Webinar Replay Video #89: FMCSA Technician Training Requirement Exemption

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Steve Kessler: Good morning, everyone. My name is Steve Kessler, and welcome to the INFINITI Fast Forward Webinar Series. I’m going to host the program today.

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Steve Kessler: as you all know, those of you that are joining our webinars on a regular basis. Our focus is primarily on safety in the trucking industry. And today we’re going to talk about a little bit about a big part of that which has to do with maintenance and the technology associated with

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Steve Kessler: the trucks out there. So, we’re going to, I think, have a very interesting program, and we’ve got a great speaker lined up for this morning. A couple of housekeeping items, as you all know, or may not know, everyone is muted so we can’t hear you.

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Steve Kessler: So, if you want to communicate, you can type in the chat box which is available in a little tray there for you. Also, there’s a Q&A section. If you have a question, feel free to type that in there, so we can address any questions or comments that you have. So do either one.

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Steve Kessler: Why don’t you all just jump into the chat right now, if you don’t mind, and let us know who you are and where you are and who you’re with. So, we have some idea who’s out there.

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Steve Kessler: and while you all are doing that, let me introduce our co-host, Mark Rhea.

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Steve Kessler: Mark’s been on most of our webinars. He’s a veteran in the industry. He’s.

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Steve Kessler: you know a certified director of safety and has a great deal of knowledge in the industry.

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Steve Kessler: So, Mark, what do you think about our topic today?

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Mark Rhea: Well, I’m really looking forward to Robert’s presentation, our commercial vehicle industry.

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Mark Rhea: I think there’s a vacuum on how we can capitalize on the technology and determine your vehicle performance and predictive maintenance, safety. All of these

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Mark Rhea: features are out there.

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Mark Rhea: but I don’t know if we capitalize on them, and I know Robert’s going to we got to have trained skilled, educated technicians to do that. And I think there’s a little gap, maybe a major gap there. And I’m really looking forward to how we, as an industry, can capitalize on this technology to improve vehicle performance and safety.

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Steve Kessler: Yeah. And it’s been a big challenge, I think, with trucking to

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Steve Kessler: to get the technicians and mechanics that they need. And that’s going to be primarily the focus of our discussion this morning is there’s been some effort and some success in helping kind of streamline that process to make sure you can get those properly trained technicians. So, without any further delay, let me introduce you all to Robert Brasswell.

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Steve Kessler: Robert is the executive director for ATA’s Technology and Maintenance Council.

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Steve Kessler: Roberts, responsible for ensuring the effectiveness of all TMC programs, products, meetings and services covering all aspects of light, medium and heavy duty, vehicle engineering maintenance and maintenance management.

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Steve Kessler: Y’all may know, Robert, since 2,005. He’s served as co-host and content producer of the Weekly Coast to coast satellite radio segment tech talk with TMC. On the Dave Nemo Show, which is produced in partnership with Dave Nemo. Entertainment, and heard on Sirius XM. Channel 146 every Tuesday at 10 AM Eastern time.

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Steve Kessler: and that show provides technical information in exchange on a wide range of technical issues to audiences of the United States and Canadian listeners.

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Steve Kessler: Robert’s a graduate of the University of Maryland’s College of Mathematical Computer and Natural Sciences.

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Steve Kessler: He joined TMC. In 1992, as an information manager he was named the Assistant Technical Director in 1994, and promoted to Technical Director in 1995

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Steve Kessler: he was awarded the Council’s highest honor in 2,004, the Silver Spark Book.

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Steve Kessler: and he was named the executive Director in 2017,

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Steve Kessler: also, in 2021 he received the Commercial Carrier Journal. Career, leadership, award.

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Steve Kessler: Robert’s been a member of the Society of Automotive Engineers since 1992.

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Steve Kessler: He served as a member of SAE’s truck and bus council and has chaired SAE’s Commercial Vehicle Maintenance Committee. He’s a member of the Fleet Maintenances Editorial Advisory Board.

