Shipper Says HOS Changes Would Hike Transport Costs

Proposed changes to truck driver hours of service rules would raise transportation costs 1 to 3 percent, one of the nation's largest food shippers said Thursday.

That could translate into tens of millions or even hundreds of millions of dollars in additional transportation spending for many of the nation's largest shippers.

"We surveyed our major carriers, who handle 80 to 90 percent of our total business," on the impact of the proposed HOS changes, said Harry J. Haney III, associate director of transportation planning for Kraft Foods in Madison, Wis.

Those truckers estimated a 3 to 7 percent reduction in driver productivity under the proposed changes, or 50 to 100 fewer miles of driving a day, Haney told a panel of Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration officials in Arlington, Va.

"We believe that could well contribute to a 1 to 3 percent increase in the total cost of transportation, which is the most expensive cost in our supply chain," Haney said.

"Right now we can reach about 75 percent of our customers within one day," he said. "If these rules were put in place as proposed, just over 60 percent would be reachable in one day and about 8 percent would incur an additional day of transit."

The Kraft Foods executive spoke at a Feb. 17 listening session on the FMCSA's latest hours of service proposal, which could shorten daily driving time by an hour and would certainly shave at least another hour off a driver's daily work schedule.

"We see no evidence these changes will actually improve safety and are concerned that it could actually hurt safety by moving more of the driving that currently occurs during the evening into daylight hours where congestion is worse," Haney said.

The $49 billion food products company operates a private fleet of trucks for about 10 percent of its domestic hauling business in the U.S., Haney said.

-- Contact William B. Cassidy at wcassidy@joc.com.