What to Expect from the Canadian ELD Mandate

The Canadian trucking industry provides businesses and individuals with a much-needed service in every province. Whether the motor carrier is provincial or federal, tracking accurate Hours of Service is an essential industry standard that’s becoming more regulated, and for a good reason. To be clear, limiting HoS isn’t a way to prevent commercial vehicle drivers from making more money by the mile or hour, but instead to avoid exhaustion and driver fatigue from constantly sitting in the cab, reduce accidents due to drowsiness, and eliminate the use of illicit drugs that help truck drivers stay awake.

By implementing ELDs, or electronic logging devices, trucking companies can ensure compliance and mitigate risk to their vehicles, shipments, drivers, and pedestrians by electronically monitoring driving intervals and requiring periods of rest. While the U.S. has instilled these regulations as of December 16, 2019, most of Canada has yet to post their violations, fees, and a timeline for the impending mandate implementation cut-off on January 1, 2023.

Transport Canada, the division of the Government of Canada that is “responsible for transportation policies and programs”, deferred a request for information to the Provincial Motor Carriers Branch, or the Canadian Council of Motor Transport Administrators.  Through communication with a representative of the CCMTA, it’s become apparent that information is very limited as they weren’t able to procure or produce any specific violations or corresponding fines, either. This article will offer a potential foreshadowing of the possible Canadian ELD violations and fines by providing a glimpse into U.S. ELD and HoS violations that are currently in place.

Canadian ELD Violations

President of the Private Motor Truck Council of Canada, Mike Millian, published an article on September 1, 2022 in which he depicts Canada’s planning for the progressive enforcement of ELD contraventions as ill-prepared, leaving regulation open to interpretation on a case-by-case basis. Since legislation for enforcing these violations on provincial and federal levels is practically non-existent, this close to the deadline, Millian predicts some confusion in the opening months of 2023. He claims that “currently eight provinces and territories are likely to have regulations in place in time to enforce the federal regulation on Jan. 1.”

However, Millian poses a few situations in which legislation must be prepared so that RCMP, OPP, and municipal police officers have the proper training and tools to verify HoS and ELD compliance:

• Registered ELD providers must integrate with Transport Canada’s previously chosen system for sending a driver’s record of duty status (RODS) electronically. Wireless transmission requires a public key infrastructure (PKI), which provides shared access to data protected by encryption.
• Digital logbooks are encrypted to prevent tampering. To allow compliance offers to review this data, they must be issued a secure, individual encryption key. At this time, a viable way to provide encryption keys to each enforcement officer has not been established, which will create more downtime for drivers and officials involved in an inspection.
• The current Conviction Equivalency Table has not yet been revised to include ELD violations. This table defines violations on a weighting scale, projecting severity from least (1) to greatest (10). If point values for non-compliance are set low, carriers and drivers might simply pay the fee and forgo compliance as long as possible. For instance, seatbelt tampering is weighted as a 2, resulting in a $200-$300 fine with no interruption in the vehicle’s service.
• Almost every Canadian province has at least one ferry route, even a few North of the 60th parallel. For coastal provinces that require frequent travel via ferry, an exemption permits commercial motor vehicle drivers to consolidate ferry boarding time, ferry travel time, and driving time taken to find a rest area after disembarkation (within 25 km) in order to meet their required eight hours of off-duty time. Currently, Candian ELD regulations don’t allow adjustment of driver’s hours, and ELD devices themselves can only record off-duty time as “personal conveyance”. This prevents drivers from recording accurate ferry travel time, so Transport Canada and the CCMTA need to find a way for drivers to access a subsection of personal conveyance use that adjusts for the ferry exemption. Check the live Google Map of ferry locations throughout Canada below to see which provinces may be affected.

Ontario and Manitoba Are Ahead of the Curve 

Ontario and Manitoba were the first two provinces to publish data on offences, fines, and survey results regarding Canada’s ELD mandate compliance. This planning has allowed them to stand out on a provincial level while providing their jurisdictions with more time for implementation. Hopefully, the remaining provinces will also prepare their citizens with concise regulations, requirements, and consequences for ELD compliance before the end of this year.