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Steve Kessler: So, having said that Robert, welcome this morning. We’re glad you’re here, and I’m going to turn the program over to you, sir.

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Robert Braswell: Well, thank you very much, Steve. I appreciate the opportunity to bring this information to you to your group today. I’m going to be talking about a new exemption that’s been granted by the Federal motor carrier Safety Administration. And if we can go to the next slide we’ll move right along. You’ve already seen this.

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Steve Kessler: Well, you come here.

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Robert Braswell: Just a little bit about the Technology and Maintenance Council upfront before we get started on the technical topic. So TMC, it’s a technology and Maintenance Council

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Robert Braswell: comprised of experienced fleets, equipment, suppliers, and service suppliers. We believe TMC is the only industry association that’s focused solely on truck maintenance and technology in our industry. Using their real-world experience, our members work together to create what we think are the industry’s best recommended practices and truck technology and maintenance to help hopefully improve trucking equipment and transportation efficiency throughout North America. Next slide.

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Robert Braswell: So TMC was started back in 1956 by a small group of maintenance directors you see there on the screen, over on the left-hand side, that was the founding fathers. They gathered to sit down with truck manufacturers to discuss recurring equipment maintenance problems, because this is what the trucks looked like back then.

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Robert Braswell: And if anybody else knows what’s going on in 1956, it was the beginning of the interstate highway system, which was a great highway system.

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Robert Braswell: But it just wasn’t. The trucks weren’t just ready for that new kind of autobahn level technology. And the trucks are really, bad. And the fleets were tired of hearing the same story. Oh, yeah, you’re the only one with that problem. So, can you imagine this, this tractor hero, the right going down 60 miles an hour on interstate? I don’t think so. Neither did these guys. So, they said, get together and do something about it. So that’s kind of where the genesis of TMC. Came from. Originally, we were called the Regular Common Carrier Conference Maintenance Committee.

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Robert Braswell: and then we eventually became part of the American Trucking Associations in 1979, next slide, please.

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Robert Braswell: Now, just about 70 years later, next year we’re going to celebrate our 70th anniversary. We’re a diverse group of more than 3,000 industry professionals who work together to improve truck equipment and technology at TMC companies don’t join TMC, only individuals do. So, it’s basically like a professional society in that regard.

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Robert Braswell: And we just concluded our annual meeting. We did well, with over 6,000 attendees. I think there were about 54, 5,500 officially registered folks at that annual meeting. So, it’s really grown by leaps and bounds just in the time that I’ve been with the Council since 1992

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Robert Braswell: next slide.

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Robert Braswell: So, with all that out of the way, let’s talk a little bit about something we’re very excited about at TMC. And Ata, and that is FMCSA. Granting us a technician training exemption. So, let’s talk a little bit about what that means. Next slide.

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Robert Braswell: So, on January 16th FMCSA. Granted Ata and TMC. A 5-year exemption that is to cut the time new technicians need to spend in preparing to enter the workforce while still maintaining high standards for safety and competency

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Robert Braswell: next slide.

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Robert Braswell: So, under this new policy, which we had requested back in 2026 years ago. In fact, technicians will be allowed to shorten to 540 h and require one year of training or experience in combination

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Robert Braswell: needed to conduct commercial vehicle inspections and brake related repair and maintenance, if training that they receive is based on TMC. Recommended practices and derivative products based on those recommended practices. Right now, as it is, you know, you need basically a year of all the job training

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Robert Braswell: to self-certify your entry level technicians to make sure they’re capable of doing

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Robert Braswell: break maintenance and repair, and or your vehicle inspections. That’s what it comes down to. So instead of we hear this all the time at TMC. From our members, you know, they’ll bring on new technicians, and I’ve got them painting curves and washing trucks and fueling trucks, and I really needed them to do other things, but they can’t do that until they get their one year under their belt.

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Robert Braswell: There’s no mandatory certification. It’s all obviously self-certified. It still is the case. But you know it makes a big difference. If you can bring somebody on board in less than half the time you ordinarily would.

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Robert Braswell: and still, of course, make sure that they’re properly trained next slide.

