The Spanish department responsible for transport has published its National Control Plan for 2020. It provides for increased inspections of tachographs and driving and rest periods. The Spanish will also carry out checks on the equipment recording working time without stopping vehicles. The services will also focus on identifying ‘letterbox companies’.
The National Control Plan for the road transport sector for next year has been approved by the Spanish government and will enter into force on 1 January. As every year, the services will focus on tachograph manipulation and working and rest times of drivers. The aim is to exclude unfair competition and the risks posed by overtired drivers from the market. To this end, officers will be able to use equipment allowing them to check tachographs remotely.
According to the Ministry of Development, the competent authorities have been equipped with mobile roadside control tools enabling detection of possible manipulation of smart tachographs without stopping the vehicle, according to the talleres-dtcoplus.com portal.
The services will also focus on the control of working time, in line with Directive 2006/22/EC and Regulation 561/2006, which set the minimum number of working days to be checked. This act requires the control of at least 3% of the working hours performed by drivers on the territory of the country. Half of these inspections will take place randomly on the roads and a half at the company headquarters. First of all, officers will control companies that carry out international transport and those that have already committed offences.
In addition, Spain wants to fight against the relocation of companies, the so-called ‘letterboxes’. Therefore, they will also focus on the inspection of foreign trucks, especially those with semi-trailers registered in Spain, informs the transport association Atfrie.
Broader-scale remote inspections in Germany
The Federal Office for Goods Transport (BAG) carries out remote tachograph inspections on a mobile basis – from police cars – but is also preparing equipment for stationary inspections. Appropriate technology is under preparation and will be installed on toll collection columns and gantries. We are talking about DSRC readers that would retrieve data from tachographs of vehicles passing under a gantry or next to a column. This data will then be passed on to the nearby BAG inspectors and a decision will be made on whether to inspect the vehicle.
Such a system brings benefits for both the services and the drivers. BAG will be able to operate more efficiently and truckers will avoid random checks and the resulting loss of time. Which data will BAG read remotely?
As BAG explained, it is not technically possible to check wirelessly the working and rest times recorded in a tachograph. According to Article 9(4) of Regulation (EU) No 165/2014 of the European Parliament and of the Council on tachographs in road transport, only data necessary for targeted roadside checks of vehicles for which the tachograph has been manipulated or misused may be transmitted remotely.
They must relate to specific recorded events or data such as:
– the last attempt at a security breach,
– the longest power outage,
– sensor malfunction,
– speed or route data error,
– data conflict associated with the movement of the vehicle,
– driving without a valid card,
– inserting a card while driving,
– time settings data,
– calibration data (including the dates of the last two calibrations),
– vehicle registration number,
– the speed recorded by the tachograph.
Photo: Trans.INFO