Virginia Tech offering $600 to drivers who participate in Flexible Sleeper Berth pilot program

The Virginia Tech Transportation Institute is offering $600 to truck drivers who participate in the Flexible Sleeper Berth pilot program run by the FMCSA.

The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration pilot program will allow participating drivers to obtain the equivalent of 10 consecutive off duty hours by using any split from a 5/5 split and a 8/2 split.

Each participant will collect data for 6 weeks total – two weeks under typical HOS regulations and 4 weeks under the Flexible Sleeper Berth Exemption. Eligible truck drivers would first meet with a VTTI researcher to complete a W9 for payment purposes, review and sign forms, and receive study equipment.

VTTI states that drivers will be required to do the following to participate in the study:

• Complete a pre-study and post-study questionnaire.
• Allow a telematics device to be installed on the inside of the windshield of your vehicle. The device collects data on vehicle speed, braking and acceleration, and side-to-side movement.
  Wear a provided actigraph watch on your non-dominant wrist at all times. This device monitors body movement in order to assess your sleeping behaviors. You will be asked to transfer data from the watch to an app, approximately once per day. You will also be asked to keep the watch charged throughout the data collection period.
• Collect data from an app installed on a study-provided tablet. This data includes a 3-minute reaction time test, sleep logs (if your watch is not working), and a self-report of your sleepiness. You will be asked to complete the tasks in this app at the beginning of each day and at the start of each rest break.
• Transfer your records of duty status (RODS) from your ELD to FMCSA’s eRODS system two times per week. You will follow the same process for transferring your RODS as you would during an inspection, except that the transfer code you will enter will be a special code reserved for this pilot program instead of an inspector’s badge number. To ensure your records are processed securely and accessed only for the purposes of your participation in the pilot program, each time you upload records to the eRODS system, FMCSA’s authorized pilot program manager (Samuel White) will promptly retrieve them and transfer them securely to the researchers at VTTI. FMCSA (including the authorized pilot program manager) will not review the RODS at any time during this process; the records you upload as part of your participation in the pilot program will not be used against you for enforcement purposes. Your records will be permanently deleted from the eRODS system within 24 hours of being uploaded – only an access log will be retained, to ensure that pilot program records temporarily stored in the eRODS system are only accessed by the authorized pilot program manager. After the RODS are transferred to the researchers at VTTI, your name will be replaced with a Driver ID.

Drivers who sign up for the Flexible Sleeper Berth study will be paid up to $600 through a reloadable MasterCard for completing all study tasks. Drivers will be paid $100 after initial signup, $150 after week two, $150 after week three, and $200 after the final week six. The final payment will only be made after the post-study questionnaire and all study materials have been returned in a provided envelope.