Transportation gets safer with DOT drug testing

Posted by SharonEvans on December 20th, 2014

The United States, in 1991, passed the Omnibus Transportation Employee Testing Act as it saw the need for drug and alcohol free transport industry. It required the DOT agencies to implement drug and alcohol testing of safety-sensitive transportation employees to ensure safety of passengers. 49 CFR Part 40, which is a regulation on how to test for drugs, is applicable to all DOT drug testing, regardless of the mode of transportation. The drug testing consortium was formed to offer drug and alcohol testing services to member employees. The drug testing is applied to all the employees covered under the US Department of Transportation. The commercially licensed drivers are required to participate in the drug and alcohol testing in order to promote safety in transportation industry.

If an employee associated with transportation industry is on drugs or alcohol while on work it can lead to serious consequences. The drug testing consortium plays a key role in helping the companies to identify employees under drug influence and also works on rehabilitating them. The employees are screened through pre-employment testing, random testing, post-accident testing, return-to-duty testing and follow up testing. Apart from that the consortium functions to coordinate goals in fulfilling the regulations and provides different services to the covered employees of the companies.

If you are an employee with airlines, covered by FAA rules or a commercial driver with trucking company covered by FMCSA rules, collecting and testing specimens by DOT drug testing applies to you. Each section of the transportation industry has specific regulations about who is subject to testing, when and in which conditions. The testing is done randomly and the employees are not pre notified for that. The employers are restricted from disclosing the release of sensitive drug and alcohol testing information. The privacy regulations are strictly followed as per the rule.

There are many members of drug testing consortium like townships, public school districts, counties, public transit systems and various other companies and agencies. They use a Third Party Administrator for random testing of drugs and alcohol for member companies. Although they are an association of independent businesses, they work as a single entity. They offer services to DOT employees and other companies who want to get their employees tested for drug and alcohol use.

The DOT drug testing is done in many ways. The first and foremost thing to do for testing is to collect samples which have to be done by reliable teams. Each employee who has to be tested for drug or alcohol must participate in the sample collection. The sample is thereafter sent to a laboratory for testing but it should be ensured that the laboratory is reliable and dependable. The breath alcohol testing is also performed in which the employees are tested on the basis of their breath alcohol level and to see it is not more than 0.. Blind samples are also sent for proper verification of drug and alcohol misuse.

The drug testing consortium plays a key role in the transportation industry by conducting the DOT drug testing and making it completely safe for the commuters.

The transport industry ensures safety of the passengers with drug testing consortium by DOT drug testing of their employees.