I you work for an agency is the agency or the company you drive for resposible for recording your hours? Apart from the driver obviously.
Ta.
You both are. The agency should know as your employer, and you should know because they can’t be trusted.
Otherwise when they send you on a job which will take you over permitted hours, you’ll get done for it. The client doesn’t care, that’s why they went to the agency.
smoker:
You both are. The agency should know as your employer, and you should know because they can’t be trusted.
Otherwise when they send you on a job which will take you over permitted hours, you’ll get done for it. The client doesn’t care, that’s why they went to the agency.
The client does care - it’s his licence.
Are agencies responsable hours wise ? I thought it was the client.
Just the way some agencies ive worked for in the past really didnt give a damm or have a clue about drivers hours and take on staff for weekend work they know fine have a full time job during the week and don’t have the hours at the weekend.
I have to sign a form when I get to a client to say I understand Driver Reg’s and also to say that I have had my proper rest.So I guess that put’s it on the Driver, although no one has asked me for any Tacho’s.
It is mainly the responsibility of the transport undertaking to whose orders you were subject to in driving the vehicle as they are liable for any infringements committed by the driver. However, the agency also bear some responsibility, as it says in the regulations.
Undertakings, consignors, freight forwarders, tour operators, principal contractors, subcontractors and driver employment agencies shall ensure that contractually agreed transport time schedules respect this Regulation.
You also have a responsibility to ensure you remain within the rules and if you work for more than one transport undertaking a duty to inform each one of your hours worked.
One point to note is that agency drivers should return tachos to the transport company they were working for and not the agency. If they return them to the agency and they don’t pass them on to the transport company, or lose them, it is the driver who will be in trouble and not the agency. The driver by returning them to the agency and not the transport company is leaving themself open to a fine not exceeding level 4 on the standard scale, £2500.
Kenny1975:
Are agencies responsable hours wise ?
They have a certain responsibility yes.
Coffeeholic:
One point to note is that agency drivers should return tachos to the transport company they were working for and not the agency. If they return them to the agency and they don’t pass them on to the transport company, or lose them, it is the driver who will be in trouble and not the agency. The driver by returning them to the agency and not the transport company is leaving themself open to a fine not exceeding level 4 on the standard scale, £2500.
that could be very expenditure just imagine having to post the card to 28 different companies,
and if you do work for a lot of firms i would keep a record of where there are so you can post them to them
Seems to me its You and the Client who are responsible for keeping hours monitered, couple of clients recently have made me write down hours for previous week and sign it etc…Agency NEVER asks. 
I keep all tachos and print outs, as the client has a record of who has driven what vehicle on what day, so if a question is raised VOSA comes to me and bingo, there is my tacho/printout… Digi tachs are downloaded by the client anyway.
I ALWAYS take a printout daily on digi and keep that as a record…
To me its wrong when an Agency does not have any means for you to download your own card, I just download mine at any clients that will let me, to keep it clear. Though I think I really should buy my own stuff so its all stored on one file, ie MINE!!
Did an agency day and later a night shift,legal,with 9 off,bloody knakered though.Ran from Chippenham up to Liverpool,back down,sleep,then a night on the milk tankers.Got a brucie bonus,not!
Catalyst:
I you work for an agency is the agency or the company you drive for resposible for recording your hours? Apart from the driver obviously.
Ta.
Depends which hours you’re referring to, the transport undertaking and you are responsible for monitoring your activities for the drivers hours, the agency as your employer is responsible for tracking the 48 hour week for the WTD for mobile workers.
But that doesn’t negate your responsibility as the worker to keep within the law.
Coddy:
I just download mine at any clients that will let me, to keep it clear.
Downloading the card does not clear it, there is just a much information on it after download as there was before. Mine is downloaded weekly but the information on my card goes back about 10 months at the moment.
Coddy:
Though I think I really should buy my own stuff so its all stored on one file, ie MINE!!
Unless you are an O/D you have no responsibility to download the card so buying your own downloading equipment would be a waste of money really. Everything VOSA would want will be on the card as they will generally only go back 6 months, statute barred for hours offences is 6 months, and the card easily holds six months worth of data.
Coffeeholic:
Unless you are an O/D you have no responsibility to download the card so buying your own downloading equipment would be a waste of money really. Everything VOSA would want will be on the card as they will generally only go back 6 months, statute barred for hours offences is 6 months, and the card easily holds six months worth of data.
Forgive me asking, but why then do we have to download the card every 28 days, if it holds so much info anyway, or do we only download a ‘temp’ folder and cant access the ‘main’ folder on the cards■■?
Coddy:
Coffeeholic:
Unless you are an O/D you have no responsibility to download the card so buying your own downloading equipment would be a waste of money really. Everything VOSA would want will be on the card as they will generally only go back 6 months, statute barred for hours offences is 6 months, and the card easily holds six months worth of data.Forgive me asking, but why then do we have to download the card every 28 days, if it holds so much info anyway, or do we only download a ‘temp’ folder and cant access the ‘main’ folder on the cards■■?
i would say that its a standard there are many driver doing many jobs some will have a lot of data some will not have a little so there brought the 28 day thing as its the same as charts
Coddy:
Forgive me asking, but why then do we have to download the card every 28 days, if it holds so much info anyway, or do we only download a ‘temp’ folder and cant access the ‘main’ folder on the cards■■?
As part of their O Licence agreement the transport company have a responsibility to monitor drivers hours to ensure compliance with the regulations and if they aren’t downloading they cannot be doing that. Obviously if they don’t regularly download, any infringements could go undetected for months with no action being taken to rectify the problem. That is something the TC would take a dim view of.
The card is designed to hold a minimum of 28 days of data and presumably that’s why the legal time limit for downloading is 28 days.
Can’t really imagine what you would have to be doing to fill the cards memory chip in 28 days though.
Its like this:
The client is responsible for ensuring you’ve not broken drivers hours and for retaining charts once handed in up to 12 months.
You are responsible for not breaking hours and retaining the charts you’re required to (previous 28 days) and then getting them to the client.
The agency is responsible for ensuring you haven’t exceeded the hours you’re allowed to work under the WTD and recording those hours. Everyone you work for (who pays your wages, not the agency clients) must have a record of not just the hours you’ve worked for them but for anyone else you’ve worked for too in the calculation period so if you’ve work for 3 agencies simultaneously, they must all have a record of the sum hours you’ve worked in total for the lot.
Coddy:
Seems to me its You and the Client who are responsible for keeping hours monitered, couple of clients recently have made me write down hours for previous week and sign it etc…Agency NEVER asks.
The agency already knows how many hours you’re doing - if you want to get paid that is.
And as Coffeeholic said, downloading the card does not clear it, it just takes a copy of what’s on it. Same as this web page. Your web browser downloaded it but it didn’t remove it from the web server.
As I said in my original post, You and the agency are responsible for recording your hours. The client just checks to make sure you are legal to work at the time when you do the job for them. They don’t keep records of your hours for other firms, just hours done for them. They are covering their arses. So to hold a complete record of your hours, you have to do it. I’m on with 5 agencies. Each one knows about what I’ve done for them, but it’s up to me to tell them what I’ve done for the others.