what does a private citizen need to drive a rental truck for commercial purposes

[ishapiro]

My husband and I own a business that exhibits at a trade show once a year in Baltimore MD.  We rent a Penske truck, and drive it, filled with our products from Philly to Baltimore.  Our products are quite heavy, pottery and granite benches and birdbaths, so my husband drives the truck through the weigh station on the way down.  Twice he has been pulled off at the weigh station, probably because a rental truck with that much weight is suspicious. At this point he is asked for his log book, the second time he was told he needed a truck driver physical.  The state police acted as if it was a favor to let him leave. Now, here is my question.  He is not a truck driver, he is a private citizen, driving a rental truck to a trade show.  What is legally required of him, and where can I get documented information on this.  Again, he is not employed as a truck driver, he owns the business.

[jwolfer]

My husband and I own a business that exhibits at a trade show once a year in Baltimore MD.  We rent a Penske truck, and drive it, filled with our products from Philly to Baltimore.  Our products are quite heavy, pottery and granite benches and birdbaths, so my husband drives the truck through the weigh station on the way down.  Twice he has been pulled off at the weigh station, probably because a rental truck with that much weight is suspicious. At this point he is asked for his log book, the second time he was told he needed a truck driver physical.  The state police acted as if it was a favor to let him leave. Now, here is my question.  He is not a truck driver, he is a private citizen, driving a rental truck to a trade show.  What is legally required of him, and where can I get documented information on this.  Again, he is not employed as a truck driver, he owns the business.

I would think that it is just a law enforcement officer trying to be a bad ass.  Another consequence of the war on drugs.

[kphoger]

Twice, though.....  Geez.....
I'm not aware of any additional requirements to drive for commercial interests.

[J N Winkler]

A few thoughts:

*  I think a rental truck loaded with goods for sale at a trade show is a marginal case for commercial transport.  Yes, the truck is carrying goods intended for sale as part of an ongoing commercial operation, but the driver is not engaged in the transport of goods for hire or reward (in other words, he is not being paid solely to provide transport services).  Commercial driving legislation is not really intended to cover people who make infrequent trips on a noncommercial driver's license to transport things they make and sell within a home-based business.

*  Considering the mass of the goods transported, are you sure that you are complying with vehicle and axle gross weight limits?  A Penske rental will have probably two single axles (no tandem axles), which implies a per-axle weight limit of perhaps 5,000 lb and a gross vehicle weight limit of 10,000 lb.

*  A good place to start looking for the restrictions that are likely to apply to small rental trucks driven by noncommercially licensed drivers is in the Pennsylvania and Maryland state commercial driver's license handbooks (published for the benefit of drivers studying for the CDL exams; should be available free of charge from the DMVs in each state, and probably also available on the Web for download as PDFs; will probably be a thickish book printed on newsprint with a staple binding).  The regulations that are applicable to commercial drivers will also be part of the Code of Federal Regulations (CFR), which is online and searchable, and both Pennsylvania and Maryland will have their own regulatory codes, which for Pennsylvania at least, and probably for Maryland as well, should be online and searchable.  But the CDL handbooks should be looked at first as a guide to any exceptions that may apply to noncommercial drivers engaged on infrequent trips.

*  Do you actually have to stop at a weigh station?  Have you tried bypassing them on the basis that you are not driving for hire or reward?  If so, what happened?

[kphoger]

Rental trucks typically now have to stop at the scales, apparently because they're all full of illegal immigrants.  Yeesh.  Also, the weight limit in some states for who has to stop at the scales is below the GVW of rental trucks.

When I lived in Illinois, I actually drove a box truck delivery route without a CDL, log book, or anything like that.  The truck was light enough that I didn't need them.  Yet, in Kentucky, we were required to stop at the scales (we found that out the hard way)–still no CDL or anything required.

[Alps]

The real answer is that you can route yourself through Pennsylvania and avoid all weigh stations.
http://goo.gl/maps/Tf0LL

[kphoger]

The real answer is that you can route yourself through Pennsylvania and avoid all weigh stations.
http://goo.gl/maps/Tf0LL

Does Pennsylvania utilize mobile weigh scales?

[Alps]

The real answer is that you can route yourself through Pennsylvania and avoid all weigh stations.
http://goo.gl/maps/Tf0LL

Does Pennsylvania utilize mobile weigh scales?

I don't believe so. I'm going based on memory where I recall weigh stations; I know there are websites out there that try to log where all of them are, so that's worth a look as well.

