§ 219.611 - Random alcohol and drug testing pools.

§ 219.611 Test result indicating prohibited alcohol concentration; procedures.

Procedures for administrative handling by the railroad in the event an employee's confirmation test indicates an alcohol concentration of .04 or greater are set forth in § 219.104.

Random alcohol and drug testing pools.

(a) General. Each railroad must ensure that its random testing pools include all regulated employees who perform regulated service on its behalf, except that a railroad's random testing pools do not have to include regulated employees who are part of a non-railroad random testing program that is compliant with the requirements of this subpart and that has been accepted by the railroad.

(b) Pool entries. Each railroad must clearly indicate who will be tested when a specific pool entry is selected.

(1) Pool entries may be employee names or identification numbers, train symbols, or specific job assignments, although all the entries in a single pool must be of generally consistent sizes and types.

(2) Pool entries must not allow a field manager or field supervisor to have discretion over which employee is to be tested when an entry is selected.

(3) Pool entries must be constructed and maintained so that all regulated employees have an equal chance of being selected for random testing for each selection draw.

(c) Minimum number of pool entries. A railroad (including a service agent used by a railroad to carry out its responsibilities under this subpart) may not maintain a random testing pool with less than four pool entries. Placeholder pool entries (entries that do not represent legitimate selections of regulated employees) are not permitted. A railroad or contractor with less than four regulated employees can comply with this requirement by having its regulated employees incorporated into a railroad or non-railroad random testing pool that contains more than four entries.

(d) Pool construction.

(1) An individual who is not subject to the random testing requirements of FRA or another DOT agency may not be placed in the same pool as a regulated employee.

(2) A railroad may not include a regulated employee in more than one random testing pool established under the regulations of a DOT agency.

(3) A regulated employee may be placed in a random testing pool with employees subject to the random testing requirements of another DOT agency, only if all entries in the pool are subject to testing at the highest minimum random testing rate required by the regulations of a DOT agency for any single member in the pool.

(4) A regulated employee does not have to be placed in separate pools for random drug and random alcohol testing selection.

(5) A regulated employee must be incorporated into a random testing pool as soon as possible after his or her hire or first transfer into regulated service.

(e) Frequency of regulated service.

(1) A railroad may not place a person in a random testing pool for any selection period in which he or she is not expected to perform regulated service.

(2) A railroad employee who performs regulated service on average less than once a quarter is a de minimis safety concern for random testing purposes, and does not have to be in a random testing program. A railroad that chooses to random test de minimis employees must place them in a separate random testing pool from employees who perform regulated service on a regular basis (e.g., engineers, conductors, dispatchers, and signal maintainers).

(3) A railroad must make a good faith effort to determine the frequency of an employee's performance of regulated service and must evaluate the employee's likelihood of performing regulated service in each upcoming selection period.

(f) Pool maintenance. Pool entries must be updated at least monthly, regardless of how often selections are made, and a railroad must ensure that each of its random testing pools is complete and does not contain outdated or inappropriate entries.

(g) Multiple random testing pools. A railroad may maintain more than one random testing pool if it can demonstrate that its random testing program is not adversely impacted by the number and types of pools or the construction of pool entries, and that selections from each pool will meet the requirements of this subpart.