So, does VOSA take this 48 hrs per week average, seriously?
What happens if they find out you have done more over say, last 8 months, providing the reference period is 26 weeks?
What happens the company you are working for insists on you working 60 hrs per week, you work for them for 3 months, then change job and work for another company that also wants you to work 60 hrs per week? How do you average down to 48 hrs per week in this case?
What happens if you work 60 hrs per week, get a sack after 3 months of working for them, find another company that also wants you to work 60 hrs per week?
what happens if you just keep working 60 hrs per week and VOSA finds out. Can they find out at all?
I suspect most drivers work 60 hrs per week constantly, otherwise they wouldn’t be able to make a living with these very low hourly pay that truckers get these days. Am I wrong?
So, does VOSA take this 48 hrs per week average, seriously?
What happens if they find out you have done more over say, last 8 months, providing the reference period is 26 weeks? The operator risks losing their “o” licence.
What happens the company you are working for insists on you working 60 hrs per week, you work for them for 3 months, then change job and work for another company that also wants you to work 60 hrs per week? How do you average down to 48 hrs per week in this case? Both the operator and drive get fined, and the O licence might be revoked. The driver has aided and abetted the haulier to run bent.
What happens if you work 60 hrs per week, get a sack after 3 months of working for them, find another company that also wants you to work 60 hrs per week? Leaving one company running bent to work for another one running bent does not excuse you in the eyes of the law.
what happens if you just keep working 60 hrs per week and VOSA finds out. Can they find out at all? It would only appear at operator’s office audit. There’s only 28 days of data on the digicards, but the operator yard are required to keep records for all their drivers going back longer than the 26 week reference period. If this were not so, then the entire rulebook would be impossible to enforce, because VOSA would not have any data to back up claims pertaining to more than 28 days worth of data, which just isn’t enough to prove an “average over 48 over 26 weeks” accusation.
I suspect most drivers work 60 hrs per week constantly, otherwise they wouldn’t be able to make a living with these very low hourly pay that truckers get these days. Am I wrong?
Those drivers that have regular hours over 48 will mitigate it away via POA. This, of course, is their loss, because it aids and abets the firm to run bent, and get a lot more hours out of a driver for the same wage. They don’t have to raise wages, with no upper limit on hours! Thus, the normal laws of market supply and demand do not apply. They are circumvented by dodgy tacho dealings, which 99% of the time VOSA won’t ever get to look at, let alone chase a prosecution over, because the government departments have told them to “go soft” in order to promote the establishment’s “deflation for the masses” agenda.
Deflation increases debt, deceases income, and keeps wages down when market forces otherwise would do the exact opposite. Palming it off upon the masses is the number one conspiracy in our society today. Why do you think the rich are able to get richer despite a recession, and the poor get poorer despite being told the “recession is over”?
If tacho’s are the only records for proving working time they must be kept for two years. VOSA will enforce working time and as they are self funding will look at all sorts of ways to extract your hard earned out of you.
There is a lot more than 28 days data on a card, I got pulled by vosa back in September and when I was talking to him he said there was only issues from back in February-March for jumping in 3-4 different motors per day and some hadn’t the proper times set so caused infringements that were saved.
If you do a 24hour printout old infringements still appear on the bottom of the printout, done one today to check driving time as POA reset clock and they still appear.
I’m in the same boat as you I work a minimum of 12hours per day which averages over 48 per week, I think the way around it is using POA as much as possible, works for me…
POA in my case isn’t aiding the firm to run bent, I work on containers and half the time when I get to my drops I find out how long they will be (sometimes 8+ hours) and normally I go out a walk around strange towns, shopping, seeing the sights etc lol…
Ryy86:
POA in my case isn’t aiding the firm to run bent, I work on containers and half the time when I get to my drops I find out how long they will be (sometimes 8+ hours) and normally I go out a walk around strange towns, shopping, seeing the sights etc lol…
Can’t class that as other work IMO
Don’t worry about winseer, dude can’t get his head around time sheet / paid hours and WTD hours
Winseer makes some good points though. I bet that for every driver happily wandering around the nearest town centre while on POA, there are ten being put under pressure to use POA instead of other work to avoid running out of hours before the job is done. I’ve never booked a minute of POA ever since it came in for this very reason; I’ve known too many transport managers try and use it as a means to extend the working day.
As I understand it, VOSA is not interested in WTD breaches, only drivers hours offences.
If anyone can provide concrete evidence of any WTD or RTD prosecutions (not MMTM bulldust, the actual details of the case with names and dates) then I am happy to be corrected.
Rhythm Thief:
Winseer makes some good points though. I bet that for every driver happily wandering around the nearest town centre while on POA, there are ten being put under pressure to use POA instead of other work to avoid running out of hours before the job is done. I’ve never booked a minute of POA ever since it came in for this very reason; I’ve known too many transport managers try and use it as a means to extend the working day.
that’s the trouble though, he does make some good points, but why spoil it and lose credibility by constantly spouting stuff that i don’t believe he’s daft enough to actually believe himself?
i know it’s easy to say, but that’s up to them to stand up to the TM or change jobs, plus it’s not any different to any other pressure to do some form of dodgy running.
i don’t see your reason why you’ve never used poa, but that’s up to you
So, does VOSA take this 48 hrs per week average, seriously?
What happens if they find out you have done more over say, last 8 months, providing the reference period is 26 weeks?
