Driver Qualification File Requirements

You must maintain a driver qualification file for each driver you employ. 49 CFR 391.51(a). If you drive under your own authority, that includes a file on yourself.

Here is the part almost every guide on this gets wrong: the rules require two files, not one. The qualification file is 391.51. The driver investigation history file is 391.53, it holds different documents, and it has security requirements the qualification file does not.

Keep them in one folder and you are out of compliance on the second one no matter how complete the first one is.

Eight categories of document. 49 CFR 391.51(b).

This is the one small carriers miss.

You must maintain records relating to the investigation into the safety performance history of a new or prospective driver, conducted under 49 CFR 391.23(d) and (e). This file must be maintained in a secure location with controlled access. 49 CFR 391.53(a).

The access rules are specific. Access is limited to people involved in the hiring decision or who control access to the data. Your insurer may have access, except to the alcohol and controlled substances data. And the data may only be used for the hiring decision. 49 CFR 391.53(a)(1) and (a)(2).

What goes in it:

A copy of the driver's written authorization for you to seek information about their alcohol and controlled substances history. 49 CFR 391.53(b)(1), referencing 391.23(f)(1).

A copy of the responses received from each previous employer, or documentation of good faith efforts to contact them. The record must include the previous employer's name and address, the date you contacted them, and the information you received. Failures to reach a previous employer, or their failure to provide the required information, must be documented. 49 CFR 391.53(b)(2).

That last sentence is worth reading twice. An employer who never writes back does not leave you with a gap in the file. It leaves you with a documentation obligation. Write down who you contacted, when, and that they did not respond.

Two separate obligations, and carriers routinely do the first and not the second.

Pull the record. An annual driver record inquiry to each driver's licensing authority. The MVR you receive goes in the qualification file. 49 CFR 391.25(a) and 391.51(b)(4).

Review it and write a note. A note relating to the annual review of the driver's driving record. 49 CFR 391.25(c)(2) and 391.51(b)(5).

Pulling an MVR is not reviewing it. The regulation lists the record and the note as two different required contents of the file. If the note is not there, the review did not happen as far as an audit is concerned.

For CDL holders, the qualification file requirement is met by obtaining the CDLIS motor vehicle record, defined at 49 CFR 384.105, from the current licensing State and placing it in the file. It must contain medical certification status information. 49 CFR 391.51(b)(6)(ii).

A non-excepted interstate CDL holder without medical certification status information on the CDLIS motor vehicle record is designated "not-certified" to operate in interstate commerce.

Two provisions in this section were time-limited and their windows have now closed. The allowance to use a copy of a medical examiner's certificate submitted to the State, for up to 15 days from issuance, ran through June 22, 2025. 49 CFR 391.51(b)(6)(ii). The National Registry verification note for CDL drivers likewise applied only through June 22, 2025. 49 CFR 391.51(b)(8)(ii).

The National Registry verification note requirement for drivers not required to have a CDL has no end date and still applies. 49 CFR 391.51(b)(8)(i).

If you are reading older guidance that tells you to keep a paper medical certificate in the file for a CDL driver, check the date on it.

Driver qualification is the first listed review area in a new entrant safety audit. 49 CFR 385.311.

Two of the sixteen automatic failure items sit here. Knowingly using a physically unqualified driver, 49 CFR 391.11(b)(4). Knowingly using a disqualified driver, 49 CFR 391.15(a). Both are single occurrence. One instance fails the audit outright.

The distinction that matters: a certificate that exists but is not in your file is a recordkeeping violation under 391.51. A certificate that has expired means the driver is not qualified, and that is a different and much worse finding. The expired medical card is the single most common version of this, because nobody is tracking the date.

The qualification file. Retained for as long as the driver is employed, and for three years after. 49 CFR 391.51(c).

Safety performance histories from previous employers, for a driver you hired. Same rule: as long as employed, and three years after. 49 CFR 391.53(c).

Five items may be purged early. These can be removed from the qualification file three years after the date of execution, per 49 CFR 391.51(d):

You are a driver. If you operate under your own authority, you need a qualification file on yourself containing the same eight categories as any employee driver would.

The application, the MVR at hire, the road test certificate or an accepted equivalent, the annual MVR, the annual review note, and current medical certification. All of it, on yourself, in a file.

Carriers who fail on this are almost never being careless. They just did not think the rules described them.

Three of the eighteen checks in the readiness check on this site cover driver files, including the annual review and medical certification. It scores your answers and tells you which findings would fail an audit outright. About four minutes, no signup to see your score.