Tachograph Infringements Explained: A Guide for UK Transport Managers

What is a tachograph infringement?

GOV.UK’s assimilated rules (opens in a new tab) and the shorter drivers’ hours summary (opens in a new tab) are the working explanation for in-scope goods vehicles and combinations over 3.5 tonnes. The tachograph is the record. An infringement is what the analysis shows when that record does not meet the limit.

Common tachograph infringements

Most findings that reach a transport manager’s desk fall into a few groups. The names differ between analysis systems. The rule behind them does not.

• Too much driving in a stretch, a day, a week, or two weeks.
• A break that is too short, too late, or split in the wrong order.
• Daily rest under 11 hours when a reduced rest was not available, or a reduced rest used too often.
• Weekly rest under 45 hours without a valid reduction and compensation.
• Driving with no card, or a gap that was never explained by a manual entry.

A mode switch left on the wrong symbol can make rest look like other work, or other work look like a break. That is a record problem until someone has compared it with the job. It becomes an infringement if the true activity still breaches a limit. Example: a driver takes 45 minutes at a site but leaves the mode on other work. The trace shows no break. If they had in fact stopped, the fix is the record and a briefing. If they had kept working, the break infringement stands.

Driving time infringements

For the ordinary assimilated goods operation, daily driving must not exceed 9 hours. It may be extended to 10 hours no more than twice in a week. Weekly driving must not exceed 56 hours. Driving in any two consecutive weeks must not exceed 90 hours.

A daily-driving infringement is not “a long day”. It is driving past 9 hours when both 10-hour extensions that week are already used, or past 10 hours at all. A fortnightly infringement can appear even when every single day looked legal, because 56 hours one week and 56 the next is 112, and the two-week cap is 90.

Break infringements

After no more than 4 hours 30 minutes of driving, the driver must take a break or breaks totalling at least 45 minutes. When the break is split, the first part must be at least 15 minutes and the second at least 30 minutes, in that order. A 30-minute break followed by 15 minutes does not meet the split.

Other work is not a break. A stop recorded as availability or other work, because the mode was wrong, will not count. The 45 minutes is a break from driving under these rules. It is not the working-time break, which is a different duty and a different clock.

Daily rest infringements

A driver must take a daily rest within each period of 24 hours after the end of the previous daily or weekly rest. A regular daily rest is at least 11 continuous hours. It may be reduced to 9 continuous hours up to 3 times between weekly rests.

A regular daily rest may also be split into two periods, the first at least 3 hours and the second at least 9 hours. The second period is the longer one. Taking 9 hours first and 3 hours later is not that split. A fourth reduced daily rest between weekly rests is an infringement even if each of those rests was 9 hours.

Weekly rest infringements

A weekly rest must start no later than the end of six consecutive 24-hour periods from the end of the previous weekly rest. A regular weekly rest is at least 45 hours. In any two consecutive weeks the driver must have at least two weekly rests, one of which is at least 45 hours. The other may be a reduced weekly rest of at least 24 hours.

A reduced weekly rest must be compensated by an equivalent period of rest taken in one block before the end of the third week following the week in question, attached to another rest of at least 9 hours. Compensation left until the fourth week, or taken as several short pieces, does not meet that rule. Some international goods journeys allow two consecutive reduced weekly rests in limited circumstances. Those conditions are on GOV.UK (opens in a new tab). They are not the ordinary UK week.

Missing data and manual entry problems

The card and the vehicle unit only record what they were told. A day with no trace can be a rest, a vehicle off the road, a card left in another cab, or driving without a card. Until someone has looked, it is only a gap.

Where the driver did other work, or drove a vehicle out of scope, the assimilated rules require that activity to be recorded. On a digital tachograph that is a manual entry. A manual entry that does not match the job, or a gap with no entry at all, is a record failure. It may also hide a driving or rest infringement. GOV.UK’s tachograph rules (opens in a new tab) require operators to download the driver card at least every 28 days and the vehicle unit at least every 90 days, and to analyse the data. An earlier download is needed when waiting would lose data.

Do not mix these with GB domestic rules

GB domestic drivers’ hours are a different set of rules. The domestic guidance (opens in a new tab) limits driving to 10 hours in a working day and duty to 11 hours. It does not copy the 4.5-hour break or the 9-hour assimilated driving limit. Breaks and rest under domestic work come from the duty to give adequate rest under the Working Time Regulations, not from the tachograph break rule above.

Where an operator-licence goods vehicle is driven for more than 4 hours in a day under the domestic rules, the driver must keep a written weekly record, and the operator is expected to check and sign it. Analysing that week as if it were an assimilated tachograph week will invent infringements the domestic rules do not contain, and miss the duty limit they do contain.

