Western Railroad Discussion > When Does A Train Crew's Time Actually Start?

I've always wondered about this question. Since a train crew can work a FRA maximum of 12 hours, when does the clock start ticking on their 12 hours? Is it from the time when they get called, or when they show up to the terminal before their train arrives, or does their time actually start when they get on their train?

The time begins at the time that the crew is ordered to report, and signs the employee register. So, if you are called for 5pm, or your job starts at 5pm, your time under the hours of service law will begin at 5pm, which is when you must also sign the employee register.

Now, there is also deadhead to be considered. If your assigned to an extra list out of a terminal (Termainal A), and you are called for an assignment at Terminal B, your time on duty starts when you leave your house to go to Terminal B. Your deadhead is the actual amount of time it takes you to get from your house to get to Terminal B, up to a maximum designated by the railroad. So, if you are ordered to report to Terminal B at 5pm, and it takes you 30 minutes to get there, your on duty time for the Hours of Service law is 430pm.

I dont know that all railroads still use a paper register, but it is a legal document by which you state you are properly rested for your assignment, and you have and read all of your bulletin orders and other new instructions.

I believe there is a lot of varience between different roads and local agreements. On the UP, you are on-duty at the time you are ordered for. This includes deadheads, locals, and assigned jobs. There is no longer any paper on the UP for HOS reporting.

RRKen

Heere is an example. I am assigned to the Conductors Extraboard at Proviso, IL. Last week I was ordered to protect a wayfreight (LPJ04) at West Chicago until further notice. I was on duty at West Chicago at 1500. Under our local agreement, West Chicago is a 1 hour deadhead. So I actually went on duty at 1400, as was technically dead at 0200. The funny thing is this is not reflected in my tie up screen automatically. When I tied up the computer thought I had been onduty for 11 hours with 1 hour of tow in. It isnt until I do my FRA certification the next day (we can not do it if we are dead or have less than 5 minutes to work) that the computer will see I was actually 13 hours old. At the end I get a one hour dead head back to proviso from West chicago, This is usually shown as a 1 hour reduction in rest on the next call I take . When ordered for a job "Further Notice" you only get the dead head once. In my example I was on the job for 5 days, so the first day my time to actaully perform the work was reduced by the Dead head by 1 hour, leaving me 11 hours to do the work (barely enough on this job, and on that particular day, it wasn't enough anyway). The rest of the week I was already "In" West Chicago , so my on duty time was correct at 1500, with a full 12 hours to work.

Sometimes it can get really confusing trying to balance these things out, but as long as I get paid for it , Im happy.

Hope this answered your question, and didn't confuse you more. if it did , let me know and Ill try to confuse you some more... hahaha..

Clay

What happens if, as in CB's dead head numbers, the carryover of 1 hour from a previous day, when called for a train the next day, results in an engineer and conductor having different times over the road? Would they not be paired?

unless you are on a regualr job (such as I was for that week) , you sledom have the same amount of rest as your crew, at least out of you home terminal . With everything working in a rotating pool , I could have 20 hours rest, while my engineer may have only 8.
In the case of a regular job, the engineer and I did have different time, In that case while I was dead on hours of service by an hour when we tied up, he was just dying, that just the way it is..

Does that answer your question?

On BC Rail, we are paid by the hour, not by mileage,on duty time starts at the time we are ordered for ie: called for duty at 12:00 we can be relieved at 22:00, regardless the crew is entitled to rest and or relief after ten hours on duty, or have the option of working longer if feeling fit etc for duty. If we "turn" out of the away from home terminal, it is required (by collective agreement and law)that the crew be off the train on the 18th hour and deadheaded home.
Doug.

On the BNSF, as on the UP, we are on duty at the call time (ex=called at 0600 hrs to be on duty at 0800 hrs, you are on duty at 0800hrs) EXCEPT at outlying points where we have set, agreed upon deadhead. Example, the extra boards are located at Hobart, Pico Rivera jobs get only 20 mins of DH, La Mirada jobs get 40 mins DH, and Watson jobs get 1 hour DH. The only exception is the Escondido Local and any job you get called for in San Diego. In those two cases you can take as much time as you like up the THREE hours. So, if you get called off the LA Hobart extra board for a San Diego yard job on duty at 1900 hrs, depending on when you get the call, you can take 2 1/2 hours dead head time to get there. IF they have sufficient notice of a vacancy, you are USUALLY called the night before and put up for 8 hours rest in a motel so you can work the entire allowed 12 hour shift. This is mainly because of the extreme traffic problems we have in this large metro area (just like Chicago). One time I was called for an afternoon San Diego yard job that I did not stand to catch ( you can check the computer, or an 800 nunber to find out what you stand for ) and I was not too happy about it and also did not care for the Trainmaster/yardmaster down there, so, I took 3 1/2 hours of dead head time and was only good for an 8 1/2 hour shift. Confused? Welcome to the world of "rails".
JB

