Hi all new to the forum so go easy! Iam looking some information on wether iam tachograph exempt or not, everyone i speak to has a different angle on it. Basically as part of my job i have to pick up new trailers and take them back to our workshop to have fridge equipment installed. It’s around a 30 mile round trip and i would never do more than two swaps a day.
I usually work 9-5 with a few hours overtime at most, also there could be large parts of the year were i dont drive the tractor unit on road, only for shunting in the yard.
I’d have thought that it’s nothing to do with “goods carried”, it’d be more to do with “for hire or reward whilst falling within scope”, If so then it would surely have to be on tacho.
Also I’m not completely certain but wouldn’t you need to keep manual records of non driving or off-road driving too?
In the regulations there is an exemption for - “drivers who never carry goods or passengers in the course of their employment are not considered to be within scope of the regulations. For example, this covers operations such as the delivery and recovery of hire vehicles and empty vehicles taken for annual test”
Santa:
In the regulations there is an exemption for - “drivers who never carry goods or passengers in the course of their employment are not considered to be within scope of the regulations. For example, this covers operations such as the delivery and recovery of hire vehicles and empty vehicles taken for annual test”
You may well be correct but my understanding is that once you couple a trailer to a tractor unit, they become one vehicle as far as the law and VOSA are concerned.
vehicles undergoing road tests for technical development, repair or maintenance purposes, and new or rebuilt vehicles which have not yet been put into service
But in any case - for the amount you do, it’s hardly a bit issue to throw a card in is it?
I dont deliver the trailers to the customer i pick them up from the bodybuilder then leave them back. I know what your saying about sticking a card in but do i download it and the tractor etc etc ■■
For 25 years I worked for government dept and as ‘Crown Vehicles’, we were officially tacho exempt. For years, our lorries were not fitted with tachos, but more recently, to have a vehicle without a tacho it had to be a special order and was consequently more expensive than an ‘off the peg’ lorry. So, although we were oficially and legally exempt, as a tacho was fitted, it HAD to be calibrated and HAD to be used, downloaded and records kept, by law. Incidentally, we were also road tax exempt and did not legally have to display a tax disc and, as such, we were also exempt from the use of speed limiters. But the law being what it is, if a limiter is fitted, it CANNOT be disconnected and MUST be working. (We were also self-insuring and did not have to carry a certificate of insurance).
As an aside, we also travelled under the auspices of the official secrets act and our reg numbers were not recorded on the PNC. PC Plod, sitting on his motorway obs point sees a lorry with no tax disc - comes up with ‘no record of this vehicle’ - has led to more than a few VERY interesting conversations on the roadside over the years!
You fall in scope of tachograph usage and all the extra parts with it, such as recording “non-driving” days in a fixed week and carrying 28 days worth of duty/tacho records. As with the above post-the trailer is the goods and I’m guessing (unless I’ve read it wrong) the trailer is not new or rebuilt under a road test, it’s a trailer that your company just wants to add a refrigerated unit to. The key part to that exemption is “undergoing a road test”
From experience if you were stopped by vosa/police you would struggle to prove you were tacho exempt.
Santa:
You may well be correct but my understanding is that once you couple a trailer to a tractor unit, they become one vehicle as far as the law and VOSA are concerned.
Depends what is being done - in this case the trailer is being delivered to have work done on it so is therefore the delivered goods and when collected it is the finished goods being returned to base
Santa:
You may well be correct but my understanding is that once you couple a trailer to a tractor unit, they become one vehicle as far as the law and VOSA are concerned.
Depends what is being done - in this case the trailer is being delivered to have work done on it so is therefore the delivered goods and when collected it is the finished goods being returned to base
But surely the trailer isn’t in service, if it still belongs to the trailer builder, who wont be hauling goods for hire and reward.
“and new or rebuilt vehicles which have not yet been put into service”
40 no way lol shes limitied to 85 and it does my head in! I think ill stay on the safe side as best i can, its hard to keep on top of with all the other work duties!
Many thanks for the replies
Santa:
You may well be correct but my understanding is that once you couple a trailer to a tractor unit, they become one vehicle as far as the law and VOSA are concerned.
Depends what is being done - in this case the trailer is being delivered to have work done on it so is therefore the delivered goods and when collected it is the finished goods being returned to base
But surely the trailer isn’t in service, if it still belongs to the trailer builder, who wont be hauling goods for hire and reward.
“and new or rebuilt vehicles which have not yet been put into service”
would have agreed with you had tractor unit and trailer been such
Santa:
You may well be correct but my understanding is that once you couple a trailer to a tractor unit, they become one vehicle as far as the law and VOSA are concerned.
Depends what is being done - in this case the trailer is being delivered to have work done on it so is therefore the delivered goods and when collected it is the finished goods being returned to base
But surely the trailer isn’t in service, if it still belongs to the trailer builder, who wont be hauling goods for hire and reward.
“and new or rebuilt vehicles which have not yet been put into service”
would have agreed with you had tractor unit and trailer been such
So, a reefer without a fridge motor isn’t a complete trailer until it’s fitted, so wouldn’t be a trailer in service, unit wouldn’t come into the equation would it?
And I think your definition of goods is inaccurate, how can a trailer be described as goods?
If you believe that delivering a trailer is not goods then feel free to test that in court but have the money ready for the big fine
Here is another example of where something is not exempt - artic plant trailer pulled by a unit which is not needed to operate that plant trailer - the trailer can operate independently of the unit
Its not UK domestic regs but full EU regs
The trailer might be exempt but the unit is not
In this instance, road testing would surely occur when the skeletal trailer had been built, to ensure there were no road going faults, prior to affixing the specialised body to it?
Incidentally, in my last job (sewage/drains tanker) I was advised I was tacho exempt and didn’t need to keep any records as such. Same applied to most of the fleet there, yet virtually of of their competitors want drivers to have a valid digi card?? Trouble is, you always get two versions of what you should do, depending on who you work for.
