How Long Should HGV Maintenance Records Be Kept?

Why maintenance records matter

The Guide to Maintaining Roadworthiness (opens in a new tab) is the starting point traffic commissioners use for whether maintenance arrangements are satisfactory. The goods vehicle operator licensing guide (opens in a new tab) says you must keep vehicle maintenance records for at least 15 months, and you must give traffic commissioners a copy if they ask. Keeping the file and being able to produce it are the same duty.

A maintenance investigation compares the dates on the sheets with the interval you declared. A missing inspection, a missing repair, or a brake result that is not with the sheet is the gap. A policy, or a blank template, is not that history. How to prepare for a DVSA visit describes that encounter. This page is how long each maintenance record is kept.

Which maintenance records should be kept?

The maintenance file is the safety inspection, the defects found on it or on the daily check, the assessment, the repair, the repairer, and the brake result that belongs with that inspection. A laden roller test taken up to 14 days before the inspection still belongs on that file, so the person inspecting can see it. Where a decelerometer is used instead, the risk assessment is kept with the maintenance documents for 15 months. Intermediate checks stay on the same file and are labelled as intermediate checks, not as a full inspection. A contractor’s written agreement is kept with the file. The forward planner shows the interval you declared, at least six months ahead. It is not a second archive, and it does not have its own retention period.

What the inspection itself contains is in HGV PMI inspections. The daily check, including why a nil report is not a defect sheet, is in HGV daily walkaround checks. Drivers’ hours, working time and licence checks are in what records a transport manager should keep.

Maintenance record retention table

Read the source before the number. Legal requirement means the cited guide says the record must be kept for that period. Official guidance means the guide recommends a period, or tells you to hold the document, without setting a month count. “No single period is set” is left blank on purpose.

The shorter notes on this site are safety inspection records, brake test records, defect and repair records and walkaround and defect reports.

The rows without a month count are the ones people most often force into 15 months. The contractor’s contract must be kept on file. The guide does not say “for 15 months” in that sentence. The current annual test certificate belongs with the vehicle. Old certificates are not given a filing period of their own, unless that test history is already part of the maintenance record, in which case the 15-month duty applies to the file, not to a separate MOT archive. The planner is how you show the next six months. Throwing last year’s wall chart away does not breach a retention rule the guides have not written. Keeping a nil-defect pad for 15 months is allowed. It is not required.

An owner-driver who has nobody else to hand a defect sheet to still records the defect and the repair and holds that record for at least 15 months. The absence of a transport office does not shorten the defect file. It also does not create a 15-month rule for the nil sheets.

What if a vehicle is sold?

The 15-month duty still belongs to the operator who had the vehicle. The guide says safety inspection records are kept for at least 15 months for all vehicles, including vehicles removed from the operator licence or sold or otherwise disposed of. Repair records go with that history. Electronic copies are included. Handing the lorry to the next owner does not hand them your duty to produce the file. A hired or borrowed vehicle is the same while it is in your possession: the inspections and defect reports from those days stay yours.

Where vehicles change ownership, the records, including digital ones, must still be available to the original operator for the period in the guide. A login that only the workshop can open, after the vehicle has left, is not available. If you suspend the inspection schedule because the vehicle is off the road for longer than the next inspection, the file should show that it was not in use. A blank gap is not the same thing as a recorded lay-up.

Can maintenance records be digital?

Yes. The guide’s general rule is that electronic records are acceptable when they contain the essential information and can be made available for examination. Electronic defect records must be available for 15 months along with the repair. A safety inspection report stored electronically means the paper original does not also have to be kept. The system should show a date and time, who carried out the check, and an audit trail. Easy access for the operator, and for an examiner, is part of having the record. A provider who cannot export the file on the day you are asked has not met that test.

Scanned paper is acceptable. Images and brake reports have to be easy to find by date and vehicle. The operator remains responsible for the data when a software provider holds it. Nothing in the guide stops you keeping a paper copy as well. The duty is to be able to produce one complete record, not to keep two that disagree.

What makes a good electronic maintenance record?

A date and time that cannot quietly be rewritten. A name for who inspected or who reported the defect. The items checked, or a clear statement of what the inspection covered. The defect, the assessment, the repair and the repairer on the same vehicle. The brake printout, or the written results where the equipment cannot print, attached to that inspection rather than stored in a separate folder nobody opens. Temperature readings, where a decelerometer was used, stay with that result. The risk assessment stays with the maintenance documents for the same 15 months.

More than one person must be able to open it, including when the person who usually runs the file is away. A photograph of a roller ticket on a phone, or a workshop message that never meets the sheet, is not the record the guide describes. The audit trail is the inspection, the defect, the repair and the return, in that order, on that asset. A safety-critical defect that was cleared in conversation, with no assessment on the file, is a missing record even if the vehicle is back at work.

What happens if records are missing?

The failure the guides describe is not being able to produce the sheet, the repair, or the brake result. A maintenance investigation compares inspection dates with the interval you declared. Examiners sample vehicle files. Where a prohibition was issued in the last 15 months, that vehicle’s file is one they expect to open: the defect, whether the driver should have seen it, and what changed afterwards. A traffic commissioner can ask for a copy of the vehicle maintenance records. The 15-month duty includes producing them, not only storing them somewhere one person can find.

A missing file is a gap in the system. It is not, by itself, a prediction of a public inquiry. What an examiner or a commissioner can do next is set out in how to prepare for a DVSA visit.

FleetPro digital maintenance records

Walkaround photos, nil defects, signatures and defect reports are on Checks, and on the same walkaround inside Core, Compliance and Complete. PMI dates are on the fleet packages. The inspections screen on the maintenance feature can mark a completed inspection fit for service, or not fit until repairs are done.

Inspection-sheet uploads, the year planner, the compliance hub and general document storage are on Compliance and Complete. They are not on Core, and they are not on Checks. Workshop is a separate package. It holds the digital PMI, brake-test evidence, repair records and its own fit-for-service outcome. It is not included in Core, Compliance or Complete.

FleetPro does not delete maintenance sheets after 15 months. The 12-month purge applies to DVLA licence-check rows, not to this file. You still choose how long a downloaded copy is kept. The product does not replace the duty to produce the record.

Maintenance record checklist

Questions operators ask

How long are HGV maintenance records kept?

At least 15 months. That is the safety inspection, the repair, the defect report with the assessment and the repairer, and the brake result kept with that file, including electronic records and vehicles you have sold or taken off the licence. You must produce a copy if a traffic commissioner asks.

Are nil-defect sheets kept for 15 months?

No. The guide recommends at least 3 months for nil-defect walkaround reports. That is official guidance. It is not the 15-month defect duty.

Do I still keep the file after the vehicle is sold?

Yes, for at least 15 months from the records the guide covers, including electronic copies. The next owner does not take that duty with the lorry.

Do digital copies count?

Yes, if they can be produced and contain the essential information. Once the electronic safety-inspection report is the record, the paper original does not also have to be kept. A photograph that never meets the vehicle file does not count as the attached brake report.

Is the MOT certificate kept for 15 months?

The guides do not give the certificate its own month count. Keep the current certificate with the vehicle. Test history that sits inside the maintenance file follows the 15-month duty already in the table.

You can open a trial and see walkaround records, and the document and inspection tools where the package includes them. No card is taken at the start. When the trial ends, features lock until you speak with us. Start at organisation setup. Package differences are on pricing.