Drivers' hours rules catch more vans than people expect

Ask a van driver about drivers' hours and you will usually be told it does not apply to them. Sometimes that is right. Often it is right for the wrong reason, which means it stops being right the moment the job changes.

There are two sets of rules, not one

The EU and retained rules, enforced with a tachograph, are the ones everyone pictures. They bite on heavier vehicles and on most passenger carrying work, and they bring daily and weekly driving limits, mandatory breaks and rest periods.

The GB domestic rules are the ones people forget. They are simpler, they need no tachograph, and they apply to a broad slice of goods vehicle work that falls outside the first set.

Assuming you are exempt because you have no tachograph is the mistake. The absence of a tachograph is a consequence of which set you are in, not evidence that neither applies.

What the domestic rules actually impose

They are less demanding than the tachograph regime and are still real obligations. They limit the time spent driving in a day, and they limit the total duty time, which is a broader thing than driving: loading, waiting and paperwork can count.

That second limit is the one that surprises trades. A day with four hours of driving and eight hours on site is a long duty day even though the driving component looks modest.

Record keeping is required, and the record is the employer's responsibility as well as the driver's.

Where the boundary sits, and why it moves

The line between the two regimes depends on vehicle weight, on what is being carried and why, and on the nature of the work. Several exemptions exist for specific trades and for vehicles used within a limited radius.

The reason this matters practically is that the boundary is a property of the job, not of the van. The same vehicle and the same driver can be inside the rules on Tuesday and outside them on Wednesday, because the work changed. A business that decided once, years ago, that the rules did not apply is relying on an answer to a question nobody has re-asked.

Why this sits next to mileage

Because the underlying data is the same, and most people are already collecting half of it.

Drivers' hours are about time: when driving started, when it stopped, how long the breaks were. Mileage claims are about distance and purpose. Both are derived from the same set of journeys, and both fail in the same way, which is being reconstructed afterwards from memory.

A record made as the driving happens answers both questions. A record written up on Friday answers neither convincingly. If you are in scope of the domestic rules, a trip log with real start and stop times is a considerably better starting point than a diary.

Worth checking, once, properly

• Which regime the work falls under, by weight and by what is carried
• Whether that answer still holds for the jobs you took on this year
• Whether duty time, not just driving time, is being tracked
• Who is responsible for keeping the record, and where it is kept

None of this is exotic, and none of it is expensive to get right. It is simply a question most small operators answered once and never revisited.

Sources

• Drivers' hours (GOV.UK)
• Drivers' hours: GB domestic rules (GOV.UK)
• Annex 6: vehicle maintenance, safety and security (The Highway Code)

General information, not legal advice. Which regime applies depends on your vehicle and your work: check GOV.UK or ask the DVSA.