The Drug and Alcohol Database Every Broker Wishes They Could Query

A broker I know who runs flatbed freight out of Atlanta sat through a deposition in early 2025. His carrier — call them MC-1389204 / DOT-4012776 — had a driver involved in a serious rear-end crash in Georgia. Nobody died, but the injuries were real and medical bills climbed past $400,000.

The plaintiff's attorney asked one question: "What did you do to verify this carrier's drug and alcohol testing program before tendering this load?"

He said he checked SAFER. He pulled the insurance certificate. He confirmed active authority.

"Did you check the FMCSA Drug & Alcohol Clearinghouse?"

"No."

"Do you know what the Drug & Alcohol Clearinghouse is?"

He did not.

That's not a unique story. A lot of brokers know the Clearinghouse exists in some vague sense, but they don't know what it tracks, who can actually access it, or — critically — what they're supposed to do given that they can't. Post-Montgomery v. Caribe Transport II, LLC (decided May 2026, unanimous Supreme Court ruling removing FAAAA preemption for negligent-selection claims), that gap in your diligence process has a dollar sign attached to it.

What the Clearinghouse Actually Is

The FMCSA Drug & Alcohol Clearinghouse went live January 6, 2020. Congress mandated it through the FAST Act, and 49 CFR Part 382 governs who must use it and how.

It's a federal database that tracks drug and alcohol violations for CDL holders: actual positive drug tests, positive alcohol tests above 0.04 BAC, refused tests (which legally count as a positive), and employer knowledge of violations under § 382.303. When a driver tests positive or refuses, their employer must report it within three business days. That driver is immediately prohibited from performing safety-sensitive functions — including driving a CMV — until they complete a return-to-duty process through a qualified substance abuse professional and clear at least one follow-up test.

The piece that matters most for carrier vetting: CDL employers must query the Clearinghouse before putting a new driver behind the wheel (49 CFR § 382.701). Then annually for every current driver. A carrier that skips those queries is in violation of Part 382. A driver with an unresolved violation still operating under that authority? That's the scenario that shows up in nine-figure verdicts.

You Can't Query It

Here's the part most brokers don't know: brokers cannot access the Clearinghouse.

Authorized users are employers of CDL drivers, state driver licensing agencies, and FMCSA itself. You're not on the list. Even if you wanted to look up MC-1389204's driver roster, you'd hit a hard access denial. This is deliberate — driver-level violation data is protected, and the system was never built for third-party access.

So what do you do?

What You Can Actually See: The Drug & Alcohol BASIC

The closest public signal you have is the Drug & Alcohol BASIC in FMCSA's Safety Measurement System. This BASIC has two components: driver-level violations caught during roadside inspections (positive field tests, refusals, evidence of impairment) and carrier-level program failures (no written testing policy, not conducting required randoms, failing to report violations to the Clearinghouse).

The percentile is what matters. A carrier in the 80th percentile or above on the D&A BASIC has more violations relative to their peer group than 80% of similar-sized carriers. That's a hard stop for me on most loads.

But here's the problem a lot of people miss: many carriers show N/A or no data on the D&A BASIC. That's not clean. It might just mean not enough inspections to generate a score. A carrier with authority that's eight months old and zero D&A BASIC data isn't clean — it's untested.

The BASIC also won't capture Clearinghouse-only violations — things the carrier reported to the federal database but that were never caught in a roadside inspection. A carrier could have a driver with an active unresolved Clearinghouse violation and show nothing in SMS if that driver was never inspected in the field after the violation was logged. That's the hole, and it's real.

What to Ask the Carrier Directly

Since you can't query the database, go to the source: ask the carrier to document their testing program.

Under 49 CFR Part 382, every carrier employing CDL drivers must maintain a written drug and alcohol testing policy. Random testing must cover at least 50% of average annual CDL driver positions for drugs, and 10% for alcohol. They must use a certified Medical Review Officer to evaluate positive drug test results. Records must be maintained.

When I onboard a new carrier with more than five or six trucks, I ask for:

• Confirmation their Part 382 program exists and is documented
• Name of their third-party administrator (TPA) if they use a consortium for random testing
• Their Clearinghouse employer account registration (active status)
• The most recent random testing cycle date

Most carriers running a clean operation will hand that over without hesitation. A carrier that acts like I'm asking for their tax returns is a carrier I'm not putting freight on.

