A draft of certification standards for company driver finishing programs has been released by the Professional Truck Driver Institute.

The company driver standards are the last segment of a truck driver education skill, curriculum and course standards developed by PTDI. Previously developed standards were for entry-level and second seat drivers. The draft has been distributed to more than 800 industry stakeholders for comment, and the final revisions are slated to be submitted to PTDI's board of directors for approval on Jan. 24.
Release of this draft stemmed from a meeting of the National Driver Finishing Standard Task Force, made up of representatives from public and private schools, the carriers and insurance industry.
In addition to agreeing on the draft standards, the task force reviewed several carrier programs, developed skill standards for solo drivers and considered program certification guidelines for carrier driver-finishing programs.
PTDI feels the standards are important because they provide a systematic training program, improve driver retention, minimize legal liability, save time and money on retraining and costly equipment repairs, and offer consistent training guidelines to instructors.
For a copy of the standards, fax a request to Virginia DeRoze at (703) 836-6610.