I was pleased to see that the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) has issued a five-year technician training exemption. The exemption shifts the amount of time technicians need for training from 12 months to 540 hours if the technician follows the Technology & Maintenance Council’s (TMC) Recommended Practices (RP) for performing annual inspections and maintaining or repairing brake systems. At the end of the 540 hours of both classroom training and on-the-job experience—one-third classroom and two-thirds on-the-job training—the technicians can self-certify that they are qualified to perform these types of inspections and maintenance and repair services.
Industry statistics show that fleets and service providers are losing a number of technicians in the first 12 to 24 months of employment, in part because they are not able to do the tasks they were hired for, i.e., maintaining and repairing trucks.
I know the importance of having properly trained technicians, as well as the key role brakes play in the safe operation of a vehicle, but TMC’s RPs are written and vetted by people in the industry who possess a wealth of knowledge. RPs go through a rigorous vetting process before being adopted. I am confident that technicians who are trained using TMC’s RPs and then are supervised during the on-the-job training portion of their education will be well qualified to perform these tasks.
As Robert Braswell, TMC’s executive director, said in an American Trucking Associations’ press release, “This exemption recognizes that TMC’s RPs meet the industry standard for technical knowledge, and technicians who are trained on them are more than capable of performing essential work.”
TMC is making available training materials, including its Preventive Maintenance Inspection Manual series, and its new RP Certification Testing App to facilitate the process of getting techs qualified to perform some of these basic maintenance and repair services more quickly than in the past.
I think the entire industry should feel good about this change because the training of these new technicians is based on industry-proven recommended maintenance and repair practices.
It’s encouraging to see that FMCSA is relying on the collective expertise of the trucking industry to make these impactful decisions. That is something that will benefit all of us.