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Robert Braswell: So, the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Regulations or FMCSRs. They require motor carriers and such to ensure that these individuals perform the annual inspection. That’s the Federal inspection that you must do every year that’s under 49 CFR 3.96.19. Those are the folks that must be qualified.

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Robert Braswell: And again, part of that qualification one year, training, experience, or combination thereof. And still, in this industry a lot of folks come into the workplace without having gone to a trade school or a

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Robert Braswell: a community college to learn their craft. It’s they’ll get hired directly by a fleet or by an employer, and they’ll learn on the job, and that’s probably about 70 to 75% of the folks coming into the industry. So, a lot of folks aren’t going to have that time and experience and or training when they come into the workplace, especially in the fleet side. And of course, fleets are doing about 75, 80% of their own maintenance. Still.

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Robert Braswell: So that’s a vast majority of the commercial vehicle technicians out there that this will affect next slide.

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Robert Braswell: So TMC through its study groups and task forces. Over the years we’ve developed a very robust set of recommended practices, and these RPS form the backbone of the knowledge the leadership of the Council provides to its members and the industry. We have over 4,000 pages of recommended practices. It’s now in 2 volumes, 3 books.

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Robert Braswell: There’s over 500. I think it’s over 550 now, recommended practices that cover all this stuff.

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Robert Braswell: and FMCSA. Now recognizes that these RPS meet the industry standard for technical knowledge, and the technicians who are trained on these RPS

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Robert Braswell: and in their words in the Federal Register, notice that they issued are more than capable of performing the essential work outlined in the FMCSR.

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Robert Braswell: So what we’re really excited about this, too, is that this is the 1st time FMCSA. Says TMC’s RPS are good stuff. So that’s nice. That’s nice vindication, you know. We’ve known it for about 70 years. But it’s nice to hear that the experts are at the fed level. Understand that, too, next slide.

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Robert Braswell: And this exemption now applies to motor carriers, intermodal equipment, providers and individuals, and it allows them to self-certify that they have completed the training program based on these TMC RPS. So, this training and certification, based on RPS rather than the currently required year of additional training or work experience, according to FMCSA.

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Robert Braswell: Would likely achieve a level of safety equivalent to, or greater than, the level of safety provided by the regulatory requirements. So, they’re satisfied that if you base the training on what we have to offer, you’re going to be in good shape as long as your technicians can show that they have learned the material

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Robert Braswell: next slide.

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Robert Braswell: So how do we do this? So TMC has developed more than 500 RPS. As I mentioned, they’re organized into 15 different sections, and it outlines all sorts of individual procedures for inspecting, repairing, replacing components and servicing systems on commercial vehicles. Now, ordinarily, as I showed that book previously. And of course, it’s also mainly online. We’d still print some copies, but the printed copies are vastly

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Robert Braswell: in the minority compared to the digital copies that we distribute, and that’s the latest version of that as our 2024, 2026 recommended practices manual. But also, this is the Kicker. We have condensed into a smaller book. We call it the preventive Maintenance Inspection guidelines for Tractors and Trailer series, and this is a picture of it.

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Robert Braswell: So, what we do is we have a preventative maintenance inspection. That we believe is a thorough one, for in this case, as you see here for Class 7 and 8 Diesel powered tractors, and we reference into this PMI

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Robert Braswell: manual and in the checklist that accompanies it. If you wanted to have that checklist as the one you use in your own operation. You know. We’ll reference the Rp, so we’ll have an item, you know. Check XYZ. It’ll refer to a recommended practice if it’s applicable. That says this is how you’re supposed to check it, or this is the way you’re supposed to inspect it.

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Robert Braswell: And that was one of the things that FMCSA. I was really excited about, that there was. It was a documented procedure on how these things should be reviewed

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Robert Braswell: as opposed to just a checklist that you might get from one of the one of the vendors out in the industry, it says breaks good

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Robert Braswell: you know, tire is good. There’s a little bit more to it than that. So, anyway, next slide, please.

