Hello all,
Last week I put my card in slot 2 by mistake (long story), anyway I didn’t notice until I was already on the motorway slip road which is only 5 mins from the depot that the tacho was flashing up “card” so I quickly pulled up onto the slip raod hard shoulder and pressed eject. The card would not come out, I checked my wallet to see if I still had it but I was pretty sure it was in the tacho. Arrived at destination (3 hours) and then had another go at getting card out which it still wouldn’t do which is when I called one of the other drivers to ask and he said try slot 2! It never occured to me that I would have put it in the but low and behold there it was. Cursing my luck I duly put it the correct slot, loaded, had my break and then drove back to depot.
Question is I did a print out once finished and wrote what I had done on the print out, is there going to be any consequences to my school boy error? Feel a bit of a plum to be fair but we all make genuine mistakes sometimes I suppose (not certain members of course!)
Not really.
The only real thing was you did a printout at the end of the day not when you swapped slots 
.
Top tip card in do any man entries then wait for that little picture of a card to be fully visible before moving. If it ain’t showing in slot 1 ( on the left) you’ve put it in the wrong hole as the vicars wife said 
To comply with the Regs, you should really have done a printout (two copies - one to hand in, one to keep with you) and written the details of your faux pas on the back as soon as the mistake was discovered. As for consequences? If you are unfortunate enough to be checked by VOSA in the next few weeks, they’ll see what you have done, that you have identified your error and done the printout thing to keep the records straight. Provided there are no other problems I doubt they’ll do anything further about it.
When it comes to downloading the tacho head, the “missing” driving will be flagged up and you’ll doubtless get an infringement to sign. Again, if that’s the only problem I doubt you’ll be in any bother.
As an aside, this incident shows how important it is that drivers be familiar with all the information available on the tacho display, and exactly what the hieroglyphics and error/fault message actually mean.
Don’t fret about it - what’s done is done and there’s nothing you can do about it now. On my first ever run after I got my licence, I put the (paper) chart in upside down. Discovered my error on returning to base, so did appropriate handwritten entries and handed it all in. Second day on the job, did exactly the same thing…
We’ve all slipped it in the wrong hole at some point fella…
What printout did you do, was it a printout from your driver card or a vehicle printout ?
If it was a printout from your driver card it’s no good, you should have done a vehicle printout to show the activities that was not recorded on your driver card.
If you never did a vehicle printout I suggest that you now do two:
- Write on the printouts the time you took over the vehicle or draw a line over the first activity that you was responsible for.
- Write an explanation of why the activities were not recorded on your driver card (Put card in wrong slot).
- Write your name on the printouts and sign them.
- Hand one printout in when your card is downloaded and keep the other with you.
I see this thread is in the Owner Fleet Operators Forum, if you’re an owner driver you only need to do one printout, there’s no point in handing one to yourself when you download the driver card 
As for the consequences question, if you do a printout of your activities recorded on the VU (vehicle printout) I would expect the DVSA to be understanding, at the end of the day they will be able to see your activities from the vehicle printout, and they’ll see from your driver card that it was in slot 2 at the activity times shown on the printout.
As taco correctly points out Veh print out not driver 
I’ve not done one for a long time
tachograph:
What printout did you do, was it a printout from your driver card or a vehicle printout ?
If it was a printout from your driver card it’s no good, you should have done a vehicle printout to show the activities that was not recorded on your driver card.
If you never did a vehicle printout I suggest that you now do two:
- Write on the printouts the time you took over the vehicle or draw a line over the first activity that you was responsible for.
- Write an explanation of why the activities were not recorded on your driver card (Put card in wrong slot).
- Write your name on the printouts and sign them.
- Hand one printout in when your card is downloaded and keep the other with you.
I see this thread is in the Owner Fleet Operators Forum, if you’re an owner driver you only need to do one printout, there’s no point in handing one to yourself when you download the driver card
As for the consequences question, if you do a printout of your activities recorded on the VU (vehicle printout) I would expect the DVSA to be understanding, at the end of the day they will be able to see your activities from the vehicle printout, and they’ll see from your driver card that it was in slot 2 at the activity times shown on the printout.
What a ridiculous performance that is required from a fella that is just going about his daily business!!
Do this, do that, click this, click that, push this button, don’t push that one, and if you make a mistake…god help you because you could be in line for legal action being taken against you!!! This is nuts!! 
bullitt:
tachograph:
What printout did you do, was it a printout from your driver card or a vehicle printout ?
If it was a printout from your driver card it’s no good, you should have done a vehicle printout to show the activities that was not recorded on your driver card.
If you never did a vehicle printout I suggest that you now do two:
- Write on the printouts the time you took over the vehicle or draw a line over the first activity that you was responsible for.
- Write an explanation of why the activities were not recorded on your driver card (Put card in wrong slot).
- Write your name on the printouts and sign them.
- Hand one printout in when your card is downloaded and keep the other with you.
I see this thread is in the Owner Fleet Operators Forum, if you’re an owner driver you only need to do one printout, there’s no point in handing one to yourself when you download the driver card
As for the consequences question, if you do a printout of your activities recorded on the VU (vehicle printout) I would expect the DVSA to be understanding, at the end of the day they will be able to see your activities from the vehicle printout, and they’ll see from your driver card that it was in slot 2 at the activity times shown on the printout.
What a ridiculous performance that is required from a fella that is just going about his daily business!!
Do this, do that, click this, click that, push this button, don’t push that one, and if you make a mistake…god help you because you could be in line for legal action being taken against you!!! This is nuts!!
No mention of clicking anything or pushing buttons that I can see. Exactly the same things (handwritten entries explaining your errors) were required on analogue tachos. Still, if it’s too difficult for you there’s always a career in shelf-stacking or burger-flipping
Roymondo:
…Still, if it’s too difficult for you there’s always a career in shelf-stacking or burger-flipping
Thanks for the careers advice but I think I will stick to running my own business as I have for the last 3 years!
tachograph:
What printout did you do, was it a printout from your driver card or a vehicle printout ?
If it was a printout from your driver card it’s no good, you should have done a vehicle printout to show the activities that was not recorded on your driver card.
If you never did a vehicle printout I suggest that you now do two:
- Write on the printouts the time you took over the vehicle or draw a line over the first activity that you was responsible for.
- Write an explanation of why the activities were not recorded on your driver card (Put card in wrong slot).
- Write your name on the printouts and sign them.
- Hand one printout in when your card is downloaded and keep the other with you.
I see this thread is in the Owner Fleet Operators Forum, if you’re an owner driver you only need to do one printout, there’s no point in handing one to yourself when you download the driver card
As for the consequences question, if you do a printout of your activities recorded on the VU (vehicle printout) I would expect the DVSA to be understanding, at the end of the day they will be able to see your activities from the vehicle printout, and they’ll see from your driver card that it was in slot 2 at the activity times shown on the printout.
If you ask for a vehicle daily activity sheet from whoever downloads the tacho head ( if you don’t do it yourself) it will show that your card was in slot two ( I had this happen before so stapled the drivers printout to the activity sheet and put in in my tacho file)
Many thanks all for the advice! Not an owner driver as such but I operate half a dozen trucks and keep myself available to take over for holidays/sickness etc.
That particular day I was in the middle of kicking a driver out of the cab so I could get on (he refused to do a 3 hour trip even tho he had 4 hours left (yes, driving and 5 hours duty time)), which is probably why I made the mistake.