A guide to safety inspection intervals
An inspection frequency would normally range between 4 to 13 weeks. See table
below for examples of operating conditions.
Operating Conditions Frequency.
A. Lightly loaded vehicles– easy operating conditions 13–6 weeks
B. General haulage–trunking 10–5 weeks
C. Arduous work–constant heavy loads
8–4 weeks D. Off road–difficult conditions 4 weeks
E. Vehicle 12 years or older 6 weeks41 of 112
Guide to maintaining roadworthiness
Experienced HGV vehicle operators
If you are an experienced operator, you are free to tailor these inspections to
suit the nature of your operations and vehicle characteristics. You may even
deploy more than one system across a fleet, where vehicles and the nature
of their work vary, even where one particular aspect of vehicles’ operations
require a greater inspection frequency than the whole vehicle fleet (see case
study 2). Systems will be judged primarily on their effectiveness in maintaining
roadworthiness.
It follows, therefore, that in order to maintain an inspection regime that is
sufficiently flexible to accommodate these changing criteria, it might be more
appropriate to adopt an inspection frequency determined by, for instance,
the vehicle’s mileage. However, if you modify your inspection schedule, it is
sensible to monitor the effect on roadworthiness on a monthly basis. If an
unacceptable increase in defects were seen then a change back to the original
schedule would be necessary.
The Vehicle Operator Licensing system (VOL) records a time based frequency
for both vehicles and trailers. Therefore, if a mileage-based frequency is
adopted, the expected maximum equivalent time-frequency should be entered
into the system (up to 13 weeks). Then ensure the mixed frequency box is
ticked on VOL to record that a varied inspection frequency is being used. This
same process should be used if a mixed time frequency is being used for
different vehicles or trailers on the fleet.
This is taken from the DVSA document, Burton Commercials offer fleet inspections no matter what the size of your fleet for mor information please click here
