Guidance

Emergency exemption and temporary relaxation of drivers' hours and working time rules

How and when to request a temporary relaxation of the drivers’ hours and working time rules for commercial operators.

• From: Department for Transport
• Published: 8 December 2011
• Last updated: 4 October 2024
  Show all updates

  1. 4 October 2024

     Assimilated (EU retained) drivers' hours rules: advice updated.

  2. 28 October 2020

     Updated to give further guidance on possible relaxations of the working time rules and exemptions for vehicles used on a 'craft basis'.

  3. 17 December 2018

     Guidance updated to give further guidance on the use of the emergency exemption in EU drivers’ hours rules to deal with weather related events.

  4. 23 January 2017

     Guidance revised to take into account revisions to the exemptions and national derogations to the EU drivers’ hours rules.

  5. 8 December 2011

     First published.

Documents

Emergency exemption and temporary relaxation of drivers’ hours and working time rules

HTML

Statement of case template

MS Word Document, 26.5 KB

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Details

National journeys within the UK and between the UK and EU are governed by the assimilated (EU retained) drivers’ hours and tachograph rules.

AETR rules apply to international journeys that are not wholly between the UK and EU and are to or through a country that is a signatory to the AETR agreement, including journeys involving Norway and Switzerland.

These documents include:

• an explanation of drivers’ hours and working time rules
• guidance on dealing with emergency and urgent situations
• information on how to request a temporary relaxation of the drivers’ hours rules
• a template statement of a case for requesting a relaxation

Drivers’ hours and working time rules are in place to protect drivers and reduce the risk of them being involved in accidents due to tiredness.