GovWire

The Driver and Vehicle Standards Agency (DVSA) carries out roadside inspections of goods vehicles and passenger-carrying vehicles to check that:

• the driver is following drivers hours rules
• the driver holds the correct licence, insurance and Driver Certificate of Professional Competence (CPC)
• their vehicle is carrying the correct load weights and type of load permitted
• their vehicle has no mechanical faults and is in a safe and roadworthy condition

DVSA will publish details of offences found on an annual basis.

About the data

The reports show:

• the operators name
• their operators licence number (some countries require operators to have more than one operator licence)
• the number of vehicles the operator had registered on their operator licence
• the number of prohibitions issued for mechanical defects
• the number of advisory inspection notices issued for mechanical defects
• the number of offences where a fine was issued for mechanical defects that DVSA found
• the number of drivers hours offences DVSA found
• the number of overloading offences DVSA found
• the amount of the fines that had to be paid
• the number of other traffic offences DVSA found

Other traffic offences include:

• failing to produce records
• falsification of records
• tachograph offences
• any offence where an offence rectification notice (ORN) was issued by a DVSA examiner
• any other offences not covered under drivers hours, overloading or mechanical offences

The data is sorted by country and then by operator name.

Data sources

These reports include defects and offences DVSA found from 1 January 2021 to 31 December 2021:

• during roadside checks
• during visits to operator sites

These reports do not include data from offences found by the police.

Factors which may affect the report

The following factors may affect the report:

• accurate entry of operator licence numbers by DVSA examiners - if these were entered incorrectly, the offence would be attributed to the wrong operator
• operator licence numbers - some countries only use numbers and do not include letters in their operator licence numbers, this means operators from different countries could have the same licence number, so its important to check the country of origin
• variations in spelling of operator names - the DVSA examiner has to manually type in the name of operators from outside Great Britain, this means there might be variations of the operator name
• operators successfully challenging an offence - if an offence is challenged by the operator and DVSA agrees with them, it might still show on the report
• data quality issues - some underlying data might change over time as DVSA finds incorrect data and fixes it