§395.8(a) requires every driver of a CMV subject to Part 395 to record their duty status for every 24-hour period. ELD is the default since the December 2017 mandate; paper logs are limited to specific exemptions (driveaway-towaway, vehicles manufactured before model year 2000, 8-days-in-30 short-haul). Note the pre-2000 exemption goes by the vehicle's model year as shown in the VIN on the registration — not the engine's, a distinction §395.8(a)(1)(ii)(A)(4) is explicit about and that most summaries get wrong. "No record" — neither ELD output nor paper — is the §395.8(a) violation.
Severity weight + audit risk
Severity weight 5 in the HOS Compliance BASIC. Beyond the SMS impact, failing to require drivers to make records of duty status (§395.8(a)) is on the §385.321(b) automatic-failure table when 51% or more of examined records are missing. New-entrant audits frequently fail on this single item.
How to prevent it
- Every driver subject to Part 395 is enrolled in an ELD account. The driver's name, the device's registration, and the carrier of record link cleanly.
- Short-haul drivers operating under §395.1(e)(1) maintain time records (start, end, total hours) — these are §395.1(e)(1) time records, not §395.8 RODs, but they satisfy the recordkeeping question at audit.
- Detached operators (owner-ops leased on) — verify their ELD is your account, not their personal one, or §395.8(a) failures roll up to your USDOT.
How Roadworthy HQ helps
Roadworthy HQ has no hours-of-service screen. It does not import ELD data, store records of duty status or supporting documents, or detect HOS violations. On the ELD side it keeps a per-vehicle registry of the device (provider, model, serial, FMCSA registration ID) and checks it daily against FMCSA's revoked-device list, with warnings ahead of the replacement deadline. A driver can be marked short-haul on their profile so the audit-readiness check stops expecting logs from them.