Tachograph live alerts

Updated 4 months ago by Matt Childs

Introduction

This page doesn’t concern the Tachofresh features, this page is about a homemade feature.

The purpose of this page is to describe the meaning of tachograph live alerts, how it works and how it is possible to configure it.

This documentation is mainly functional.

To resume, a tacho notification is sent ONLY:

if the vehicle is in the company pool of vehicles
AND if it exists an alert registered with the alert type of the alert / infringement detected by the system
AND if it matches with the filters (severity, POI, etc.) of the alert registered

=> in this case, an alert is sent to the recipients of the alert registered using the correct channel (Mail, SMS, Push notification)

The tacho alerts are based on the European regulation.

Driving time, working time and rest are defined by the EU law.

Alert types available

The system could manage different types of alerts:

Exceeded driving alerts

Continuous driving
- The driver exceeded uninterrupted driving time of 4:30 hours before taking the legal break (45 minutes or 15+30 minutes).
- Based on driver shift.
Daily driving
- The driver exceeded daily driving time of 9h (or 10h if possibilities to extend is allowed).
- Based on driver shift.
Weekly driving:
- The driver exceeded weekly driving time of 56h per week.
- Based on calendar time.
Bi-Weekly driving:
- The driver exceeded biweekly driving time of 90h per 2 weeks.
- Based on calendar time.

Insufficient rest

Insufficient rest:
- The driver has insufficient daily rest (11h or 9h if reduced) or insufficient weekly rest (45h or 24h if reduced).
- Based on driver shift.

Exceeded working alerts

Continuous working:
- The driver exceeded uninterrupted working time of 6 hours before taking the legal break according to EU law.
- Based on driver shift.
Daily working:
- The driver exceeded daily working time according to EU law (10h).
- Based on driver shift.
Weekly working:
- The driver exceeded weekly working time according to EU law (60h).
- Based on calendar time.

Please note that activities already completed (e.g. other tasks) may shorten the possible driving time.

Example 1 :

If a driver works during 4 hours and don’t take a break
If he needs to drive, he can drive only for 30 min before taking a rest because he cannot work more than 6 hours and driving is considered as a work activity.

Example 2 :

If a driver drives during 4 hours and don’t take a break
If he needs to work, he can work only for 2 hours before taking a rest because he cannot work more than 6 hours.

Features available

Alert without severity management:
- Exceeded driving: Available
- Exceeded working: Available
- Insufficient rest: Available
- Card out: Not available yet
Filters
- Filter by severity:
  - Exceeded driving: Available
  - Exceeded working: Not available yet
  - Insufficient rest: Not available yet
- Filter by group: Not available yet
- Filter by day of week / hours: Not available yet
- Filter by POI: Not available yet
Channel
- Mail: Available
- SMS: Not available yet
- Push notification: Not available yet

General logic of detection of tacho alerts

Currently, our Masternaut system receives one tacho frame 4-12 per minute when the HGV is running.

To detect an infringement, the system uses a field in the tacho frame 4-12 named “timeRelatedStates”.

Some states are not used because there are some pre-alerts.

This field “timeRelatedStates” could have different states:

0 — no time-related warning detected - 0 is the normal state
1 — continuous driving time pre-warning active (15 min before 4h30)
2 — continuous driving time warning active (4h30 exceeded)
3 — daily driving time pre-warning active (daily driving time above 9 h or above maximum allowed daily driving time)
4 — daily driving time warning active (daily driving time above 9 h or above maximum allowed daily driving time)
5 — daily/weekly rest pre-warning active
6 — daily/weekly rest warning active
7 — weekly driving time pre-warning active
8 — weekly driving time warning active
9 — 2 weeks driving time pre-warning active
10 — 2 weeks driving time warning active
11 — driver 1 card expiry warning active
12 — next mandatory driver 1 card download warning active
13 — Working time warning active (6h)
14 — Daily working time warning active (10h)
15 — Weekly working time warning active (60h)
16 — Driving without card
17 — Driver Card inserted during weekly rest

This field could have only one state, if there is one or several infringement, it should be the most serious offense (the state closest to 0).

Important: The alert is based on the uninterrupted state of the timeRelatedStates and the severity. If there is a change of states, it could have more than 1 notification sent.

Example:

1 - A driver drives more than 4h30 and an alert is registered about the exceeded continuous driving time
2 - timeRelatedStates == 2
3 - A notification is sent.
4 - The driver do a short break and timeRelatedStates == 0
5 - The driver do a too short break and timeRelatedStates == 2
6 - A second notification is sent.

The technical solution is based mainly on 3 Masternaut components:

Paddington (existing component)
Tacho AS (Amazon Service)
BVFM Notification (Amazon Service)

Scheme of Tacho AS and BVFM Notification

The scenario of a creation is the following:

1 - The tachograph detect an infringement
2 - The M400 reads the information from the tachograph and change the timeRelatedStates field
3 - The frame is sent to to Paddington (Masternaut)
4 - The frame is treated by Tacho AS (Masternaut)
5 - The alert processing checks if an alert needs to be sent.

A tacho notification is sent:

if the vehicle is in the company pool of vehicles
AND if it exists an alert registered with the alert type of the alert / infringement detected by the system
AND if it matches with the filters (severity, POI, etc.) of the alert registered

=> in this case, Tacho AS is calling BVFM Notification with the different to send a notification

6 - Final result: BVFM Notification (Masternaut) send a notification to the recipients of the alert registered using the correct the channel (Mail, SMS, Push notification)

Filters

Filter by severity

In order not to send too many emails or to set up an escalation process, the alerts have different levels of severity before triggering an alert notification.

We use a standard classification for the severity management from the European Commision.

See this link for more information.

Generally, sanctions (fines, etc.) are linked to the severity of the alert and depend on the country.

Some alerts could have:

One unique severity: Minor
- In this case, the alert is only based on the timeRelatedStates field and there is no severity management
3 severties: Minor, Serious, Very Serious
4 severties: Minor, Serious, Very Serious, Critical

			Severity management
			Severities*
		timeRelatedStates	Severity management	2nd criteria: others	Field(s) for checking the severity (seconds)	Minor	Serious	Very Serious	Critical
Continuous Driving		2	Yes		continuousDrivingTimeSeconds	4.5	5	6
Daily Driving	if possibilities to extend IS NOT allowed	4	Yes	if remainingDailyExtendedDriveTimePeriods == 0	dailyDrivingTimeSeconds	9	10	11	13.5
Daily Driving	if possibilities to extend IS allowed	4	Yes	if remainingDailyExtendedDriveTimePeriods != 0	dailyDrivingTimeSeconds	10	11	12	15
Insufficient rest		6	No
Weekly Driving		8	Yes		weeklyDrivingTimeSeconds	56	60	65	70
Bi-Weekly Driving		10	Yes		previousAndCurrentTotalDriveTimeSeconds	90	100	105	112.5
Continuous Working		13	No
Daily Working		14	No
Weekly Working		15	No

Severities* : Severity values in hours permit to define when an alert is triggered

Who can access the feature?

Each user that has access to tachograph page could access the tachograph alert management window.