What the NHVR requires of an electronic work diary

An EWD is a voluntary alternative, not a replacement

Under the Heavy Vehicle National Law, a driver who has to keep fatigue records can do it in a written work diary or in an electronic work diary that the NHVR has approved. Using an EWD is a choice — nobody is forced off paper — but once you record electronically, the electronic record is the record.

That is why approval matters so much. A general-purpose logbook or spreadsheet app, however good, does not satisfy the law. Only an approved EWD does.

How approval works

The NHVR assesses an EWD system against a published standard before it can be used, and the approval is granted to the provider for a specific system — not to the operator using it. Approval covers how the system records work and rest, how it warns a driver approaching a limit, how records are stored and produced, and how tamper-resistant the whole thing is.

Netcorp is an NHVR Approved Provider. Our approval covers Standard Hours, BFM and AFM rule sets, and it went through the same process as every other approved provider — being free changed nothing about the assessment.

Approval covers the device too

An EWD approval currently extends to the hardware the app runs on, not just the software. That is why every provider publishes a device list, and why running an approved app on an unapproved handset is not the same as being compliant.

We keep the current list of approved phones and tablets on the support page, with the minimum OS, GNSS and mobile-data requirements. If a device isn't listed, it isn't approved yet — ask us, because it may already be under test.

What stays your responsibility

Approval makes the system lawful to use. It does not discharge the operator's own duties, which sit with you regardless of which provider you pick:

• Nominate a Record Keeper — a real, named person responsible for storing fatigue records and producing them to the NHVR on request.
• Keep records for the retention period the law sets (three years, in our system, with older records archived rather than discarded).
• Make sure each driver is familiar with the EWD before they record in it. The NHVR expects that familiarisation to have happened, which is why our sign-up asks for it.
• Record the driver's licence details accurately, and keep the rule set nominated against each driver current.
• Report EWD faults and malfunctions — to us, and to the NHVR.

None of that is provider-specific. If you are comparing EWDs, it's the part of the workload that doesn't change no matter who you choose.

What it costs

Approval is not what makes an EWD expensive — most of the price on the market is commercial, not regulatory. Ours is free for drivers and free for operators, permanently, because Netcorp funds it out of a telematics business that has been running for 25 years. There is no trial clock and no per-seat tier.