Your hours of service time starts upon your on duty time as specified in the call. With the case of a regular job, it's the bulletined start time.

If you are deadheading to an assignment, it's the time you were ordered to report for deadheading. "Deadheading to" when combined with service when you arrive "there" is counted as time against you for hours of service. The only occasions when you must be rested when you leave your house occur when the company want's you to go directly to a train without first reporting to a terminal in order to be deadheaded there by carryall.

Deadheading from an assigment or after being relieved under hours of service doesn't count as hours of service but as "limbo time", and your rest doesn't start until you tie up at your destination.

There are no requirements under the Hours of Service Law for crewmembers to have the same amount of rest, be on or off duty the at the same time, nor even have the same starting points. These are all Contract items.

Regarding the post in which the guy deadheaded to a "five day stand" at W. Chicago, the deadhead to was part of hours of service. The deadhead from wasn't, although his rest didn't start until he arrived back at Chicago. What he did on the days in between is a Contract thing, except for the time on duty working the job itself.

>If your assigned to an extra list out of a terminal (Termainal A), and you are called for an assignment at Terminal B, your time on duty starts when you leave your house to go to Terminal B.

No. It starts with your on duty time at termina A for the deadhead.

>Your deadhead is the actual amount of time it takes you to get from your house to get to Terminal B. up to a maximum designated by the railroad.

No. You always show the full amount of time allowed by the Company for deadheading from A to B under hours of service time even if it takes less time. The figure has been arrived at by negotiations between the Union and the Carrier, and the FRA uses these for enforcement purposes.

I certainly hope you don't show your house as the on duty point for deadheading to B because doing that opens up a whole new can of worms.

>There is no longer any paper on the UP for HOS reporting.

This may be true, but it's still up to you to report your hours of service properly using the means the Compnay has provided.

I do know that the UP's electronic timeslip system is not as slick as the SP's and that there are many occasions when deadheading to an outside assignment isn't reported properly because of the cumbersome and complex sets of screens the UP uses.

The carriers don't instruct the crews adequately about hours of service reporting.

InsideObserver wrote:
> Regarding the post in which the guy deadheaded to a "five day
> stand" at W. Chicago, the deadhead to was part of hours of
> service. The deadhead from wasn't, although his rest didn't
> start until he arrived back at Chicago. What he did on the
> days in between is a Contract thing, except for the time on
> duty working the job itself.

The dead head back counted against my hours of service for the next job. When I ceritfu the next job I am called for I first have to deadheadmy self back to proviso and account for the 1 hr, reducing my rested time for the current job by one hour.

>The dead head back counted against my hours of service for the next job.

No. The hours of service for "the next job" don't start until you go on duty for "the next job". There is NO connection between the two.

You must be fully rested to go on "the next job", so if you've deadhead back from an outside point, that deadhead is "limbo time" (those quotation marks are directly from the FRA and a descision from the US Supreme Court), meaning your rest period for 'the next job' doesn't start until you have ended your deadhead.

For example, if you worked an outside job, tied up at 10:20 PM, and had a 1 hr 30 min deadheaded back to your home terminal, then your rest for your next call won't start until 11:50 PM. You will be fully rested at 7:50AM. With a 2 hour call, the phone would probably ring at 5:50 AM, which is permissible under FRA rules provided they call you *no more than once* before 7:50AM. If you had died on the law before deadheading, then add 2 hours to the above fully rested for service and call times.

The only circumstance in which the deadhead back counts for hours of service for "the next job" occurs when you are called on duty before your statutory rest period has elapsed. This is a very unlikely situation because the hours spent performing service on the previous job would count against you as well. You wouldn't be called on duty because you wouldn't have enough time left under the hours of service law to do anything.