In a small company you often have to wear many hats and the Administration Director at RedLynch Leisure also manages the company office, finance, tenders as well as health and safety. The additional workload in managing compliance with Drivers’ Hours Law, Working Time Directive regulations and digital tachograph legislation, was an additional and worrying burden given that Redlynch rely on their vehicles to conduct their business and cannot risk jeopardising their Operator’s licence. 

A small family business that has been providing specialised construction services for over 15 years, Redlynch Leisure install playground and sports equipment and safety surfacing for local authorities, schools, hospitals, builders and the manufacturers of sports and playground equipment.

Redlynch operate a fleet of three HGVs to transport heavy and bulky materials and equipment to the construction sites.

Tina Harrison, Administration Director at Redlynch, is also responsible for compliance with Tachograph legislation. When Redlynch acquired a new HGV with a digital tachograph, they were aware of new legislation and took advice from an independent transport consultant on the exact requirements to maintain compliance with all of the relevant regulations.

Tina wanted a solution that would save both time and money and discovered that the Smartanalysis service would do everything she wanted at a reasonable cost.

With Smartanalysis, there is no fixed fee. You only pay for the analogue charts and digital driver data you send to Smartanalysis, all vehicle downloads are also free, giving an additional financial benefit to Redlynch.

Tina posts the paper Analogue tachograph charts to Descartes and we scan them into the Smartanalysis system. Driver card and vehicle unit data is submitted via a PC, smartcard reader and VU download device in the office.

Descartes take care of everything else and email Tina every week with reports on Vehicle Unit Downloads, Driver Card downloads and Drivers’ Hours. The reports are simple and it is easy to see exactly what is going on and if there are any infringements.

This solution worked well for Redlynch but was still reliant on the drivers downloading their driver card data and vehicle unit data regularly, meaning Tina had to continuously remind them!

So when Tina heard about Smartdownload, Descartes' solution for automatic remote download of digital tachograph data, it was the final piece of the puzzle.

With Smartdownload all driver and vehicle unit downloads are scheduled and happen in the background automatically. This ensures that the data is available on Smartanalysis and the required reports can be emailed to Redlynch with no manual intervention, giving Tina more time to focus on the business.

“Smartanalysis has removed the burden of managing our compliance. Everything works in the background. I know our data is always available and secure if the authorities want to see it. The reports on Vehicle Unit Downloads, Driver Card downloads and Drivers’ Hours that are emailed to me automatically give me everything I need so I can spend my time on the business.”

Tina Harrison, Administration Director, Redlynch Leisure