Ending predatory practices

Predatory lease-purchase agreements that often leave truck drivers in a worse position than where they started have persisted in the industry for decades.

Such agreements involve programs where a carrier leases a truck to a driver for a certain amount of money and takes a percentage for the load. In some instances, drivers have claimed that they owed the carrier money at the end of the pay period. Commonly, the driver never ends up owning the truck despite making numerous payments to the carrier.

These predatory practices led to a provision in the 2021 infrastructure law that ordered the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration to create a Truck Leasing Task Force.

The task force, which held its first meeting on July 11, will evaluate the effects of commercial motor vehicle lease agreements and determine best practices for future agreements.

Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg provided opening remarks at the inaugural meeting.

“We’re working to make sure truck leasing agreements are not trapping drivers into predatory situations, and that is going to be the focus of this board’s work,” Buttigieg said during his opening remarks. “We’ve seen a lot of ways that lopsided leases are preventing drivers from ever getting ahead and even leave them in a worse place than where they started through no fault of their own. “These conditions are unacceptable for any worker in America and certainly for essential workers like those who get our goods to where they need to be through trucking.”

In an interview with Land Line Now, Buttigieg also explained how such practices that make drivers leave the industry are a detriment to highway safety.

“We know that experienced drivers are the safest drivers, so it’s a safety win every time you keep a good, experienced driver on the road,” he said. “But in order to get after that, we have to tackle the issues that affect quality of life.”

That’s why driver retention is a priority for the administration, Buttigieg said.

“Retention tells you what the people who are living the reality of being a truck driver in America today actually think about the sustainability, the viability and the overall quality of their job,” he said. “If they’re being compensated well, have a good quality of life, and feel safe, then you’re going to see those retention numbers improve. There are a lot of ingredients that go into that, but if we see the needle move on that, then we know we’re doing the right thing. If we don’t, then we know we have more work cut out for us.” LL