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Your drivers' tachograph data could be an invaluable fleet-management aid — if you have the tools to analyse the
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information Sharon Clancy reports.
What do digital tachographs have to do with telematics? Well, for once, a system designed to record legal :ompliance — in this case drivers' hours rules — an actually deliver operational benefits.
Tclematics rely on data. So. once the drivers' lours and working time data has been :aptured digitally or converted to digital 'ormat, it can be exported and used by other leet-mana2ement systems from traffic and oad scheduling to payroll.
Using up-to-date data reduces the risk of iccidental breaches of drivers' hours regulaions, either by employed or agency drivers. ['hat means downloading more regularly than he law requires, but the benefit is better ilanning, with less risk of drivers running out 4 hours on a given nin.To get a full picture of ictivities,you must include the data from both the in-vehicle tachographs and from the drivers' smart cards or charts. Drivers may be operating vehicles with both types of tachographs, in which case the all-important hours data will he stored in two places.
Digital format
However, scanners that read the chart and convert the information into digital format are now widely available. And Actia's D-Box download tool, for example, can be used to check instantly the hours status of agency and temporary drivers via the driver smart card (see panel, below).
-The key benefit is to protect the fleet operator from being exposed to the risk of prosecution by inadvertently hiring drivers who have not rested sufficiently, or are who are close to their maximum driving hours and will potentially be in contravention during the contracted working period," says marketing director Mike Oliver.
Some of the more sophisticated tachograph software can also provide a degree of fleet management information.The vehicle activity reports available on the web-based Tachomaster, for example (see panel, opposite), include the total time the vehicle was moving and the average duty completed per day. giving some useful vehicle utilisation information. If the vehicle has been driven less than four or six hours, it is flagged up.
The three leading tachograph manufacturers all supply devices that can download the data from any make of digital tachograph. Most will also read drivers smart cards, and there are devices that allow drivers to download the data from their own cards. If plugging in to download the data from the tachograph seems a little old-fashioned in these days of wireless data, remember that the manufacturers are constrained by detailed technical specifications laid down in European law for digital tachographs. drawn up in the I990s.Storage of digital data in its original Format is required by law, points out Tachodisc, as original data records are time-stamped.
Wireless
However, 2(X)8 will see more products on the market that can download the data and then wirelessly send it back to the depot, a website or a central office. making it even easier to integrate tachograph data into fleet management systems. Here we outline some of the top tachograph products and the operational benefits they could bring. •