Everything this chapter has described ends up in one place. § 391.51(a) requires each carrier to maintain a driver qualification file for each driver it employs, and permits it to be combined with the personnel file. § 391.51(b) then lists what the file must contain: the application for employment completed under § 391.21; a copy of the motor vehicle record received from each licensing authority; the certificate of the driver’s road test, or the equivalent accepted under § 391.33; the motor vehicle record received in response to the annual inquiry; a note relating to the annual review of the driving record; the medical examiner’s certificate; any medical variance issued by FMCSA, including a skill performance evaluation certificate; and a note relating to verification that the medical examiner was listed on the National Registry. Read as a list it is dry. Read as a record about you, it is the document a carrier would produce to prove you were lawfully behind the wheel.

This section also answers a question Chapter 5 raised and deliberately did not settle. § 391.51 provides that after January 30, 2015, a non-excepted, interstate commercial license holder without medical certification status information on the CDLIS motor vehicle record is designated “not-certified” to operate a commercial motor vehicle in interstate commerce. That is what the self-certification made under § 383.71 actually decides: it places you in a category, and the category determines whether missing medical status on your State record stops you driving. A non-excepted interstate driver whose certificate never reached the State is not-certified in the eyes of the record, however current the paper certificate in their hand.

§ 391.53 adds a second, narrower file: the driver investigation history file, holding the safety performance history information the carrier obtained under § 391.23, with its own requirements for what is kept and who may see it. Between the two, a driver’s qualification is documented from application to annual review — and the practical lesson is that the file is where a dispute about whether you were qualified will actually be decided.