YES,,,, tachos again

[delboy98]

interlog:
I would interpret it as follows:

1. You work less than 6 hrs - you don’t need a break

2. As soon as you have done 6 hrs, you will need a break. This break has to be 30 minutes as you will be working hours total between 6 and 9 hours a day, breaks totalling at least 30 minutes in total are required, e.g you will be working between 6 and 9 hrs.

3. As soon as you have worked 9 hrs, you will need to take an additional break of 15 minutes.

I suppose it is down to the interpretation of the law.

Mark

Exactly as I see it Not that I need to work to the WTD

[coffeeholic]

interlog:
I would interpret it as follows:

1. You work less than 6 hrs - you don’t need a break

Agreed

interlog:
2. As soon as you have done 6 hrs, you will need a break. This break has to be 30 minutes as you will be working hours total between 6 and 9 hours a day, breaks totalling at least 30 minutes in total are required, e.g you will be working between 6 and 9 hrs.

And here you are doing what a lot of people do when they want to make the regulations fit their interpretation, you are ignoring certain words because they don’t fit your interpretation. The same thing happens with the tacho rules. If it has to be a 30 minute break why is the word totalling in there? In your interpretation that word isn’t needed, it would just say a break of 30 minutes is required. It doesn’t say that, it says for a day that has working time of between 6 and 9 hours there must be breaks totalling at least 30 minutes in total. Note the word used is breaks, not break. The use of the plural shows that it can be more than one break. As the minimum as defined by point 4, which you also chose to leave off your interpretation for some reason, is 15 minutes, that means that when your working day is between 6 and 9 hours you can take either 1 x 30 minute break or 2 x 15 minute breaks, providing you don’t exceed 6 hours work without taking one of those breaks. If that wasn’t the case the word totalling would not be there and the word breaks would be replaced by break.

You say As soon as you have done 6 hrs, you will need a break. This break has to be 30 minutes
The regulations say breaks totalling at least 30 minutes in total are required.
See the difference? The regulations clearly say it can be more than one break - breaks totalling - while you are ignoring that bit and saying it must be one break.

interlog:
3. As soon as you have worked 9 hrs, you will need to take an additional break of 15 minutes.

No you won’t. If you have taken a break before exceeding 6 hours work why do you need another break just 3 hours later? The maximum amount of time you can work without a break is 6 hours, not 3. If you took a break before exceeding 6 hours work then you don’t need a further break until you have done another 6 hours work, which would be before you exceed 12 hours. Those times could vary depending at what time you took your first break. as it is unlikely to always be at exactly 6 hours work. If your work for the day will total between 9 and 12 hours Then a break to bring the total to the required 45 minutes needs to be taken during that period. If you are working for more than 12 hours then you could take a second 15 minute break at 12 hours and the third, and last one, in the period between 12 hours and when you finish.

interlog:
I suppose it is down to the interpretation of the law.

I suppose it is down to reading the regs properly before making that interpretation and noticing things like plurals of certain words.

[interlog]

Scenario:

You have worked 5 hrs, take a 15 minute break and when getting back on site after 7 hrs of work are told to go home.

Legal or would you need to take another 15 minute break?

Mark

[coffeeholic]

interlog:
Scenario:

You have worked 5 hrs, take a 15 minute break and when getting back on site after 7 hrs of work are told to go home.

Legal or would you need to take another 15 minute break?

You would need to take another 15 minute break, as your total work for the day is between 6 and 9 hours, then a couple of minutes work filling out your tacho, time sheet, getting your kit together, then clock off and head home. Doesn’t make much sense in that scenario but that’s the way the rules are written. Off course there is nothing to stop you taking a 30 minute break after the 5 hours in your scenario, thus avoiding the need for a break just before you go home, but there is no legal requirement to do so.

[delboy98]

Picture the scene…

Ive driven for 4 hours…
Unloaded and partially reloaded the trailer for the morning for 2 hours…
Take 15 minutes break…
Takes me a further 12 minutes to finnish reloading…
END OF SHIFT

So where would i take the other 15, if i need it to be totaling 30 minutes

[coffeeholic]

delboy98:
Picture the scene…

Ive driven for 4 hours…
Unloaded and partially reloaded the trailer for the morning for 2 hours…
Take 15 minutes break…
Takes me a further 12 minutes to finnish reloading…
END OF SHIFT

So where would i take the other 15, if i need it to be totaling 30 minutes

Another scenario that shows the craziness of the WTD regs, the same kind of scenarios can be conjured up for the tacho rules. As breaks separate periods of work you could take it after the 12 minutes of loading then be back to work for a couple of minutes as you complete your tacho or hand keys and paperwork back into the office, or even back for just a few seconds as you shut the trailer doors.

Of course the sensible thing to do, knowing that you would be finished reloading very shortly, would be to take 30 minutes instead of 15 after the 2 hours of loading and unloading. That is just the sensible thing though, not a legal requirement.

