Compliance Strategies

The best way to develop a hazmat shipment compliance strategy is to first focus on how your business uses commercial transportation, and then focus on whether your business ships hazmat. The benefit of this approach is that it provides management a framework for making decisions about whether and under what circumstances the business will ship hazmat in the first place.

Without question, hazmat shipments are more central to certain businesses than others. However, the scope of what qualifies as hazmat is so broad, and modern business transactions and relationships so complex and varied, that it is prudent for all businesses to develop, at least, sensitivity to hazmat shipment regulation.

In thinking about compliance, it may be helpful to consider the following threshold questions:

• What items does the business offer for commercial shipment?
  
  
• Who is doing the actual transportation -- does the business rely on a private or common carrier?



• Is the business substantially involved in making arrangements for shipments that it receives?



• How many different shipping steps are associated with your business (from manufacturing to final customer delivery, taking into account promotions and product samples, returned products as well as shipments to and from intermediate suppliers, vendors and distributors).



• Who is responsible for ensuring the business' compliance with the HMR?

In many cases, hazmat violations are essentially regulatory oversights rather than an intentional attempt to skirt the law. However, because violations are generally evaluated by DOT from a no-fault, strict liability perspective, businesses that develop a proactive compliance strategy can substantially reduce their liability exposure.

© 2004 Cramer Law Group PLLC