, Brett. “CSA – Compliance, Safety, and Accountability Program.” Nov 11 2015. http://www.truckingtruth.com/wiki/topic-16/csa
Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration. “CSA.” https://csa.fmcsa.dot.gov/
Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration & CSA. “Safety Measurement System (SMS) Methodology.” September 2015. https://csa.fmcsa.dot.gov/Documents/SMSMethodology.pdf
Wikipedia. “Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration.” June 9 2015. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federal_Motor_Carrier_Safety_Administration
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