The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) has launched a new, simplified, online registration process.
The first phase of the Unified Registration System (URS) combines multiple “legacy” reporting forms into a single, online “smart form” that streamlines the registration and renewal process, improves efficiency, reduces errors and, “most importantly, strengthens safety for the motoring public,” the agency says.
Only the initial registration by new applicants will be done using the URS online registration application until 2016, including truck and bus companies, freight forwarders, brokers, intermodal equipment providers, and cargo tank manufacturing, inspection and repair facilities.
All other aspects of the URS regulation, including the new fee structure, will roll out during a later phase. All existing entities with a USDOT, MC, or FF number, or combinations of them will continue to use existing agency forms and processes to conduct updates, seek additional registration authorities, make administrative filings, and other registration related transactions, until September 30, 2016, according to FMCSA.
When fully implemented next year, URS is designed to enable FMCSA to more readily identify unfit carriers and detect unsafe truck and bus companies seeking to evade agency enforcement actions, including civil penalties, by attempting to regain USDOT registration by registering as a purported different, unrelated business entity.
FMCSA estimates URS will ultimately reduce costs to industry by approximately $9 million in time saved and fees incurred over a 10-year period.
For more information about URS visit: http://www.fmcsa.dot.gov/urs.
