diff --git a/core/src/main/scala/org/apache/spark/internal/io/SparkHadoopWriter.scala b/core/src/main/scala/org/apache/spark/internal/io/SparkHadoopWriter.scala
index a619f10bbf064..a5d2c5c88ae03 100644
--- a/core/src/main/scala/org/apache/spark/internal/io/SparkHadoopWriter.scala
+++ b/core/src/main/scala/org/apache/spark/internal/io/SparkHadoopWriter.scala
@@ -18,7 +18,7 @@
 package org.apache.spark.internal.io
 
 import java.text.NumberFormat
-import java.util.{Date, Locale}
+import java.util.{Date, Locale, UUID}
 
 import scala.reflect.ClassTag
 
@@ -70,6 +70,11 @@ object SparkHadoopWriter extends Logging {
     // Assert the output format/key/value class is set in JobConf.
     config.assertConf(jobContext, rdd.conf)
 
+    // propagate the description UUID into the jobs, so that committers
+    // get an ID guaranteed to be unique.
+    jobContext.getConfiguration.set("spark.sql.sources.writeJobUUID",
+      UUID.randomUUID.toString)
+
     val committer = config.createCommitter(commitJobId)
     committer.setupJob(jobContext)
 
diff --git a/core/src/main/scala/org/apache/spark/internal/io/SparkHadoopWriterUtils.scala b/core/src/main/scala/org/apache/spark/internal/io/SparkHadoopWriterUtils.scala
index de828a6d6156e..657842c620f30 100644
--- a/core/src/main/scala/org/apache/spark/internal/io/SparkHadoopWriterUtils.scala
+++ b/core/src/main/scala/org/apache/spark/internal/io/SparkHadoopWriterUtils.scala
@@ -20,7 +20,7 @@ package org.apache.spark.internal.io
 import java.text.SimpleDateFormat
 import java.util.{Date, Locale}
 
-import scala.util.DynamicVariable
+import scala.util.{DynamicVariable, Random}
 
 import org.apache.hadoop.fs.Path
 import org.apache.hadoop.mapred.{JobConf, JobID}
@@ -37,14 +37,35 @@ private[spark]
 object SparkHadoopWriterUtils {
 
   private val RECORDS_BETWEEN_BYTES_WRITTEN_METRIC_UPDATES = 256
+  private val RAND = new Random()
 
+  /**
+   * Create a job ID.
+   *
+   * @param time (current) time
+   * @param id job number
+   * @return a job ID
+   */
   def createJobID(time: Date, id: Int): JobID = {
+    if (id < 0) {
+      throw new IllegalArgumentException("Job number is negative")
+    }
     val jobtrackerID = createJobTrackerID(time)
     new JobID(jobtrackerID, id)
   }
 
+  /**
+   * Generate an ID for a job tracker.
+   * @param time (current) time
+   * @return a string for a job ID
+   */
   def createJobTrackerID(time: Date): String = {
-    new SimpleDateFormat("yyyyMMddHHmmss", Locale.US).format(time)
+    val base = new SimpleDateFormat("yyyyMMddHHmmss", Locale.US).format(time)
+    var l1 = RAND.nextLong()
+    if (l1 < 0) {
+      l1 = -l1
+    }
+    base + l1
   }
 
   def createPathFromString(path: String, conf: JobConf): Path = {
diff --git a/core/src/test/scala/org/apache/spark/internal/io/SparkHadoopWriterUtilsSuite.scala b/core/src/test/scala/org/apache/spark/internal/io/SparkHadoopWriterUtilsSuite.scala
new file mode 100644
index 0000000000000..33b58ec9e6665
--- /dev/null
+++ b/core/src/test/scala/org/apache/spark/internal/io/SparkHadoopWriterUtilsSuite.scala
@@ -0,0 +1,102 @@
+/*
+ * Licensed to the Apache Software Foundation (ASF) under one or more
+ * contributor license agreements.  See the NOTICE file distributed with
+ * this work for additional information regarding copyright ownership.
+ * The ASF licenses this file to You under the Apache License, Version 2.0
+ * (the "License"); you may not use this file except in compliance with
+ * the License.  You may obtain a copy of the License at
+ *
+ *    http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0
+ *
+ * Unless required by applicable law or agreed to in writing, software
+ * distributed under the License is distributed on an "AS IS" BASIS,
+ * WITHOUT WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS OF ANY KIND, either express or implied.
+ * See the License for the specific language governing permissions and
+ * limitations under the License.
+ */
+
+package org.apache.spark.internal.io
+
+import java.util.Date
+
+import org.apache.hadoop.mapreduce.JobID
+
+import org.apache.spark.SparkFunSuite
+import org.apache.spark.internal.io.SparkHadoopWriterUtils.createJobID
+
+/**
+ * Unit tests for functions in SparkHadoopWriterUtils.
+ */
+class SparkHadoopWriterUtilsSuite extends SparkFunSuite {
+
+  /**
+   * Core test of JobID generation:
+   * They are created.
+   * The job number is converted to the job ID.
+   * They round trip to string and back
+   * (which implies that the full string matches the regexp
+   * in the JobID class).
+   */
+  test("JobID Generation") {
+    val jobNumber = 1010
+    val j1 = createJobID(new Date(), jobNumber)
+    assert(jobNumber == j1.getId,
+      s"Job number mismatch in $j1")
+
+    val jobStr = j1.toString
+    // the string value begins with job_
+    assert(jobStr.startsWith("job_"),
+      s"wrong prefix of $jobStr")
+    // and the hadoop code can parse it
+    val j2 = roundTrip(j1)
+    assert(j1.getId == j2.getId, "Job ID mismatch")
+    assert(j1.getJtIdentifier == j2.getJtIdentifier, "Job identifier mismatch")
+  }
+
+  /**
+   * This is the problem surfacing in situations where committers expect
+   * Job IDs to be unique: if the timestamp is (exclusively) used
+   * then there will conflict in directories created.
+   */
+  test("JobIDs generated at same time are different") {
+    val now = new Date()
+    val j1 = createJobID(now, 1)
+    val j2 = createJobID(now, 1)
+    assert(j1.toString != j2.toString)
+  }
+
+  /**
+   * There's nothing explicitly in the Hadoop classes to stop
+   * job numbers being negative.
+   * There's some big assumptions in the FileOutputCommitter about attempt IDs
+   * being positive during any recovery operations; for safety the ID
+   * job number is validated.
+   */
+  test("JobIDs with negative job number") {
+    intercept[IllegalArgumentException] {
+      createJobID(new Date(), -1)
+    }
+  }
+
+  /**
+   * If someone ever does reinstate use of timestamps,
+   * make sure that the case of timestamp == 0 is handled.
+   */
+  test("JobIDs on Epoch are different") {
+    val j1 = createJobID(new Date(0), 0)
+    val j2 = createJobID(new Date(0), 0)
+    assert (j1.toString != j2.toString)
+  }
+
+  /**
+   * Do a round trip as a string and back again.
+   * This uses the JobID parser.
+   * @param jobID job ID
+   * @return the returned jobID
+   */
+  private def roundTrip(jobID: JobID): JobID = {
+    val parsedJobId = JobID.forName(jobID.toString)
+    assert(jobID == parsedJobId, "Round trip was inconsistent")
+    parsedJobId
+  }
+}