Case Study
Accreditation of tachograph workshops in Slovenia
The tachograph is an equipment fitted to road vehicles which are used for the carriage of goods or passengers. It enables the display, recording, printing, storing and outprint of vehicle movement data, including its speed. As such it enables to control the work of the driver and establish the compliance with social legislation, which also specifies requirements for driving time limits which includes the necessary breaks and daily and weekly rest periods.
In order to ensure the proper functioning of the tachograph, it is necessary to inspect its operation at regular intervals. The inspection of tachographs in Slovenia may be carried out only by accredited inspection bodies – tachograph workshops, on the basis of the authority of the state body.
The procedure for accreditation of tachograph workshops in Slovenia began in 2001. At the moment, 24 organizations are accredited and they inspect the operation of approximately 20,000 tachographs annually. Inspections are carried out at 46 permanent locations, some also with a mobile workshop on site.
Slovenian accreditation, as a national accreditation body, cooperates with the state body which regulates the field already in the drafting stage of legislation. This way the legislation complies with the requirements for accredited conformity assessment to a greater extent. The national regulation specifies an inspection procedure, formalizing recording, reporting, setting requirements for staff qualifications and equipment requirements. The fulfilment of those and other requirements of the accreditation standard ISO / IEC 17020 is verified through accreditation.
The entire inspection procedure is managed from a central information system. The information system also collects all data that has been obtained in the procedure. The data is available to supervisory authorities – the inspectorate and the police to facilitate real-time supervision.
With a series of activities, including the accreditation of tachograph workshops, Slovenia has achieved a higher level of quality of services performed and consequently safer participation of vehicles in the transportation.
Further information is available on the Government website.
