Tachograph fines and the most common breaches

Who pays – the company or the driver

This is the most common misunderstanding. Most tachograph obligations rest on the transport undertaking, not the driver – the company is responsible for the vehicle having a working recording device, for data being downloaded within the deadlines, and for work being organised so that driving and rest times can actually be observed.

The driver has their own responsibility for what happens behind the wheel – using their own card, switching activities correctly and taking breaks. Their breaches are dealt with as an offence, in a different regime from the company's administrative delicts.

In practice that means a single inspection can produce two sanctions at once – one for the driver at the roadside and another for the company after an inspection at the premises.

The Slovak rates as an illustration

In Slovakia, sanctions against an employer and a transport undertaking are set out in Section 37 of Act No 462/2007 Coll. on the organisation of working time in transport. The law divides them into three bands by seriousness.

Up to €663 – administrative failings, such as not instructing a driver on their duties when using a card, or failing to produce working-time records on request.

From €663 to €3,319 – operational breaches, typically driving with a non-functioning recording device or failing to ensure the data is copied from the device.

From €1,659 to €16,596 – the most serious band. It covers organising work in a way that prevents a driver from observing driving and rest times, failing to download data within the 90- and 28-day deadlines, destroying or falsifying data, and operating a vehicle without an approved recording device.

For a repeated breach, the law allows a fine of up to double the upper limit, with the original upper limit becoming the new floor. €16,596 can therefore become substantially more.

Why "organisation of work" is the most expensive item

Note where the law placed organisation of work – in the highest band, alongside falsifying data. That is not an accident.

If a dispatcher plans a route that simply cannot be completed without exceeding driving time, the breach was not caused by the driver but by the company. The law treats it that way too: the one sanctioned is the one who created the conditions, not the one who ended up in them.

The practical conclusion for a company is that an unrealistic schedule costs more than one missed deadline. This is precisely where it helps to know where the vehicles are and how long they have been on the road, so routes can be planned against reality rather than hope.

Fines abroad differ substantially

Each member state sets its own rates, so the same breach costs a different amount in every country. Slovak transport authorities warn about it directly: fines in some EU countries can be very high, even ruinous.

Some states add further consequences – impounding the vehicle until payment, or a deposit taken at the roadside. For a small firm with a single van abroad, the problem is not only the amount but the fact that the vehicle stops.

We deliberately do not quote figures country by country – they change and circulate in outdated versions. If you drive regularly to a particular state, verify its rates with a transport adviser.

What an inspection actually checks

At a roadside check the authorities may examine tachograph data for the day of the check and the preceding 56 days. It is not a snapshot of a single day – it is nearly two months of history.

That has two consequences. First, one breach cannot be "driven off" by behaving correctly today. Second, those 56 days also reveal gaps in the record – periods when a driver drove without a card or switched activities incorrectly.

An inspection at the premises goes further still – there it is also checked whether the company downloads data within the deadlines and retains it. Downloaded data must be kept for at least twelve months and be accessible either directly or remotely at the premises of the undertaking.

The most common breaches in practice

Exceeding 4.5 hours of driving without a break is the most frequent finding – typically when trying to push on to the unloading point.

A fourth reduction of daily rest between two weekly rest periods. Three are allowed, a fourth is not, and it is easily overlooked.

Forgotten compensation for a reduced weekly rest – it is taken in one of the following weeks, so the company forgets about it.

Incorrect switching of activities – time spent loading or on other work has to be recorded as other work, not left as rest.

Missed data downloads – the driver card after 28 days, the vehicle unit after 90. A missed deadline cannot be put right retrospectively.

A missing "out of scope" mode on a journey that does not fall under the regulation. Without that marking, an inspection may treat as a breach something that never happened.

How to reduce the risk

Most breaches are prevented by process, not by severity. A fixed download rhythm (cards on the first of the month, units once a quarter), one folder for DDD files with a backup, and a list of when each was last downloaded.

The second layer is planning. If you know where the vehicles are and how long they have been driving, you can set routes so the driver fits within the limits without improvising.

And, to be straight about it: GPS tracking replaces neither the tachograph nor its data. A GPS unit is not an approved recording device under Regulation (EU) No 165/2014. SaveTrack gives you a mileage log, position and the basis for planning; downloading and archiving tachograph data has to be handled separately.

The rates quoted come from the wording of Act No 462/2007 Coll. in force at the time of writing. Rates and rules change – verify the current wording, or consult a transport adviser, before acting on any of this.