I'm not asking because I think they're dirty. I'm asking because after Montgomery, negligent selection means I need to show what reasonable steps I took. "Carrier provided Part 382 program documentation, confirmed TPA enrollment, and Clearinghouse employer account verified active" is a sentence I want in my file. That sentence costs me ten minutes. The deposition without it costs me a lot more.

One important thing: owner-operators and small single-truck carriers who operate as for-hire motor carriers are subject to Part 382 just like a 500-truck fleet. Many of them don't know this. If they're not enrolled in a consortium for random testing, they're out of compliance. Ask.

Red Flags That Show Up in Other Places

Even without direct Clearinghouse access, secondary signals can suggest a carrier might have D&A problems.

A high Vehicle Maintenance BASIC score combined with any D&A BASIC presence is a rough combination. It often means a carrier is stretched thin — skipping maintenance inspections and possibly skipping required drug tests with the same mentality and the same budget.

The MCS-150 filing tells you how many drivers and power units the carrier claims. If a carrier reports 20 drivers but has minimal D&A BASIC inspection history, ask yourself how they're hitting 50% random coverage with that headcount and never surfacing a violation in a field inspection.

L&I data can also show whether a carrier has maintained continuous, compliant insurance — which doesn't directly tell you about D&A compliance, but it does tell you about whether this is an operator who files required documents on time. Carriers that let insurance filings lapse often have other compliance gaps running simultaneously.

Unsafe Driving BASIC is the other thing I look at in combination. A carrier with elevated Unsafe Driving AND any D&A history is a carrier where the organizational culture around safety is clearly a problem, not just a data point.

Why This Matters After Montgomery

Montgomery v. Caribe Transport II changed the landscape. Plaintiffs can now sue brokers in state court for negligent carrier selection, and state negligence standards apply. What "reasonable" vetting looks like is now going to be defined by juries, not appellate courts.

Plaintiffs' attorneys know about the Clearinghouse. They know you don't have access. But they're going to ask what you did to verify D&A compliance given that you can't query it directly. "I asked for documentation and they provided it" is a defensible answer. "I didn't think about it" is not.

A carrier that puts a driver with an unresolved Clearinghouse violation behind the wheel of a CMV is operating in violation of 49 CFR § 382.723. If you tendered a load to that carrier without any D&A diligence, and that driver causes a crash, your carrier file will be exhibit A in the lawsuit. The plaintiff's attorney doesn't need to prove you knew about the violation — only that you didn't take reasonable steps to verify compliance.

The standard isn't perfect diligence. It's reasonable diligence. But "I never asked anything about their drug and alcohol program" doesn't meet even a low bar.

How I Document This

In DOTScreener, every carrier screen automatically pulls the D&A BASIC percentile so I don't have to go hunting for it. For the documentation side, I keep a note in the carrier's file with a timestamp any time I request and receive Part 382 program documentation.

For high-value loads — anything where the cargo insurance gap between $100,000 and $500,000 represents real exposure — I add the carrier's TPA name to the notes. A carrier using a reputable consortium like Foley, National Drug Screening, or Labcorp/DrugScan tells me they're not running their random testing informally.

The note doesn't need to be elaborate: "D&A program documentation received [date], carrier uses [TPA name], random rate confirmed at 50%, Clearinghouse employer account confirmed active via carrier attestation." That entry makes the plaintiff's attorney's next question harder to ask.

If I'm monitoring an existing carrier through DOTScreener's continuous monitoring and the D&A BASIC percentile jumps significantly between loads — say, from the 30th percentile to the 70th in a 60-day window — that's a conversation I'm having before the next tender. A score that moves that fast isn't statistical noise. Something happened.

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The Clearinghouse was built to keep problem drivers off the road. Between employers, it largely works. What it can't do is give brokers direct visibility. That means you build your own layer of diligence: ask the carrier, document the answer, note the D&A BASIC on every screen, flag the anomalies.

It's not complicated. It just has to be deliberate.

— Mason Lavallet

Founder, DOTScreener.com