It happened on the M6, somewhere south of Stafford, on a Thursday night. Late run, light trailer, nearly empty motorway — and then the tacho display went dark. Just stopped. No mode symbols, no activity recording, nothing. And I sat there for a moment genuinely unsure what I was supposed to do. I knew you wrote it down. I did not know what, exactly, or on what, or where it had to live afterwards.
If you've been in the cab long enough, this has either happened to you or it will. The device fails. Sometimes dramatically, sometimes it just quietly stops. And you're suddenly facing a question most drivers have never properly thought through, because nobody covers it until you actually need it.
So here's the full procedure, from Article 37 of Regulation 165/2014 and gov.uk Section 4 guidance. Nothing speculative, nothing reconstructed from what I vaguely remembered at the time.
What the manual record actually has to contain
When the tachograph malfunctions, you're required to manually record your activity for any period the device isn't capturing. You do this on a record sheet: on an analogue chart if your vehicle uses them, or on a temporary sheet that you then attach to or store with your driver card if you're on a digital unit.
The record must include:
- Your name
- Your driver card number (or your driving licence number if your card is inaccessible for any reason)
- A signature
- Details of the periods the device is no longer recording
Those details of the periods matter more than most people realise. Not just "tacho broke at 22:47." You need to record what you were actually doing during each period: driving, other work, rest, or availability. The mode symbols that the tacho normally captures automatically? You're tracking those manually now. The device failing doesn't pause your obligations under 561/2006. It just moves the recording from the device to your handwriting.
Think of it this way. The tacho is your witness. When the witness goes offline, you write the statement yourself. And the same standard for accuracy applies.
Where the record sheet lives, and this part matters
If you're on a digital tacho and don't have analogue charts in the cab, you need a piece of paper: a temporary sheet. Write the required information on it. Then store it with your driver card or physically attach it to the card.
Not left in the cab somewhere. Not photographed and emailed in at some later point. With the card, or attached to it, so that if DVSA stop you near Carlisle or on the A5 outside DIRFT, everything's in one place and you can produce it immediately. The manual record travels with the card.
This is where people get it slightly wrong. They write everything down carefully, which is exactly right, and then tuck the paper in the map pocket and forget about it. The paper needs to be with the card. That's the requirement.
If the device is only partially working, take the printout
Not every malfunction is total. Sometimes the display goes down but the printer still works. Sometimes the recording is intermittent. Sometimes you get error codes but the unit's still partially functional.
If the device has printout capability and is partially working, take a printout. Then annotate it manually: note the time the fault started, what you were doing when it occurred, and sign it. A timestamped printout with clear handwritten annotations and a signature is more convincing evidence than a blank sheet with reconstructed times written in afterwards. It shows the exact point the device failed, with your own record of what happened from that point on.
The printout and your manual annotations together form the record for that period. Don't choose one or the other if you can have both. Take the printout, write on it, sign it, store it with your card.
Tell your operator. Not at the end of the trip.
You're required to report the malfunction to your transport undertaking as soon as circumstances permit. Not at the end of the run when you hand the keys over. Not "I'll mention it Monday." As soon as you reasonably can. In practice that means phoning in or messaging your transport office when you stop for a break, not making a mental note to bring it up eventually.
Why does the timing matter? Because the repair obligation falls on the operator, not the driver. And that repair obligation has a specific time limit — the one-week rule — that catches out a surprising number of operators who think the fix can wait.
The one-week repair rule, which most people haven't heard of
Here's the rule from Regulation 165/2014. The transport undertaking must repair the tachograph as soon as circumstances permit by an approved fitter or workshop. That's the baseline. But underneath it, there's a harder deadline.
If the vehicle cannot return to the operator's base within one week of the breakdown, repair must be completed while the vehicle is in operation. En route. At an approved tachograph workshop wherever the vehicle happens to be, whether that's near Immingham, somewhere on the M6, or Carlisle industrial estate.
One week. Not when a service slot comes up. Not when it comes back in for its next check. If the vehicle genuinely cannot get back to its operating base within seven days of the fault, the operator needs to find an approved repairer and get the work done on the road.
This catches operators out more than almost anything else in this area. I've seen vehicles running on manual records for two, three weeks because the transport manager thought it could wait until the vehicle came back in. It can't, not when the one-week deadline applies. The rule exists precisely for the tramping vehicle or the long-haul unit that's working the country and won't see home base for a while.
