The Working Time Directive for HGV Drivers

Drivers often think the drivers' hours rules are the only thing limiting their week. They are not. Sitting alongside them is a second, separate set of limits: the Working Time rules. Where drivers' hours cap your time at the wheel, the Working Time rules cap your total working time, including all the loading, waiting and paperwork that fills a shift. You have to comply with both, so understanding the difference matters.

Where these rules come from

For HGV drivers, the working time limits are delivered through the Road Transport (Working Time) Regulations 2005, which implement the EU Road Transport Directive for mobile workers. They apply to drivers and crew whose work is covered by the EU drivers' hours rules. If you run under those hours rules, you are almost certainly a "mobile worker" caught by these regulations too.

What counts as working time

This is the crucial distinction. Working time is more than driving:

• Driving: all your time at the wheel.
• Other work: loading, unloading, cleaning, technical checks, helping passengers, paperwork.
• Time at the workstation where you have to be available and cannot use the time freely.

What does not count is a genuine period of availability (POA): time when you know in advance you will be waiting and how long for, such as an expected ferry crossing or a scheduled wait at a delivery point, provided you can dispose of the time as you wish even if you must stay near the vehicle. Breaks and rest do not count as working time either. Using POA correctly on your tachograph is what keeps your working time down, so it is worth understanding.

The core limits

The 48-hour average, and no opt-out

Your working time has to average no more than 48 hours a week across the reference period, normally 17 weeks. This is different from the general Working Time Regulations that most UK workers know, because mobile workers in road transport cannot use the individual 48-hour opt-out. You cannot sign a form to work beyond the average. The 60-hour figure is a single-week ceiling, not a target; string too many 60-hour weeks together and your 17-week average breaches the 48.

Night work

If any of your work falls in the night period, your working time is limited to 10 hours in each 24-hour period. For goods vehicles the night period is midnight to 4am (an agreement can shift it to 1am to 5am). A collective or workforce agreement can lift the 10-hour cap, but without one it applies. Trunk and night-trunk drivers in particular need to keep an eye on this.

Breaks under the Working Time rules

The Working Time rules add their own break requirement, separate from the drivers' hours 45-minute break. You cannot work more than 6 hours without a break. The break rules are:

• At least 30 minutes if you work between 6 and 9 hours in total.
• At least 45 minutes if you work more than 9 hours.
• Breaks can be split into periods of at least 15 minutes each.

In practice, if you are taking your drivers' hours breaks correctly you will usually satisfy the working time break too, but they are legally distinct requirements.

How it interacts with drivers' hours

The two systems overlap but measure different things. A day can be legal on driving hours and still breach working time, most commonly on the 48-hour average or the night limit. The classic trap is a run of long weeks: your daily driving never breaks the 9 or 10 hour limit, but weeks of 55 to 60 hours of total work pull your 17-week average over 48. Track both.

Keeping records

Working time records are your responsibility as much as your employer's. Your tachograph data feeds the calculation, and correct use of POA versus other work directly changes your totals. If you work for more than one employer or agency in a reference period, you must tell each of them in writing about the hours you have worked elsewhere, because your 48-hour average is calculated across all of it, not per employer.

The takeaway

Think of it as two speed limits on the same road. Drivers' hours cap the driving; Working Time caps the whole shift and the whole 17 weeks. Use POA properly, respect the night limit if you work through the small hours, and watch your rolling average rather than just today's total. Stay inside both and you are fully compliant.