How to Strengthen Your CSA Performance: A Practical 60-Day Action Plan

Your FMCSA Compliance, Safety, Accountability (CSA) score is one of the most consequential numbers in your fleet operation. It affects your ability to win contracts with safety-conscious shippers, your insurance premiums, and your likelihood of being selected for roadside inspections.

The good news: CSA scores are improvable — and they improve faster than most fleet managers expect when the right systems are in place. Here's a 60-day roadmap.

Days 1–14: Audit Your Current BASIC Performance

CSA performance is organized around seven Behavior Analysis and Safety Improvement Categories, commonly called BASICs:

1. Unsafe Driving

2. Hours of Service Compliance

3. Driver Fitness

4. Controlled Substances/Alcohol

5. Vehicle Maintenance

6. Hazardous Materials Compliance

7. Crash Indicator

Pull your current BASIC percentile scores from the FMCSA Safety Measurement System. Identify which categories are above alert thresholds and where your most recent inspection violations have clustered. This tells you where to focus first.

Days 15–30: Activate Driver Behavior Monitoring

For most fleets, Unsafe Driving and Hours of Service violations are two BASICs that fleets can influence through consistent monitoring, coaching, and compliance processes

A telematics platform with real-time driver behavior visibility, driver scoring, speeding alerts, and HOS compliance monitoring can help fleet managers identify concerning patterns and coach drivers before those behaviors contribute to roadside violations or safety incidents

OneView™ driver safety dashboards give fleet managers a daily view of which drivers are generating alerts, what behaviors are most common, and where coaching conversations need to happen. As these insights are used consistently, many fleets begin to see improvements in alert frequency and driver behavior within the first few weeks.

Days 31–45: Strengthen Maintenance Records and DVIR Processes

Vehicle Maintenance can often be reduced through consistent inspections, timely repairs, and accurate documentation.

Many Violations stem from equipment issues that could have been identified and resolved before a roadside inspection.

Using Pedigree’s OneView™ platform supports configurable inspection and maintenance workflows:

• Pre-trip and post-trip DVIRs can be standardized

• Defects are documented and tracked

• Repairs can be logged and tied to maintenance activity

These processes give teams greater visibility into unresolved defects, create a documented record of compliance activities, and help reduce the likelihood of preventable maintenance violations.

Days 46–60: Review, Coach, and Document Progress

FMCSA’s Safety Measurement System uses 24 months of roadside inspection and crash data and updates carrier results monthly. Recent violations generally carry greater weight, while older violations have less influence as they age.

Although previous violations remain in the measurement system for the applicable period, consistent coaching, timely maintenance, improved compliance processes, and clean inspections can contribute to stronger performance over time.

Use this phase to:

• Reinforce driver coaching based on observed behaviors

• Validate that maintenance issues are being resolved promptly

• Review changes in driver alerts and inspection results

• Document updated policies, processes, coaching, and corrective actions

• Establish an ongoing schedule for reviewing BASIC performance

This documentation is valuable internally and may also help demonstrate the strength of your safety program when communicating with customers, insurers, or regulators.

The Technology Difference

Improving CSA performance requires more than reacting to violations after a roadside inspection. It requires identifying the behaviors, equipment issues, and process gaps that can lead to violations before they become larger problems.

OneView™ brings driver safety, Hours-of-Service compliance, inspections, and maintenance information together in one platform. This visibility makes it easier for operations teams to recognize risks, prioritize action, document improvements, and maintain consistency across the fleet.

A 60-day action plan will not erase previous violations, but it can help your fleet establish stronger habits, improve accountability, and build a more proactive safety and compliance program.

Talk to our team about a compliance-focused OneView™ implementation. Book a call at pedigreetech.io/demo.