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What Every California Trucker Should Know About Prevailing Wages
Whether you are an owner-operator or have a small to large trucking company of your own, the laws relating to prevailing wage and trucking have changed. Here is what you need to know.
There are on-haul and off-haul prevailing wage rates which apply to certain types of trucking. The first thing you need to know is that if you are hauling to or from a public works jobsite or spending any real time on the jobsite, you (owner-operator) or your company MUST be registered with the California Department of Industrial Relations (DIR) as a Public Works Contractor BEFORE you perform the work. The cost is $400 a year. California operates on a fiscal year, so that is July 1 to the following June 30. If you are NOT registered as a public works contractor at the time of bid, then you will be required to register and the cost will then increase by a $2,000 penalty. $400 for the registration fee, plus $2,000 penalty for not being registered at the time of bid or if you were contacted after bid, then you must be registered before you or your company begins work on the project. This is an annual amount to be paid each year. The DIR can also fine you/your company, the prime contractor and the awarding agency $100 a day for every day you worked on the project without being registered. This is serious, and it is expensive if you do not do it right.
Secondly, prevailing wages apply to on-haul and off-haul of materials and equipment. A pure supplier delivery is not covered, but a prime contractor who contacts a broker to have a certain amount of gravel hauled onto the jobsite or contaminated soil removed from the jobsite, will trigger prevailing wages. Concrete deliveries are covered by prevailing wages as well. And, trucks which remain on the project for various tasks fall under the Teamster wage rates. Prevailing wages apply based on what is being transported, where it is being delivered and who ordered the trucking. There are few exceptions and only under very specific fact scenarios.
Owner-Operators and Trucking firms are required to complete and maintain Certified Payrolls (CPRs). A broker is a broker and not the employer of all the independent firms that haul under the broker. The broker should only be using CPRs when an employee of the broker is working. Prevailing wages apply to owner operators. And, while Caltrans has special rules and forms they use, those same forms and rules are not necessarily used by other public agencies.
While there are no apprenticeship requirements for on-haul and off-haul trucking or concrete deliveries, the Teamsters in Southern California has established a training committee which then means that truckers performing Teamster work on projects in Southern California will need to pay training contributions to either an approved training committee or to the state each month. Additionally, certain apprenticeship forms are mandated for projects in Southern California over $30,000 (prime contract). The issue here is not just wages , but the penalties that awarding agencies and the State can impose: up to $200 per day per worker for wage violations; $25 per day per worker for overtime errors, $100 per calendar day for failure to comply with apprenticeship requirements; and $100 per day per worker if you are unable or unwilling to provide certified payroll information to the awarding agency, their agent or the DIR within 10 days, when such documentation is requested.
Prevailing wage law has become more complicated for truckers in recent years. Understanding the obligations and complying is a lot more desirable than paying huge fines