[delboy98]

Coffeeholic:

delboy98:
Picture the scene…

Ive driven for 4 hours…
Unloaded and partially reloaded the trailer for the morning for 2 hours…
Take 15 minutes break…
Takes me a further 12 minutes to finnish reloading…
END OF SHIFT

So where would i take the other 15, if i need it to be totaling 30 minutes

Another scenario that shows the craziness of the WTD regs, the same kind of scenarios can be conjured up for the tacho rules. As breaks separate periods of work you could take it after the 12 minutes of loading then be back to work for a couple of minutes as you complete your tacho or hand keys and paperwork back into the office, or even back for just a few seconds as you shut the trailer doors.

Of course the sensible thing to do, knowing that you would be finished reloading very shortly, would be to take 30 minutes instead of 15 after the 2 hours of loading and unloading. That is just the sensible thing though, not a legal requirement.

Im just testing the crazyness of the WTD(and your patence), Me personally, if i was to work under the WTD would be to just take the 30 mins in one hit and have done with it

[coffeeholic]

delboy98:
Im just testing the crazyness of the WTD

In that case we could be here all night.

delboy98:
(and your patence),

In that case we could be here all night, but we won’t be as I have to leave go to work at 03:45

delboy98:
Me personally, if i was to work under the WTD would be to just take the 30 mins in one hit and have done with it

Me personally, I just take the tacho breaks and if they don’t fit in with the WTD six hour rule then tough. They normally do though because I’m usually ready for a break or two before six hours work.

[delboy98]

Coffeeholic:
They normally do though because I’m usually ready for a break or two before six hours work.

You wouldnt last 6 hours without a Coffee anyway

[coffeeholic]

delboy98:

Coffeeholic:
They normally do though because I’m usually ready for a break or two before six hours work.

You wouldnt last 6 hours without a Coffee anyway

Flask

[teddy_0781]

as u say tough i thought the tacho break cancel,s the wtd break anyway so after 41/2 u would be ok anyway

[coffeeholic]

teddy_0781:
as u say tough i thought the tacho break cancel,s the wtd break anyway so after 41/2 u would be ok anyway

It does, but it could take you longer than six hours work to reach 4.5 hours driving, you could do a whole shift and not accumulate 4.5 hours driving in fact.

[paul_midway]

Stop it stop it stop it . Make life simple for yourselves

[conor]

Coffeeholic:
You don’t have to take 30 minutes per six hours work under the WTD.

Completely disagree with your interpretation that it can be split and so do the people running the training courses I went on.

It has always been in employment law pre WTD for everyone that a continuous 30 minute break had to be taken if an employee was working more than 4 hrs.

[coffeeholic]

Conor:
Completely disagree with your interpretation

It’s not just my interpretation, it is now also the view of people like the DfT.

Conor:
that it can be split and so do the people running the training courses I went on.

Depends when you went on the training courses. The interpretation has changed from what it was originally. If you can’t split it why is the option to do so in the regulations? If it can’t be split, then please explain to me these two quotes from the regulations.

Breaks totalling at least 30 minutes in total are required.

and

Breaks should be of at least 15 minutes duration.

Why does it say “breaks totalling at least 30 minutes” if you have to take one 30 minute break. “Breaks totalling” clearly means that there can be more than one break - breaks (plural) = more than one - so explain why those words are in the regulations if you must take one continuous 30 minute break.

Conor:
It has always been in employment law pre WTD for everyone that a continuous 30 minute break had to be taken if an employee was working more than 4 hrs.

Irrelevant, we are no longer pre WTD and the only rules regarding breaks for drivers pre WTD were the tacho rules. Under those rules there is no requirement to take a break at all during the day if you don’t exceed 4.5 hours of driving time.

It’s easy to say you disagree but you are not offering any evidence that it must be a continuous break, apart from stating that the people who gave you a training course said so. I’ve sat in on a couple of tacho training courses where the trainer gave totally wrong information, regarding rest on a ferry and split rest in one case, and admitted they were wrong when challenged about it. The people who do the training, or even enforce the law, aren’t always right, as was once proved on these very forums. At a recent assessment I took, with a major company, two of the multiple choice tacho questions did not actually have the correct answers as one of the multiple choices, that test had been devised by their training department.

Please point out to me where in the WTD regulations it states that the 30 minutes of break, required for a day with between 6 and 9 working hours must be continuous. I don’t mean personal interpretation of the break requirements, I mean where it states categorically that the break must be a continuous period of 30 minutes. Here’s a clue, it doesn’t, and for it to be a requirement it would need to state that. Not only does it not say that, it in fact clearly states that the period can be made up of more than one break, unless the meaning of the word breaks has also changed recently.

[delboy98]

Here we go again

Wheres that rope