Working time is a third limit again: overall work, not driving. A driver can be inside the driving limit and outside working time. HGV drivers’ hours rules sets the three regimes apart. Retention is on drivers’ hours and working time records.

What should a transport manager do when an infringement occurs?

The finding is the start. The transport manager’s record is what happened next. A printout in a tray is not an investigation.

1. 1DetectThe analysis names the rule, the driver and the day.
2. 2InvestigateCompare the trace with the job, the mode switch and any manual entry.
3. 3DiscussTell the driver what was found, and hear what the day actually was.
4. 4Record the explanationWrite whether it was a mistake, a wrong mode, or a real breach.
5. 5Correct or trainChange the schedule or the briefing. A repeat needs more than another conversation.
6. 6MonitorLook for the same rule and the same driver next month.

That review belongs in the wider monthly compliance checklist. One infringement can be a mistake. The same one next month is a system.

Is signing an infringement enough?

No. A signature, a letter, or a digital acknowledgement shows the driver was shown the finding. It does not show that the planner changed the shift, that the mode error was explained, or that the same reduced rest stopped.

The goods vehicle operator licensing guide expects the transport manager to make sure drivers follow drivers’ hours rules and that records are handed back and inspected. A file of signed printouts, with the same breach every week, is evidence the letters were produced. It is weak evidence that anyone managed the operation. Keep the signature. Keep the action next to it.

Repeat infringements

Count the rule, not only the driver. Three different drivers with a break split the wrong way is a briefing problem. One driver with insufficient daily rest in three of the last eight weeks is a scheduling problem, even if each week was signed.

Write the pattern down: who, which rule, how many times, what changed, and the date you will look again. “Monitor” is not an action. If the pattern is still there, the action was not enough.

What records should be retained?

The operator licensing guide (opens in a new tab) says keep drivers’ hours records for at least 12 months. That is separate from the 15-month maintenance figure and the 24-month working-time figure. What records a transport manager should keep sets the periods side by side.

Keep the infringement, the driver’s explanation, the letter or acknowledgement, and what you did about a repeat, for at least as long as the hours record it belongs to. A letter with no analysis, or an analysis with no letter, is half the file. The summary is on tachograph records.

Tachograph analysis software

You can analyse by reading charts and printouts. That still works for a very small operation if every file is opened and the same questions are asked. It fails when the download sits in a folder and the only output is a pile of letters nobody compares with last month.

Software does not decide the rule. It applies the ruleset you select to the file you uploaded, and it keeps the finding next to the driver. You still investigate a mode error and a real breach differently.

The overview shows drivers with infringements and overdue card and vehicle-unit downloads. An empty day is not always a missing file. You can enter a manual day. A later .ddd for the same driver and date replaces it. Reports include driver infringements, missing days, last readings and infringement letters. A letter can be printed, sent to the driver app for a digital signature, or stored as a scanned wet-ink copy. A manager can sign the report off. Signed findings stay out of the next report unless you choose to include them again. FleetPro does not email you for every new infringement. The driver-facing step is the letter and the sign-off. More of the module is on tachograph compliance.

Practical monthly tachograph checklist

Tick a line when you have looked at the evidence, not when the software has a menu for it.

Common questions

What counts as a tachograph infringement?

A breach of the assimilated drivers’ hours rules the record shows: driving, breaks, daily rest or weekly rest, or driving without a card. A working-time breach and a GB domestic breach are different findings.

Who is responsible?

The driver, for the duty they drove. The operator and the transport manager, for a system that downloads the data, analyses it, and deals with what it finds.

Can a company be prosecuted for a driver’s infringement?

The driver can be. The operator can also be held responsible where the failure is the system: no analysis, no follow-up, or the same breach allowed to continue. A single driver mistake is not automatically a company prosecution. A pile of signed letters with no change can be evidence against the operator.

How long should tachograph records be retained?

Drivers’ hours records, including the downloads and the analysis, for at least 12 months. Working-time records are a separate 24-month duty. Do not use the 15-month maintenance period for this file.

What should a transport manager do with infringements?

Investigate, speak to the driver, record the explanation, correct or train, and look for the same infringement again. File the signature with that action.

Can tachograph analysis be automated?

The file can be uploaded and the rules applied by software. The investigation and the decision are still the transport manager’s. Automation does not sign the infringement off for you.

Keep the finding with the action

The useful record is the infringement, the driver’s account, and what changed afterwards, on the same driver as the download. A letter with no analysis, or an analysis nobody opens, does not show effective management.

You can look at tachograph analysis on a trial if that module is part of the package you open. No card is taken. When the trial ends, features lock until you speak with us. Start at organisation setup. What each package includes is on pricing.