What happens the company you are working for insists on you working 60 hrs per week, you work for them for 3 months, then change job and work for another company that also wants you to work 60 hrs per week? How do you average down to 48 hrs per week in this case?
What happens if you work 60 hrs per week, get a sack after 3 months of working for them, find another company that also wants you to work 60 hrs per week?
what happens if you just keep working 60 hrs per week and VOSA finds out. Can they find out at all?
I suspect most drivers work 60 hrs per week constantly, otherwise they wouldn’t be able to make a living with these very low hourly pay that truckers get these days. Am I wrong?
thanks
1. Yes they do, they don’t enforce it at the roadside because they don’t have the means to do it. There is no penalties system in place yet for enforcing it on an individual driver basis, they usually offer advice to the vehicle Operator. 2. That doesn’t make sense. A 26 week reference period is 6 months, whats 8 months got to do with it? I’m not sure i understand what you’re asking here to be honest. 3. Sections 11 and 12 of theRTD WTD cover that. The employer is supposed to ask you and you have to give him the information to enable his calculations. 4. See above. 5. I’m guessing here but i would think if you flag up as working excessive hours then the Operator of your vehicle may get a visit.
If anyone thinks the RT WTD is not being policed just because drivers are not gettting fined for breaking it at the roadside there’s an importat point to remember here, that legislation is there for your protection to give you rights to breaks, rests etc…Unlike 561/2006 it is not there to curtail you, rather afford you some basic stuff.
The VOSA applications and descisions that are publisised have plenty of examples of Operators who have only been allowed to renew their licence on the condition of strict adherence to the RT WTD, so someones looking at it and telling the TC’s they aint complying? Mind you, anyone could go look at the notices and contact one of the Operators and give them the advice you get here now and again, no one bothers about it !
Mike-C:
If anyone thinks the RT WTD is not being policed just because drivers are not getting fined for breaking it at the roadside there’s an importat point to remember here, that legislation is there for your protection to give you rights to breaks, rests etc…Unlike 561/2006 it is not there to curtail you, rather afford you some basic stuff.
The VOSA applications and descisions that are publisised have plenty of examples of Operators who have only been allowed to renew their licence on the condition of strict adherence to the RT WTD, so someones looking at it and telling the TC’s they aint complying? Mind you, anyone could go look at the notices and contact one of the Operators and give them the advice you get here now and again, no one bothers about it !
I think on balance you’re right there; and I do agree that essentially it’s there for our protection however irksome it might seem at times.
I can’t help but think, though, that if any authority were to pursue prosecutions, it might well come to pass that the legislation is found to be unenforceable, bit like the Hunting Act has proved to be; and that may be why no-one has yet pursued it.
Sidevalve:
I can’t help but think, though, that if any authority were to pursue prosecutions, it might well come to pass that the legislation is found to be unenforceable, bit like the Hunting Act has proved to be; and that may be why no-one has yet pursued it.
Im guessing here a bit but i think things like limitations on prosecutions (6 months?) might scupper them trying to prosecute a driver for exceeding average hours, so they go for the employer with one of them enforcement sanctions, i.e get your house in order or we’ll remove your O licence. Thats my guess on it anyway.
stevieboy308:
i don’t see your reason why you’ve never used poa, but that’s up to you
Because I recognised from the start that POA was (and is) a ridiculous unpoliceable fudge which would lead to a net change of absolutely sod - all in our excessive working hours. At the time the WTD was first mooted, I was working on general haulage doing 70+ hours a week, which was nothing unusual. I felt then that that was too many hours, and when I discovered that legislation was being introduced to bring it down to 48 hours, I was over the moon: I could have my working week all wrapped up by Thursday morning! Then POA was introduced and it became apparent that very little was going to change. So I refused to book POA, and eventually found myself a job where I didn’t need to.
OK, so “a friend of mine” works for a company that pushes him to work up to the limit of 60 hrs per week every week.
They apparently, have a workplace agreement that extends reference period from 17 to 26 weeks.
If 48 per week rule is enforceable and something to be taken seriously than he should be getting a few days off at the end of his 26 weeks reference period as he regulary does 55, 57, 59, 60 hrs every week, not including POAs, this is only driving and other work.
He would love to work less per week, but he’s got no choice as he is being pushed to max hours .
If he does so many hours over the 48hrs limit than he should be getting something like 8-12hrs off, at the end of his 26 weeks reference period, for every week he has been working.
That would mean he would have an extra 2-3 weeks of time off (holiday) at the end of his 26 weeks reference period.
That’s if the 48 hrs average per week rule is enforceable and he hopes it is, as he is on weekly/monthly wage, a and not paid per hour, so the more hours he works the less he gets paid per hour.
Do employers and VOSA take this 48hrs seriously, or is it something there but no one really pays too much attention to it?
Thanks
Sidevalve:
I can’t help but think, though, that if any authority were to pursue prosecutions, it might well come to pass that the legislation is found to be unenforceable, bit like the Hunting Act has proved to be; and that may be why no-one has yet pursued it.
Im guessing here a bit but i think things like limitations on prosecutions (6 months?) might scupper them trying to prosecute a driver for exceeding average hours, so they go for the employer with one of them enforcement sanctions, i.e get your house in order or we’ll remove your O licence. Thats my guess on it anyway.
That makes sense. Easier to target a rogue operator than a rogue driver, and the latter couldn’t exist without the connivance of the former anyway.