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Robert Braswell: So, this limited five-year exemption ensures again, we kind of covered all this but bottom line is that

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Robert Braswell: the inspector qualification requirements continue to apply. All of that’s the same in these different sections (396) 193-9625. But the point is that you’re going to go ahead and do the self-certification in 4 months

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Robert Braswell: instead of a year. Let’s go to the next slide.

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Robert Braswell: and the exemptions are effective. From January 16th, 2026, until January 15th, 2030, unless, for some reason, FMCSA. Decides to rescind it. So, one thing we learned in the process is, it takes 5 years to get a 5-year exemption. So, we’re already working on the next 5 years exemption.

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Robert Braswell: That’s the Federal Government for you.

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Steve Kessler: Here it is!

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Robert Braswell: And again, you meet all the inspector qualification requirements of 3, 9, 6, 19 and 3, 9, 6, 2, 5. If you’ve completed the training course, using the curriculum. It’s consistent with our materials, which means you can do a Federal annual inspection properly after 4 months. If you can demonstrate

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Robert Braswell: that you have proficiency in that area next.

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Robert Braswell: Now, this is just going to go over some of the terms here that what the training provider, if you use this service and this. This applies not only to schools, but to individual fleets who may do their own training, it could apply to vendors, you know, like a tier, one tier, 2 suppliers that may want to, you know, do training programs on breaks, for example. But I’m just going to go through some of these points quickly. So, each program that follows our guidelines must do the following things next slide.

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Robert Braswell: So, one, you got to provide a training program that’s consistent with our materials.

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Robert Braswell: 2 next slide

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Robert Braswell: you have to provide at least 540 h of classroom and hands-on instruction, and that’s exclusive of time for new individual entrants to satisfy the requirements described below, or, alternatively, you can do 210 h of classroom and hands-on instruction, exclusive of time for individual entrants who have already completed at least 330 h of combined classroom and hands-on experience as the folks that maybe come out of a trade school

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Robert Braswell: like a community college or a high school v-tech program. They’re kind of rare as hen’s teeth, but there are some out there, and if you’ve taken and successfully passed the ASCT 4 and T 8 tests, you don’t have to do all the follow through that the ASC. Requires maintaining those credentials.

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Robert Braswell: But if you’ve passed the ASCT 4 and T8 test, and you’ve done the 2 10 H of classroom, plus the 3 30. That also will qualify you to be self-certified for this program. And we’ve been partnering with our friends at ASC and the ASC Education Foundation.

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Robert Braswell: So, they have about 200 5,300 schools in their network. I’ve been meeting with them doing webinars like this to get them on board to start offering

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Robert Braswell: training based on what we’re talking about here, and the curriculum that we’ve established. So, we’re excited that any of the ASC Education foundation schools would very shortly start displaying that in their marketing, hey? You want to, you want to, you know. Get your guys out, and for 4 months you can do it. Come over to our school, and we can. We can do it for you instead of, you know, reinventing the wheel at your own operation or so forth.

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Robert Braswell: Next slide.

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Robert Braswell: The program administrators often must provide instructional training, such that approximately 1 3rd of the instruction is classroom-based. Two-thirds are laboratory or hands-on consistent with the RPS. You also must provide notice back to us that the training program self-certification

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Robert Braswell: has happened, including the effective date of the self-certification, and they got to provide graduates of their program a certificate of completion. It shows that they have, you know, done the work and satisfied, you completed the program consistent with the terms of the exemption that FMCSA has outlined.

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Robert Braswell: Next slide.

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Robert Braswell: The program administrators also must maintain a list of individuals to whom it is issued. The certificate that we just mentioned.

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Robert Braswell: and they also must allow FMCSA. Access to any documents or records relating to the inspector training program. It provides that may be necessary for FMCSA to evaluate the educators compliance with the terms and conditions of the exception. So basically, if you’re running a program. You have got to use the materials you have got to keep track of what you’re doing. You have got to do the document.