[cpzilliacus]

The real answer is that you can route yourself through Pennsylvania and avoid all weigh stations.
http://goo.gl/maps/Tf0LL

Does Pennsylvania utilize mobile weigh scales?

I have seen the PSP with (what appear to be) portable scales on I-83 between York and  Harrisburg.

[cpzilliacus]

My husband and I own a business that exhibits at a trade show once a year in Baltimore MD.  We rent a Penske truck, and drive it, filled with our products from Philly to Baltimore.  Our products are quite heavy, pottery and granite benches and birdbaths, so my husband drives the truck through the weigh station on the way down.  Twice he has been pulled off at the weigh station, probably because a rental truck with that much weight is suspicious.

Much of this will not be relevant, but the Maryland Motor Carrier Handbook might be helpful anyway.  You can get it at this URL:  http://www.sha.maryland.gov/OOTS/motorcarrierhandbook.pdf

Answering your question, it depends (at least in part) on the weight of the truck as determined by the scales used at the weigh/inspection station (which are inspected and certified on a regular basis).

He may well have been stopped because the truck was overweight, or because one of the axles was overweight (most weigh stations today weigh the entire truck, as well as the weight on each axle (or tandem axles - only for the really big trucks with air brakes)).

If the laden weight of the truck is over 26,000 pounds (not what most Penske rental trucks are designed for), then he needs a commercial drivers license (CDL) and all of the things that go along with same (logbook, medical card, apportioned registration and IFTA sticker and the rest of it).

There are also requirements that kick in if the gross weight  of the truck exceeds 10,000 pounds (a professional driver behind the wheel of a truck that weighs more than 10,000 pounds but less than 26,000 pounds is supposed to have a medical card but does not usually need a CDL unless the truck is carrying hazardous materials).  If the truck weighs over 10,000 pounds, it must stop at Maryland weigh/inspection stations.  Not stopping when you are supposed to stop can result in a ticket.

Driving a rental truck over its maximum gross vehicle weight can void the rental contract, and any insurance that he may have purchased.  And if he gets in a crash, he may get blamed because he was operating an overloaded vehicle.

If the truck is loaded over its maximum gross vehicle weight (GVW, usually on the outside of the drivers side door of rental trucks), then he also runs the risk of an overweight ticket (depending on how much he's over, the overweight fine can be substantial).

So without knowing more, I suggest not loading the truck over the gross vehicle weight, and definitely not over 26,000 pounds in any case.  For a modest fee, most truck stops have CAT weigh scales where he can weigh the truck himself before heading out for Baltimore.

At this point he is asked for his log book, the second time he was told he needed a truck driver physical.  The state police acted as if it was a favor to let him leave. Now, here is my question.  He is not a truck driver, he is a private citizen, driving a rental truck to a trade show.  What is legally required of him, and where can I get documented information on this.  Again, he is not employed as a truck driver, he owns the business.

It sounds to me like the trooper or other enforcement officers he spoke with figured out that he is a private citizen not normally in the business of hauling freight.  If they had thought that he was a truck driver hauling for someone else, he would almost certainly have been issued one or more tickets.

Still, regardless of who he is or what his occupation is, he has to comply with state size and weight laws and regulations.  If the people at a weigh/inspection station determine that he is driving an overweight vehicle, then he runs the risk of having this sort of thing happen to him.

One solution is to make sure that your loaded merchandise does not put your truck over the weight limits  I discuss above.  If you cannot get everything loaded onto one truck, perhaps you should consider renting two trucks and both driving?

Note that renting a trailer and loading that up to reduce the load in the truck and then towing it behind the truck will not prevent the problem, for those CDL requirements I mention above also apply to gross combination weight (GCW for short, in other words, the load of the truck and trailer together).

EDIT:  Several times.  Added a mention of the 10,000 pound threshold.  And a link to the Maryland Motor Carrier Handbook.

[cpzilliacus]

The real answer is that you can route yourself through Pennsylvania and avoid all weigh stations.
http://goo.gl/maps/Tf0LL

I am not sure that the MSP is out there looking for rental trucks per se, but they do have "roaming" Commercial Vehicle Enforcement Section troopers that look for trucks on smaller roads (including weigh scale bypass routes).  They usually drive black (unmarked) Ford Expeditions or Chevy Suburbans.

[1995hoo]

....

*  Do you actually have to stop at a weigh station?  Have you tried bypassing them on the basis that you are not driving for hire or reward?  If so, what happened?