On March 23, 2022, the Ontario Court of Justice published their set fines for Schedule 51 under the Provincial Statues and Regulations, which is the “Ontario Regulation 555/06 made under the High Traffic Act”. These regulations and set fines correspond to offences for breaking Hours of Service rules and ELD compliance such as:

• Exceeding maximum driving or on-duty time ($320)
• Failing to take required off-duty time ($320)
• Failing to retain ferry receipts ($250)
• Driving a commercial vehicle with no ELD solution ($250)
• Using more than one ELD ($250)
• Tampering with the ELD ($400)

While Ontario borrows many of its ELD and HoS rules from Federal legislation, it will most likely make specific provincial amendments and edits in the future. Currently, each fine is between $250 – $400 per violation. However, as new offences are added as unprecedented situations surface, that range will most likely expand in both directions.

Manitoba even went so far as to survey representatives of the Canadian trucking and transportation industry in February and March 2020, which provided some very interesting data as far as what the community perceives as issues or barriers to ELD implementation. This preemptive preparation has allowed them to join Ontario in publishing public ELD violation data, currently without fine amounts.

United States ELD Violations

On December 16, 2015, the “ELD Final Rule” was published for U.S drivers and motor carriers. Described as an “awareness and transition phase”, it refers to a period of time where the voluntary use of ELDs was simply suggested. Phase two, enacted on December 18, 2017, and dubbed the “Phased-in Compliance Phase”, insisted on the mandatory use of ELDs within 2 years, grandfathering existing AOBRDS for the same time span. After this two-year grace period, the “Full Compliance Phase” came to an end on December 16, 2019, requiring the mandatory use of ELDs for all applicable commercial vehicles in the United States.

Details on ELD rule violations such as descriptions, severity weights, and fines are difficult to find online, even in the U.S. where the electronic logging device mandate has been in effect for nearly 3 years. A request to the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) for detailed information resulted in a one-sentence reply, “You may have to create a FOIA request to obtain all of the information you seek.” The Freedom of Information Act statute states that “all federal agencies are required to respond to a FOIA request within 20 business days unless there are unusual circumstances”, which delays the construction of a comparative ELD violation guide for the two North American companies even further.

After a review of a variety of regulatory documentation, we’ve established a general range for ELD fines in the United States. For example, drivers failing to maintain a record under Title 49, Subtitle B, Chapter III, Subchapter B, §395.8 are subject to a maximum penalty of $1,388 for each day, up to a total of $13,885 (or 10 days). Since a violation/fine list has not yet been published for U.S. regulations, we’ve curated a list of the most frequently cited violations regarding ELD usage and upkeep.

U.S. Safety Measurement System HoS and ELD Compliance Violations:

Canadian Resources for ELD Info

The main constituents that control the ELD regulations in Canada are Transport Canada and the CCMTA. Since there’s nothing set in stone as far as violations and monetary penalties go, we’ve compiled some resources for each province. The links below host the most updated legislation regarding the ELD mandate, Hours of Service regulations, road safety, and more essential info for commercial carriers:

• Alberta
• British Columbia
• Manitoba
• New Brunswick
• Newfoundland & Labrador 
• Northwest Territories
• Nova Scotia 
• Nunavut
• Ontario
• Prince Edward Island 
• Quebec 
• Saskatchewan 
• Yukon 

Conclusion

Canadian companies that are required to comply with the 2023 ELD mandate should have already begun the search for a certified ELD provider. It’s also beneficial to find a fleet management solution that also offers GPS tracking, AI dash cams, elogs, and digital roadside inspections to ensure that every aspect of fleet compliance is on record in one place.

Certified devices should have a complementary app for Android or iOS that’s downloadable on smartphones and tablets for increased functionality. Titan GPS apps provide users with alerts and notifications that allow drivers and fleet managers to maintain compliance after the enforcement period. Companies that are unsure if their vehicles must be equipped with electronic logging devices to replace or corroborate paper logs, contact Transport Canada to discover what’s legally required to avoid fines and penalties before January 1, 2023.

*Some statutory exemptions apply to specific provinces, read our provincial guide to HoS rules in Canada for a granular look at regulations by territory.