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Robert Braswell: You got to prove that the technicians completed the process and are competent. And you have got to let us know, TMCATA, that your program is there, and your individuals are passing the test, and you’ve got to make sure FMCSA has access to that same material that’s in a nutshell next slide.

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Robert Braswell: So, we then will maintain, publish, and provide the FMCSA. A public list of training programs that have self-certified. And we must remove from the list any programs that we determine do not comply with the terms of the exemption. Now, we’re just starting out. So, we don’t have the list yet. But we’re in the process this year of building out the infrastructure to start doing this, and I’ll explain that here in the next couple slides

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Robert Braswell: next, please.

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Robert Braswell: We’re going to go ahead and skip through this one next slide.

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Robert Braswell: So just as a bottom line, you know, we believe that by allowing technicians to train in these programs, we can make it much easier and more efficient for new industry for new technicians to enter the industry. One of the things that we hear all the time is when you bring in a new technician, and they matriculate out of a school, or you’re onboarding them for the 1st time into a shop environment.

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Robert Braswell: There is a high propensity for these guys to quit within the 1st 18 to 24 months. If you can get them to stick around for 2 years, they’re going to stick around for a long time. That’s what the statistics show on all the studies that we’ve seen. But it’s that 1st year and a half 2 years. It’s tricky. And you know, why is that? And some of this is, you know, they come into it. They think they’re going to be working on trucks, and they can’t for a year.

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Robert Braswell: you know, they’re washing trucks or painting curbs, or doing stuff like that, and they just either get bored with it, or it’s not what they thought, or maybe you know, the

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Robert Braswell: maybe the way they learn things in school isn’t matching up with the way the fleet does it in their own operation. There’s sort of a disconnect. There are all sorts of reasons. But we think this was one thing

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Robert Braswell: that’ll help cut red tape and get students and young folks out on the shop floor quickly and become more productive for their employers. Next slide.

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Robert Braswell: So, we are developing an RP training and certification app. In fact, it is available already. If you go on to the Apple App Store or Google play, you can look for TMC RP Certification. That’s the name of the of the

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Robert Braswell: the application, you can download it, and what it is. It is modules that you can use off your smart device like an iPad or a, you know, smartphone, or whatever. And

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Robert Braswell: you can follow some of them through what we call augmented reality training. There’s several RPS that we have

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Robert Braswell: repackaged into this kind of online format. So, you see, like video, you see, like these animations and so forth. And it kind of helps you through some initial quiz and testing verify that you understand what’s in the Rp. And you can, you know, kind of demonstrate for yourself that you know how to do that, and then build into the app itself

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Robert Braswell: is a certification testing module. And there’s 8 of them. It’s going to be built out to 8 right now there’s 2 that are functional. They cover electrical, and they cover brakes and chassis this year by midyear. Hopefully, by the end of summer we’ll be adding a preventive maintenance inspection based on that book that we showed you earlier and tires and wheels.

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Robert Braswell: And if you’re interested there’s a link down there now, it’s a long link. But if you can, just if you get a copy of this presentation, you can copy, paste it, or you can just type in atabusinessolutions.com and click technology and maintenance. You’ll find what I’m talking about. That’s the shortcut. You’ll see that over on the left-hand side. But the nice part about this app is, if you don’t have a testing program already set up, we do a bank of 300 questions and we boil it down. And we rotate these questions in this app

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Robert Braswell: so that it’s a 50-question test on the individual modules that we are covering. So, like, I say, if you wanted to test your technician skill on recommended practices dealing with electrical or brakes, you can do that. It’s a ready-made tool, and it’s something you can do economically. The app is a free download. The testing modules you do have to purchase through our Ata business solutions website. I think it’s 1 $25 for the testing.

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Robert Braswell: and then you get so many chances at it before you know you can’t. You can’t take it again.

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Robert Braswell: and I think there’s a time limit for a couple hours, 3 h, or whatever it is in taking the test that they’re on the app. But folks have told us they would really like to have some sort of a

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Robert Braswell: an automated way of testing their folks on the recommended practices. It doesn’t compete with what ASC does, and they do certification for the master technician level and all that. And it’s complementary to that. It’s certainly not replacing it. And again, you can complete this program without using that part of our offerings. You can take the ASC T 4 and T 8 alternatively and do the exact same thing

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Robert Braswell: next slide.