If your tacho packs up on day two of a five-day run based out of Birmingham, your operator needs to think about a repair on the road. Not in a week. Depending on the timelines, possibly urgently. The one-week rule is the ceiling, not the target.
What counts as an approved fitter
It has to be an authorised tachograph centre. Not just any truck dealer, not a mobile mechanic who reckons he can sort it out. An approved fitter with the authorisation to calibrate, repair, and certify tachograph equipment. The reason isn't bureaucracy for its own sake. It's calibration: a device that's been worked on by an unauthorised person produces records of questionable legal reliability from the repair date onwards, and that creates problems downstream.
Your operator should have a list of approved centres or a relationship with a national repair network. Worth establishing that before a device fails, not during. If you're genuinely stuck and your operator doesn't know who covers the area you're in, DVSA can point you in the right direction. The network of approved centres is findable. It just takes a phone call.
Downloads don't stop because the tacho broke
The download schedule keeps running regardless of whether the device is working. Vehicle unit: at least every 90 days. Driver card: at least every 28 days. A malfunction doesn't pause either of those clocks, and missing a download deadline because the tacho was broken isn't a defence that holds up.
When the device is repaired and downloading happens, there'll be a gap in the electronic record: the period covered by your manual records instead of VU data. Those manual records need to be retained alongside the downloaded data. The temporary sheets, the annotated printouts — they're the compliance evidence for the malfunction period, and they stay relevant after the device is back up. Don't throw them away.
The 90-day VU and 28-day card download rules apply throughout the malfunction period. Get the device downloaded as soon as it's repaired if you're anywhere near the deadline.
Infringements during a manual record period still count
A broken tachograph is not a compliance holiday. Exceed your permitted drive time, miss a required break, short-change a rest during the manual recording period: it still counts as an infringement under 561. The same limits apply throughout. You're evidencing compliance by hand rather than electronically, but the obligations haven't changed.
This is where accuracy of manual records matters for you personally, not just for the operator's traffic commissioner returns. If DVSA query your hours for the malfunction period, careful timestamped records showing you stayed within the drive and rest limits give you something concrete to stand behind. Vague records, was driving, took a break, drove again, are much harder to defend when someone's asking specific questions about specific times on a specific day.
The full breakdown of what needs to be recorded and how the mode categories work is in the HGV tachograph rules guide.
Quick reference: when the tacho goes down
I'll put this in plain language because regulation text doesn't help much at 3am in a layby outside Carlisle.
- You don't have to stop immediately, but start recording manually right now, from the point of the fault
- Get paper. Write your name, your driver card number (or your driving licence number), and sign it
- Record what you're doing and when: driving, break, rest, other work. Note the times. Be specific about start and end
- If the device can produce a printout, take one. Write the time of the fault on it and sign it
- Call or message your operator as soon as you stop. This is a legal requirement, not just courtesy
- The one-week clock starts from the breakdown. If you won't be back at the operator's base within a week, they need to arrange a repair en route
- Store all manual records with your driver card or physically attached to it, not loose in the cab
That's the whole procedure. It's not complicated. It's just rarely explained to anyone before they actually need it.
What DVSA expect if they pull you over
If DVSA stop you and the tacho isn't recording, the first question is why. "It's broken and I've been keeping manual records" is a completely acceptable answer, assuming you have the manual records. Clean, accurate, signed records that show your mode activity and let them verify you've been within the drive, break, and rest rules. That's all they need to see to understand you've done the right thing.
DVSA understand that tachographs fail. It happens on every fleet eventually. What they don't accept is a driver with a broken tacho and nothing written down, or a manual record that falls apart under any scrutiny. The difference between a driver who's done the right thing and one who hasn't is usually right there in whether the paperwork exists and whether it's credible.
The honest truth is most of us have never practised manual recording before we need it. I knew the rough shape of it: name, card number, signature, mode symbols. But I'd never actually done it until that night on the M6 near Stafford. Doing it for the first time in a dark cab, tired, slightly stressed, is not ideal conditions for careful paperwork. Knowing the procedure before you need it is genuinely useful. Not glamorous. Just useful.
If you're tired of writing tacho infringements into a notebook, ShiftOwt tracks 561/WTD compliance automatically — £5.99/mo for drivers, agency pricing on request.