In the fall of 1986, a new acronym joined the alphabet-soup world of abbreviations and designations for truckers in Ontario: CVOR. That stands for Commercial Vehicle Operator Registration, and initially it referred to an enhanced, computer-based system that tracked critical “events” (i.e., a driving infraction, accident, or out-of-service detention at a roadside spot check) relating to commercial-vehicle fleets, with point values assigned according to their relative severity. In July 1989, subsequent legislation prescribed a requirement for virtually all persons operating commercial vehicles over 4500 kilograms GVW on Ontario roadways-regardless of where the fleet is based, or whether the equipment is owned or leased-to register themselves and the basic details of their power units.

The intent, of course, was to let the provincial Ministry of Transportation better know who was running on Ontario’s highways, and to create a more sophisticated database for a fleet’s record of traffic infractions, accidents, and mechanical fitness detentions.

A given carrier need register only once, but a photocopy of the ensuing registration certificate must be kept in each vehicle in that fleet.

“Over the past 10 years, the CVOR system has been enhanced and reinforced to better function as a means of identifying that small minority of carriers whose dedication to safe operation is not at the desired level,” Mike Weir, director, carrier safety and enforcement branch, at the Ontario Ministry of Transportation (MTO), begins. “This is an evolving process, and the most recent significant development was a set of announcements we issued on March 29.

“In the previous schedule of CVOR demerit points, a carrier could get a point for being involved in an accident even if the accident report indicated no culpability on their part, or you could get points for other administrative deficiencies-no validation tag, a dirty plate, and so forth-that were not safety-related.” Weir explains. “As part of these most recent changes, we’ve ‘zero-pointed’ such situations, and are focusing the imposition of points just on situations where safety is involved.”

The CVOR system is based on demerit-point thresholds that vary according to fleet size (the larger the fleet, the more points allowed in a “rolling” 24-month period), and there exists a comprehensive list of infractions-the Violation Table-that consists of approximately 1400 items, with associated point values that range from zero (example: “consignor fail to mark article”) to 30 (e.g., criminal negligence causing death). Most penalties range from one to five points. Anything higher than 6 or 7 points would typically also involve a Criminal Code violation.

A 1996-vintage MTO chart shows the exact number of points that may be accumulated before the threshold is crossed and some enforcement action is taken. This begins with a warning letter, and escalates up to a mandatory personal interview, a facility/operational audit, and ends with outright sanctions such as fleet-size restrictions, multi-day operating suspensions, or cancellation of the CVOR. To offer a few examples at random: a 10-vehicle fleet has a threshold of 40.9 points; a 150-truck fleet one of 227.2 points; and a 600-truck operation’s threshold is 556.3 points.

“Thresholds have traditionally been set at a significantly higher level than the mathematical average of how fleets actually perform,” Weir explains. “This is typically by a multiple of three or four, so we’ve always felt that there was no doubt that a fleet deserved some special scrutiny and enforcement action if its performance was that much worse than the real-world average of their peers of similar size.”

Two years ago, a joint government-industry task force known as Target 97 developed a wide-ranging list of recommendations for commercial-vehicle safety in Ontario. A number of them pertained to the CVOR system, and it’s many of these that are addressed in the recently announced changes:

o All accidents since August 1995 with a point value of 1 will be changed to zero.

o All CVSA detentions since August 1995 will be re-pointed to 1 point per OOS defect (to a maximum of 4 points per vehicle combination) from the current 2 points/defect and max of 8 points per vehicle combination.

o Convictions categorized as non-safety-related will be re-pointed to zero.

o Overweight convictions will be assigned 2 points where the amount of overload exceeds 2000 kg; for overloads under that level, zero points will be assigned.

o A requirement has been added to the Highway Traffic Act that an operator must notify the Registrar of Motor Vehicles of fleet-size changes in excess of 20%.

o Out-of-service rates will be considered in the sanction and rating process.

o Accidents will have a more significant role in the evaluation process, and accident thresholds will be attributed a weighted average twice that of convictions or detentions.

o Current CVOR thresholds will be revised to take into account fresh data collected in a recent update of 17,000 carriers. These thresholds will be based on the new fleet-size data, and the new weightings for accidents, convictions, and detentions.

More changes to the CVOR process are on the way, particularly a re-definition of the thresholds and an accompanying categorization of fleet size into “small” (fewer than 50 vehicles) and “large” (50-plus).

A discussion paper on this was expected to be made public by the end of May, with implementation targeted by the end of August. Also under consideration is some kind of third-party appeal process for carriers who are involved in an accident that does end up on their CVOR, but where no charges are laid.

“Part of the Target 97 report recommended that intervention start a lot earlier relative to the threshold,” an MTO source says.

“This would mean a warning letter going out at the 50%-of-threshold point, not 100%; at 65%, you’d get either an interview or an audit; at 90%, there could be further action of that nature; and hitting 100% of threshold would trigger a process to consider suspending that carrier’s right to operate in Ontario.

“The thing to keep in mind, though,” the official goes on, “is that there’s also this process under way to re-define the thresholds. So you can’t just look at the current threshold numbers and say that in the future you’d get hit with a warning letter half as soon. There’s a lot yet to be worked out.”

The linchpin of future government policy in Ontario regarding monitoring and enforcing commercial-vehicle safety will be the Carrier Safety Rating System. Being developed in co-operation with other industry stakeholders, this will rate the on- and off-road safety performance of all operators on Ontario’s highways.

“Operators will be assessed and rated by evaluation of key performance information, including the results of any available audits conducted at that carrier’s facility,” Mike Weir says.

“This information will provide a clear indication of a carrier’s overall safety performance, and will be available to the public, industry, and other government jurisdictions.”

Based on a carrier’s CVOR record and facility-audit results, the MTO will categorize carrier performance with a rating of either Excellent, Satisfactory, Conditional, Unsatisfactory, or Satisfactory-Unaudited. The Registrar of Motor Vehicles will have the authority to assign a safety rating to an operator, and that operator will be notified prior to assignment of the rating, or of any change of rating.

Appeals of the Registrar’s decision can be made in writing, explaining why the rating is felt to be inappropriate. Following consideration of any such submission, the Registrar will then assign a rating to that operator.

The first four months of 1999 were spent in an education and awareness process to let all involved carriers-and keep in mind, this includes many operators not domiciled in Ontario, whose audits would be handled by their local provincial/state authority under a reciprocal agreement-learn the details of the impending program.

The period May to August of this year will see the MTO assign safety ratings to those carriers whose substandard performance has earned an Unsatisfactory rating.

During the August-October timeframe, an enhanced, more automated CVOR system will be introduced to help the Registrar assign safety ratings to the remaining carriers.

The focus will be on assigning Conditional ratings (carriers may request a facility audit in a bid to secure a Satisfactory or Excellent rating).

Beginning this fall, the Ministry will also assign Satisfactory-Unaudited ratings to operators whose CVOR record reflects an acceptable performance, but who have not had a facility audit.

“In a sense, of course, our educational initiative for the Carrier Safety Rating System will be an ongoing effort,” Weir sums up.

“And to that end we’re preparing newsletters and brochures, plus information updates at the Ministry Web site (www.mot.gov.on.ca), to give all involved players the best-possible opportunity to understand and successfully participate in these new programs.” s