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Robert Braswell: So, for full details, here’s another long URL, and this this 1st one in blue will tell you about an overview like a news story of this whole thing that I just kind of covered. But in about 8 paragraphs. So, it’s a lot easier to digest than me talking for 20 min, or you can go to the Federal Register. Actually

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Robert Braswell: notice that was published back in January and read 13 pages of God, awful and stereo instructions on what all this means, but that is the actual release that came out of the FMCSA.

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Robert Braswell: Next slide.

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Robert Braswell: And just as a reminder, we do have a couple upcoming events this fall. We have our TMC. Fall meeting, national technician skills competition. That’s in Raleigh, North Carolina. It’s September

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Robert Braswell: 14th through the 18th and next year we’re back in Nashville, Tennessee, March 16th through the 19th for our annual meeting and transportation Technology Exhibition.

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Robert Braswell: And I think that’s about the last one. It’s going to cover it up. If anybody has any questions about any of these, that’s my contact information, you can reach me by email or by telephone. I’ll be happy to explain this in greater detail. Again, we’re just rolling this out. It’s not 100% available yet.

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Robert Braswell: The certification app is the training materials are available on that atabusinessolutions.com website. So, you can buy the instructor and the student version of those PMI training booklets. Of course, the recommended practices are always available to TMC. Members, and you can buy the recommended practices directly as a non-member. It’s a little bit higher price. And you could do that through us

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Robert Braswell: e-commerce site Ata business solutions as well.

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Robert Braswell: and you know, as we get more of these pieces in place and more of the schools through the ASC. Education Foundation on board offering the curriculum. I think you’re just going to see this a lot more in the industry. And hopefully, we’ll make a difference and get folks, you know, working more productively, faster and sooner we’ve got a huge technician shortage that’s not getting a whole lot better. It’s getting somewhat better. We were getting more people into the pipeline, and we’re really excited about that.

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Robert Braswell: But it’s not a shortage of applicants. It’s now a shortage of qualified applicants, and I think that’s 1 of the reasons why we’re seeing folks that muster out in less than 2 years, because it’s either they’re not

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Robert Braswell: up to speed where they need to be for the employers’ expectations, or it’s just not their cup of tea based on the way it is in the industry. So that’s pretty much all I have on this presentation. I don’t know if there’s any questions here. I can go ahead and look at the chat and see what we have here. How do we get a copy of the slides? I’ll leave that to you, Steve. You can talk about that.

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Steve Kessler: Yeah, we’re going to obviously record this. But we can include the slide deck if that’s okay with you, Robert.

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Robert Braswell: Absolutely.

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Steve Kessler: That. They can have the slides, and we generally would send those out in a PDF document. So, we’ll get that out to you along with the link

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Steve Kessler: where you can get to the replay. I do have one question you asked.

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Robert Braswell: Sure.

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Steve Kessler: The preventative maintenance, inspection, guidelines and.

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Robert Braswell: Yes.

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Steve Kessler: The example you gave was for Class 7 and 8 is something like that available for

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Steve Kessler: other truck types 4, 5, 6, or will it be, or.

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Robert Braswell: Yes, we do. We have. And in fact, the exemption does cover these other truck types. So, we have a similar guide for light medium duty vehicles class 2 through 6.

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Robert Braswell: So that’s your package trucks, your straight trucks, things like that, and we also have it for drive and trailers.

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Robert Braswell: So.

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Steve Kessler: Okay.

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Robert Braswell: The 3 versions of ice cream. When it comes to preventive maintenance, inspection guidelines that we offer at TMC. We may, we may add, some more. You know there’s some things we don’t want to reinvent. The wheel-on-like tanker inspection was talked about. But you know the National Tank Carriers association does a really good job with that. I don’t think we need to reinvent the wheel there. So, we’re going to kind of stay in our wheelhouse and cover those areas. I think that’s a good one.

