To your question. A driver cannot drive beyond their 8th hour after going on duty unless they take a thirty minute break. That break can be either off duty, sleeper berth, on-duty, or a combination of all three as long as it's a consecutive thirty minutes. Company policy still mirrors the old 30 minute break rule that required a driver to take a full thirty minute off duty break. If he didn't take this brake and then drove beyond his 8th duty hour, he'd be in violation. For city drivers, the company will take 1/2 hour of pay away after the driver exceeds 6 hours of duty time for that work day, so if you're in the city, you might as well take your break because you're not being paid anyway, if you miss pick-ups, that's on mgmt provided you warned them ahead of time that you had to take your break. If you're on linehaul, the company still wants you to take your full 30 minute break as the law was before, not as the law is now. Here's the secret though, the ELD's are based on FMSCA HOS rules, not company policy, so once a linehaul driver starts working the dock and he's on duty for more than 30 minutes, his 8 hour break clock resets to another full 8 hours. If I was on linehaul, I would take my 30 minute off duty break in the form of a power nap after my set was hooked for the return leg home. Does that help cut through the clutter?
https://blog.bigroad.com/blog/what-is-the-fmcsa-30-minute-break-rule#:~:text=What is the 30-Minute Break Rule? According to,8th hour before being allowed to drive again.