on a recent visit to a vosa checkpoint (not my idea)i was found to have moved my lorry 2 km without my tacho recording,pointing out to the operative that i had mistakenly forgot to close my tacho and had filled my card in the night before the mileage was the same so was not trying to cover any work,but the missing time was whilst searching docks for my trailer.He then informed me of a breach of tacho rules and issued a fixed penalty of £200 and parked me up for 9 hrs.Then explaining he had no-one to monitor gave me permission to drive the rest of my journey.I thought this a bit over the top so contacted vosa head office where i was told i could put a letter of appeal in after 6 weeks and a couple of phone calls i recieved a letter informing me the penalty was upheld and have to pay the £200.It was pointed out that my appeal was decided by the same examiner as issued it in the first place (surley that is like putting your hand back in the fire to see if it burned you the first time).In 25 yrs of driving i have never had a tacho offence but this does not register with the laws of vosa who it looks like will make money at any cost.regards Bigben,a merry xmas to all you .
Sending the appeal to the officer who issued the fine does seem a bit daft. He will already have a biased view of the incident and words may have been exchanged which will also give him a biased view.
A appeal should ideally be 3 independent officers from different areas to be balanced and fair IMO.
What if workshop moves your lorry out into the yard when it’s serviced/repaired then? I know about workshop cards but I’m sure they don’t use them everytime our trucks are moved. I’m on analogue so it’s a bit different but I have to admit to moving my wagon into the workshop when my tachos recording in the yard spare (slap wrists are coming I know).
Muckaway:
What if workshop moves your lorry out into the yard when it’s serviced/repaired then? I know about workshop cards but I’m sure they don’t use them everytime our trucks are moved.
They wouldn’t, that’s not what workshop cards are for. They are used for testing, calibrating and programming the VDU.
go to court. they have to prove that you did it with total disregard for the eu regs to secure a conviction.
Got pulled on the far side of woodhead near barnsley the other week, insisted on me going over the weighbride even though i was pulling an empty flat bed, nobs
mutley:
Got pulled on the far side of woodhead near barnsley the other week, insisted on me going over the weighbride even though i was pulling an empty flat bed, nobs
did you tell them you were pulling glider fuel?
How come vosa don’t have to work to the whole “innocent until proven guilty” thing? I got a £200 fine for not carrying my paper charts with me, ok I know the rules and was committing an offence by not carrying them but £200!? Then the guy parks me up for 45hrs because I can’t prove I’ve had adequate weekly rest! Fact is though, he couldn’t prove that I hadn’t! I think a £60 fine for the original offence and a further £200 if I failed to produce them by a certain date wouldve been fairer.
all I’d done was forgotten to pick them up when I left home that morning, I had nothing to hide.
darkseeker:
How come vosa don’t have to work to the whole “innocent until proven guilty” thing? I got a £200 fine for not carrying my paper charts with me, ok I know the rules and was committing an offence by not carrying them but £200!? Then the guy parks me up for 45hrs because I can’t prove I’ve had adequate weekly rest! Fact is though, he couldn’t prove that I hadn’t! I think a £60 fine for the original offence and a further £200 if I failed to produce them by a certain date wouldve been fairer.all I’d done was forgotten to pick them up when I left home that morning, I had nothing to hide.
Fool, hand them your digi tacho… no mention of analogue tacho’s 
Tried that, it was when he got me to get my timesheets faxed to him it all went pear shaped; that’s not on here, that’s not, or that…
i’ve worked for one particularly well known company who used their units for shunting at night i.e shunter would take the unit and trailer to the warehouse load it and park it up then jump in the next unit and do the same, all units showed a “driving without card” warning in the morning, this was five days a week every week, the company seemed to think this was fine but where does that leave the driver if he gets a pull?
Just an observation. VOSA bods use a laptop to record your responses to their questions, and I have known them to be less that thorough when they type the answers in. They sometimes miss little bits off your responses so it actually makes you look worse.