When I rented a Penske truck–I believe it had three axles, and I was charged a higher toll on the Verrazano–in Brooklyn in July 2001 to haul a load of furniture my aunts were giving me back to Virginia, I asked about this and I was told that I would indeed be required to stop at weigh stations. The only one I passed (at the Susquehanna on I-95) happened to be closed that day. I was kind of disappointed in a way just because I've never gone through a weigh station and thought it would be a different experience.

[cpzilliacus]

....

*  Do you actually have to stop at a weigh station?  Have you tried bypassing them on the basis that you are not driving for hire or reward?  If so, what happened?

When I rented a Penske truck–I believe it had three axles, and I was charged a higher toll on the Verrazano–in Brooklyn in July 2001 to haul a load of furniture my aunts were giving me back to Virginia, I asked about this and I was told that I would indeed be required to stop at weigh stations. The only one I passed (at the Susquehanna on I-95) happened to be closed that day. I was kind of disappointed in a way just because I've never gone through a weigh station and thought it would be a different experience.

Three axles?  That (to me) implies way over 26,000 pounds gross vehicle weight (in other words, you would have needed a Class B CDL) and probably an air brake CDL endorsement.

You sure you were not driving a truck with two axles and dual rear tires? 

Trucks over 7,000 pounds get charged a higher toll in some states, including the Pennsylvania Turnpike.

[Scott5114]

Even if he is not a professional truck driver, he's still transporting goods for the purposes of commerce, and is still benefiting commercially off the sale of the goods transported, isn't he? That may have led the cops to be thinking "Eh...I dunno...."

[kphoger]

he's still transporting goods for the purposes of commerce, and is still benefiting commercially off the sale of the goods transported

However, this would also be true if he ran a business out of his basement and rented the truck to move to a new house.  Any merchandise packed up from his basement and transported would be commercial assets by which he would later benefit commercially.

[realjd]

The Penske website lists all of the truck models they rent, broken down by CDL and non-CDL. Many of them are listed in both categories with differing max weights. If you had issues with the cops, I suspect the weight was the issue. If the truck required a CDL to drive at all, I doubt Penske would have rented it to you without one.

[J N Winkler]

Even if he is not a professional truck driver, he's still transporting goods for the purposes of commerce, and is still benefiting commercially off the sale of the goods transported, isn't he? That may have led the cops to be thinking "Eh...I dunno...."

This is true.  However, many motor carrier licensing regimes have an element of economic regulation that draws a distinction between transport on own account (i.e., you carry only your own commercial articles) and transport for hire (i.e., other people hire you to carry their goods).  Transport on own account is typically more loosely regulated than transport for hire.

I don't know of any American states which actually draw this distinction, but in the bad old days of quantity licensing in Britain (1934 to--I think--1968), you could get a C license (allowing own-account transport only) essentially for the asking, but to get an A license (pure transport for hire) or B license (mixed own account/transport for hire), you had to jump through hoops in order to prove that traders would be inconvenienced if you were not licensed to haul for hire.  This licensing regime was introduced partly to make it more difficult for lorries to compete with the railways for high-value goods traffic.

[1995hoo]

....

*  Do you actually have to stop at a weigh station?  Have you tried bypassing them on the basis that you are not driving for hire or reward?  If so, what happened?

When I rented a Penske truck–I believe it had three axles, and I was charged a higher toll on the Verrazano–in Brooklyn in July 2001 to haul a load of furniture my aunts were giving me back to Virginia, I asked about this and I was told that I would indeed be required to stop at weigh stations. The only one I passed (at the Susquehanna on I-95) happened to be closed that day. I was kind of disappointed in a way just because I've never gone through a weigh station and thought it would be a different experience.

Three axles?  That (to me) implies way over 26,000 pounds gross vehicle weight (in other words, you would have needed a Class B CDL) and probably an air brake CDL endorsement.

You sure you were not driving a truck with two axles and dual rear tires? 

Trucks over 7,000 pounds get charged a higher toll in some states, including the Pennsylvania Turnpike.

I may well be mistaken. It was over 11 years ago and I didn't take a picture of the truck. I recall it having more than four tires and so I assumed it had an extra axle–I don't really know much about trucks. I read car magazines but I don't pay much attention to trucks.

[cpzilliacus]

Even if he is not a professional truck driver, he's still transporting goods for the purposes of commerce, and is still benefiting commercially off the sale of the goods transported, isn't he? That may have led the cops to be thinking "Eh...I dunno...."

This is true.  However, many motor carrier licensing regimes have an element of economic regulation that draws a distinction between transport on own account (i.e., you carry only your own commercial articles) and transport for hire (i.e., other people hire you to carry their goods).  Transport on own account is typically more loosely regulated than transport for hire.

