Designated Employer Representative (DER): what it is and whether you need one

What the DER is responsible for

• Receive drug and alcohol test results from the Medical Review Officer or the testing consortium.
• Immediately remove a driver from safety-sensitive duty on a positive result, a refusal, or an alcohol concentration of 0.04 or greater.
• Direct drivers to testing, including reasonable-suspicion, post-accident, random and return-to-duty tests.
• Refer a violating driver to a Substance Abuse Professional (SAP) and receive the SAP report.
• Report violations to, and query, the FMCSA Drug & Alcohol Clearinghouse.
• Retain the program records an FMCSA compliance review will ask for.

Authority: 49 CFR §40.3 (definition), §382.107, and Part 382 Subpart G (Clearinghouse). Verify current text at fmcsa.dot.gov.

Is DER training required?

Part 40 does not set a fixed DER course or certificate. What it does require is that the DER actually knows the procedures they are responsible for executing — when a driver must be removed, what a refusal is, and what must be reported to the Clearinghouse.

Separately, and this is the requirement people most often miss: anyone who supervises CDL drivers must complete at least 60 minutes of training on alcohol misuse and 60 minutes on controlled-substance use under 49 CFR §382.603. In small companies the DER and the supervisor are frequently the same person, so that training is usually the one you need to buy.