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Robert Braswell: So, another question comes up, is this certification for annual inspectors that do the annual inspections? Yes, it’s for. So this is for those technicians that would perform the Federal annual inspection.

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Robert Braswell: That is correct.

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Robert Braswell: What a lot of floats, what a lot of fleets call their sea level. Pm.

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Robert Braswell: that’s what this is for.

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Steve Kessler: Very good. One thing I wanted to pop up on the screen. Obviously, our company is all about training and safety and certainly wanted to let you all know if you have any interest in how we might be able to help you with a training platform. It’s called the INFINITI training system, you know. You can answer yes to this poll, and we’ll get with you and talk to you a little bit about what we have.

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Steve Kessler: Also, there are several of you out there. I know that are certified directors of safety under the NATMI program, and if you need to have a

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Steve Kessler: a certificate of attendance for today. We’re happy to provide that this will provide a quarter of a point towards your recertification. So, I’m going to give everybody an opportunity to do that

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Steve Kessler: one last thing while their people are looking at the poll. Here Robert is. I know the program is early on. Have you had feedback successes, or anything that would indicate that this is working exactly like you hoped it would.

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Robert Braswell: Yeah. Well, 1st of all, I’m very excited about the outreach we’ve done to the ASC. Education Foundation schools. We’ve got a lot of interest there. So that’s great. And I’ve also gotten quite a few calls from just fleets wanting to know more about the program. They all seem to have this universal problem of the one year. I think it’s a long time they think they can.

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Robert Braswell: There’s a way to bring their folks up along faster. And this is a good way to do it. We’re not trying to cut corners, just trying to make sure you’re trained properly, but in doing so maybe there’s a little advantage. Get to bring your people up to speed and work more productively faster. That’s the bottom line.

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Steve Kessler: Alright! Looks like there’s 1 last question about this requirement for.

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Robert Braswell: No, there’s no requirement. All this is completely voluntary. There’s absolutely no requirement other than the requirements that already exist in books under 396, 19 and 3, 9, 6, 2, 5, which is pretty much all self-certified. All you must do right now is just say, hey, I’ve been on the job for a year, and I’m going to write down my name on a certificate, and that’s all that’s required. There’s nothing more

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Robert Braswell: that you need to do. You don’t have to do any of this. You don’t have to take ASC certification. It’s all voluntary. But if you want to do this within 4 months, instead of waiting for the year. This is how you would do that.

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Steve Kessler: Looks like we have one last question, can safety consultants be trained to offer this.

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Robert Braswell: Sure, I don’t see why they wouldn’t. There are no restrictions necessarily. You can read the Federal notice for all the details, but as far as I know, there’s no restriction on the types of folks that can provide this training.

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Robert Braswell: Thanks for mentioning NATMI. We also partner with NATMI, too. We offer jointly certified directors of maintenance credentialing. And that’s something we do at our annual meetings twice a year.

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Robert Braswell: and I know they do at other times of the year, too. But it’s a great program, and we like supporting it. So.

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Steve Kessler: Absolutely. We’re sponsors of NATMI as well. So

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Steve Kessler: very good. I don’t see any more questions coming in, Robert. Thank you very much. This is good information, you know. It’s been a challenge for a long time to get the technicians that we need in this business. In some cases, companies have found it more difficult to find a good mechanic or technician than they do finding qualified truck drivers. So

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Steve Kessler: there’s always been a great need. And I think speeding this whole opportunity up. By gosh, what 8 months! It’s going to make a big difference if they can complete this course. Work in 4 months, which I think is awesome. So

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Steve Kessler: thank you for coming today and joining us and for those of you out there. We’re going to be sending out a link with the reply. Please share it with those that couldn’t join us today. And having said that hope, everybody has a great safe day, Robert. Thank you, Sir Mark. Thank you. We hope to see all of you at the next webinar. So, look for an invite.

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Steve Kessler: Thank you all very much.

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Robert Braswell: Thanks! Again.

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Steve Kessler: Thank you.