This is correct.  In Maryland (and at least some other states) it is possible to get a non-commercial license for operating heavy-duty trucks.  Such licenses are especially for people that transport goods for themselves, especially farmers and (at least in Maryland) some watermen who transport their own catch (from the Chesapeake Bay, the Atlantic Ocean or its bays) to market.  Some volunteer firefighters that drive heavy fire suppression vehicles also use such licenses, though I think that professional ("paid") firefighters that want to drive fire engines, ladder trucks and similar vehicles are required to get a CDL.

I don't know of any American states which actually draw this distinction, but in the bad old days of quantity licensing in Britain (1934 to--I think--1968), you could get a C license (allowing own-account transport only) essentially for the asking, but to get an A license (pure transport for hire) or B license (mixed own account/transport for hire), you had to jump through hoops in order to prove that traders would be inconvenienced if you were not licensed to haul for hire.  This licensing regime was introduced partly to make it more difficult for lorries to compete with the railways for high-value goods traffic.

That reminds me of the evil days of collusive rate-setting (which was allowed and even encouraged by law) and legal barriers to entry in the business of interstate transport of goods.  President Carter (not Reagan) put an end to that sort of ham-handed government regulation, and prices have come down since then.

[cpzilliacus]

Even if he is not a professional truck driver, he's still transporting goods for the purposes of commerce, and is still benefiting commercially off the sale of the goods transported, isn't he? That may have led the cops to be thinking "Eh...I dunno...."

Most cops that enforce motor carrier laws and regulations are not interested in drivers and rental trucks hauling their own goods around.  That's just not what they do (and  many of the rules do not apply to "do it yourself" transport anyway).

Now it is possible (as was suggested above) that they are interested in rental trucks because such vehicles are used for human smuggling (certainly there have been more than a few cases where someone was hauling a load of undocumented aliens in the cargo space of a truck) or transporting illegal substances like marihuana or even untaxed alcohol.

[cpzilliacus]

The Penske website lists all of the truck models they rent, broken down by CDL and non-CDL. Many of them are listed in both categories with differing max weights.

That makes sense.  The 26,000 pound limit comes in to play.  If your truck is at or above 26,000, then the driver needs that CDL.

If you had issues with the cops, I suspect the weight was the issue. If the truck required a CDL to drive at all, I doubt Penske would have rented it to you without one.

I agree with you about the weight.  But regarding CDLs, remember that Penske rents their trucks empty. 

I have seen cases where the truck was not intended to weigh more than 25,999 pounds, but when weighed, was above that limit - if the truck scales out at over 26,000, then the driver is supposed to have a CDL.

Why the limit is 26,000 is not at all clear to me.  Seems pretty arbitrary.

[agentsteel53]

Why the limit is 26,000 is not at all clear to me.  Seems pretty arbitrary.

it's as good a number as any.  why is the speed limit 70, or the BAC limit .08?  somewhere around those points, human frailties come into play and that's a reasonable-enough line to draw that covers a lot of situations.

my question is, why are many Mississippi bridges given a weight limit of something like 57142 pounds?  my guess for that one is that it used to be a round number like 50000, and then they scaled it up by 1/7th because they deemed concrete was one-seventh better or who knows what.

[J N Winkler]

Why the limit is 26,000 is not at all clear to me.  Seems pretty arbitrary.

My theory:  it is based on 10,000 lb per single axle/20,000 lb per tandem axle plus 6,000 lb for one steering axle, in a hypothetical minimum configuration.

[cpzilliacus]

Why the limit is 26,000 is not at all clear to me.  Seems pretty arbitrary.

My theory:  it is based on 10,000 lb per single axle/20,000 lb per tandem axle plus 6,000 lb for one steering axle, in a hypothetical minimum configuration.

Your theory makes plenty of sense. 

Though I sometimes wonder how urban transit agencies get away with their 40-foot buses, which tend to have much more weight over the rear (single) axle.

In Europe, at least some transit operators run urban transit buses with either tandem axles in the back, or perhaps more commonly, a "tag" axle in the rear to reduce the axle loading.

[jwolfer]

Florida ( and I believe California) have agricultural  check points that rental trucks have to stop at... you are not supposed to transport houseplants into Florida... a lady I used to work with moved from Maryland and the moving company would not tranport the plants...

I remeber when i was a kid at least on the side roads all Pick-ups, trucks, trailers and vans were required to stop... i dont know if there was some kind of disease happening to citrus at the time but i remember being in my aunts van and having to stop for Ag Inspection