Construction
Fleet compliance software for construction fleets.
DVSA sets the floor. The main contractor whose gate you are trying to get through sets the standard you actually have to meet.
14 days free access · no card needed
Construction is the sector where compliance has two masters. DVSA and the Traffic Commissioner govern the licence, and then the client governs the site: accreditation schemes, vehicle specifications, driver training and incident reporting imposed as a condition of working, audited by somebody who is not an examiner.
The fleet makes it harder. A single operator may run tippers and mixers on an O-licence, vans that sit outside it, and plant that never touches a public road but still has to be inspected, maintained and operated by someone trained. Three regimes, one yard, and usually one person keeping track.
The problem
What makes construction compliance hard
Client standards layered on top of the licence
Accreditation and site-access schemes commonly require vehicle specifications, driver training and reporting that go beyond what the licence asks for, and the audit comes from the contractor rather than DVSA. An operator can be fully compliant with its undertakings and still be turned away at a gate.
A fleet with three different rulebooks in it
Tippers and mixers under the O-licence, vans outside it, and plant that is maintained and inspected but never licensed as a goods vehicle. Each has a different inspection basis and a different record, and the one most often lost is the plant, because it has no annual test to force the issue.
Checks on sites, not in a yard
Vehicles start from a compound, a depot or whatever site they finished on, and drivers rarely pass an office. A paper system assumes a filing point that this operation does not have, which is why check sheets arrive in batches or not at all.
Damage that happens off the public road
Site work puts loads on a vehicle that road mileage does not — kerb strikes, tyre damage from spoil, body and tipping gear wear, hydraulics. It shows up between inspections, and it is the kind of defect that gets mentioned in the cab rather than written down.
Lifting equipment that runs on its own clock
Cranes, hiabs and tail lifts carry a thorough examination regime under separate legislation from vehicle roadworthiness. A vehicle can be clean on its maintenance file and still have lifting equipment outside its examination date, which is a different failure with a different record behind it.
The answer
How FleetOptix helps
A fleet with three different rulebooks in it
Every vehicle and asset sits on one register with its own inspection dates and history, so plant that has no annual test forcing the issue is on the same screen as the tippers that do.
Maintenance and roadworthinessChecks on sites, not in a yard
The check is completed and submitted from wherever the vehicle starts, on a phone, so the record does not depend on a driver passing a filing point. A nil return is a record in its own right.
Walkaround checks and defectsDamage that happens off the public road
A defect raised on a check reaches the workshop with the vehicle, the driver and the date already attached, which turns a conversation in the cab into something with a rectification and a completion date against it.
Incidents and reportingClient standards layered on top of the licence
Driver licence, CPC and training records sit on one driver record, so the evidence a main contractor asks for comes out of the same place as the evidence an examiner would.
Drivers and licensingLifting equipment that runs on its own clock
Examination and service dates are held against the asset they belong to, and the plan and the compliance diary sit on one calendar, so equipment due for examination is visible before it is committed to a job.
Scheduling and planning
Free to use
Paperwork for construction fleets
The records this sector is asked to produce, as printable forms. Free to use, whether or not you ever buy anything.
- HGV walkaround check sheetA printable daily walkaround check sheet for HGVs, covering the items a driver is expected to inspect before the vehicle is used and the record that proves they did.
- Vehicle defect report formA defect report form that records what was found, who was told, what was done about it and when the vehicle was fit to use again.
- Tail lift LOLER checklistA checklist for operators running tail lifts, covering the thorough examination regime that applies to lifting equipment separately from vehicle maintenance.
- Inspection schedule plannerA spreadsheet for planning preventative maintenance inspections across a fleet for the year, so intervals are set deliberately and gaps are visible before they open.
- New driver induction checklistAn induction checklist for new drivers, covering the documents to see, the briefings to give and the records that prove both happened.
Who it is for
The people doing this job
Transport managers
Named on the licence for the vehicles that need one, usually while also answering for the vehicles and plant that do not.
What is transport manager?Plant and fleet managers
Responsible for assets that move between sites, change hands and get damaged, and whose maintenance history is the first thing asked for after an incident.
SHEQ and compliance managers
Answering accreditation audits and client pre-qualification questionnaires, usually from records held by somebody else.
Site and yard supervisors
Signing vehicles out, picking up the defects drivers mention in passing, and needing somewhere for those to go.
What is driver defect report?Drivers and operators
Starting from a compound or a site rather than a depot, with no office to hand a sheet to.
What is walkaround check?
Questions
What construction operators ask
- Can it hold plant as well as road vehicles?
- Yes. The register is built around assets with inspection dates, defect history and a maintenance record, which applies as readily to plant as to a tipper. What differs is the inspection basis, which you set per asset rather than inheriting from a road vehicle regime.
- Does it cover FORS or CLOCS requirements?
- Not as a scheme module. What it holds is the underlying evidence those schemes ask you to produce — checks, defects, inspection history, driver records — so an audit is answered from one place. The scheme's own requirements and submissions stay yours to manage.
- Our vans are under the licensing threshold. Is it worth recording them?
- The licence obligation may not apply, but the duty to keep a vehicle in a roadworthy condition does, and after a collision an insurer or an investigator will ask the same questions about a van as about a tipper. Most operators record them for that reason rather than a licensing one.
- Does it track lifting equipment examinations?
- Examination dates are recorded against the asset, so equipment on its own clock appears alongside the vehicle's inspections. FleetOptix records that a thorough examination happened and when the next is due; it does not carry it out or certify the equipment, which is a competent person's job.
- Can each site or depot see only its own fleet?
- Yes. Access is role-based, with a cross-depot view for the people who need the whole operation rather than one compound.
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Put the evidence somewhere it can be found
Vehicles, drivers, checks and records in one platform, built for UK construction operators.
14 days free access · no card needed