I got stopped at Wylie with a tanker. A law officer leapt out and waved me in. The result was that the tank was swaying well by the time I got in there. The examiner didn’t let me sit at all, just gestured me across, then ordered me to park up because I was 1100kgs over. I asked to reweigh and he refused. When he took my statement he omitted that I had asked to reweigh, omitted that I had stated I was allowed to reweigh, omitted that I had said the tank was moving, omitted that he had said the movement of the liquid could easily make the difference between under 1 tonne over and beyond 1 tonne over.
I flatly refused to answer anything else or sign anything until he put the whole truth down. In the end he did, so VOSA had to throw the case out because he had not followed the proper procedure.
Some of them are jobsworth enough to think they can abbreviate the truth to suit their aims. DO NOT LET THEM!! If you had explained in a reasonable manner, then make sure everything is written down. They tend to make more mistakes than we do and those mistakes will bite them in the ■■■.
Personally, I think I would be inclined to use the voice recorder for any stops in the UK. As long as you tell the examiner or copper that you are going to record it, I think they will be more understanding and less foolish.
Just remember that these ■■■■■ are not police officers. Although they can hand out ‘fines’ don’t be pushed around. Tell then that due to being screwed around in the past, you would like to record the convo in case of a repeat incident.
I’d also keep something in the cab that points out some rights (Right of re-weigh etc).
To be honest, if VOSA told me to park up for 45 hours, I’d leave the wagon in the check point and ■■■■ off. Im not allowed to move it afterall.
i think appealing to the same person is 'king mental but just in case i’m wrong i’ll seek a second opinion… yes i agree it is stupid
darkseeker:
Tried that, it was when he got me to get my timesheets faxed to him it all went pear shaped; that’s not on here, that’s not, or that…
Do you have to keep timesheets by law? I do them but don’t fill all the on site/off site stuff if I’m on turnaround or working on inter-company jobs, and I don’t record POAs, except for switching tacho over…
I am waiting to see what happens if or when i get pulled because my truck seems to get used as the night shunter for loading trailers.
Some nights it can clock up 10kms around the yard all without a digi-card in.None of the night loaders and weekend loaders have a Hgv licence and we have no yard card either.Having raised the point with my TM she just said thats its fine dont worry about but i"m far from sure wait and see i suppose
Maybe you should write to the Traffic Commisioner about it. Raise the issue of the examiner and state clearly that you tried to explain the situation but that the examiner was not interested. Also ask what the next step is beyond the TC because you feel that they need to explain their heavy handed, Stalin-like attitudes to drivers.
Point out that, as far as you know, you are innocent until proven guilty.
See it isn’t only you. The O licence holder is going to get it in the neck, too.
I thought that with a FPN you were innocent until you chose to pay it, thereby admitting your guilt.
Of course you are encouraged to do just this in order to reduce the fine.
Just had a thought that some bright lawyer type could go to the top court in the land and suggest that encouraging you to plead guilty by paying the FPN when you are innocent of the offence, that this could be construed as “perverting the course of justice”.
paul b:
i’ve worked for one particularly well known company who used their units for shunting at night i.e shunter would take the unit and trailer to the warehouse load it and park it up then jump in the next unit and do the same, all units showed a “driving without card” warning in the morning, this was five days a week every week, the company seemed to think this was fine but where does that leave the driver if he gets a pull?
No problem for the driver. The times of the driving without card will show as outside the driver’s shift. Almost every time I get into my unit in the yard it shows driving without card as the units are parked three deep and someone will have to move a couple to to get theirs out.
bigben:
on a recent visit to a vosa checkpoint (not my idea)i was found to have moved my lorry 2 km without my tacho recording,pointing out to the operative that i had mistakenly forgot to close my tacho and had filled my card in the night before the mileage was the same so was not trying to cover any work,but the missing time was whilst searching docks for my trailer.
Yeah right. Quite how you can miss it when its directly in front of you and on some wagons such as Scanias you can’t even turn the wheel more than slightly without it getting in the way is beyond me.