Fleet and driver expiry date tracking, in a single list

A coach company has two kinds of papers that expire: those of the coach (the ITV, Spain's periodic roadworthiness inspection, the insurance, the next maintenance service and the vehicle documents) and those of the driver (the driving licence, the CAP (Spain's Driver CPC), the tachograph card and other documents). On top of that come the tachograph download deadlines. Keeping them under control means having them all in one list, sorted by whatever falls due first.

Here is what is worth watching, why a single list works better than one reminder per document, and how the Bus Center dashboard gathers it all, with its limits.

What expires in a coach company

More things expire than you might think, and each has its own deadline and its own rule. This is the list worth watching, with the article where we explain each one:

On the coach	On the driver
ITV inspection (how often)	Driving licence
Insurance	CAP (renewing the CAP)
Next maintenance service	Tachograph card
Vehicle documents with a date	Other documents with a date

And there is one deadline that is not an expiry date but is watched all the same: the tachograph downloads, both from each driver's card and from the vehicle unit. Every company also has its own dated papers. In Bus Center they fit in as other driver expiry dates, with their type and description, or as vehicle documents with an expiry date, and they appear on the same dashboard. How and how often tachograph data is downloaded is explained in downloading the driver card.

A single list, sorted by urgency

If every date lives in a different place, the risk is forgetting to check one of them. If each coach's ITV is on its card, the insurance is in the policy and each driver's CAP is in a folder, someone has to remember to look in every place in time.

A single list changes that: everything that falls due soon appears together, sorted by whatever expires first, whether it belongs to a coach or to a driver. So one coach's ITV and one driver's CAP compete on the same screen, and you plan the week's services with everything in front of you.

A simple habit: look at the list when you plan the week, before assigning coaches and drivers. Anything overdue is best sorted out before that coach or that driver is assigned to a service.

The Bus Center dashboard: 30 days and three levels

The dashboard gathers whatever expires in 30 days or less: the ITV, maintenance and insurance of the coaches; the licence, CAP and tachograph card of the drivers; and other expiry dates and documents. The list comes out sorted from most to least urgent.

Each alert comes with one of three levels:

• Overdue: the date has already passed.
• Urgent: 15 days or fewer remain.
• Warning: between 16 and 30 days remain.

The list is calculated from the dates in the records at that moment. When the ITV is renewed and the new date is entered, the alert stops appearing; there is no need to delete it by hand.

Maintenance is also tracked by kilometres: the dashboard warns you when 5,000 km or fewer remain before the service. We cover it in preventive maintenance for buses and coaches.

Overdue tachograph downloads

Bus Center keeps track of the tachograph download deadlines: driver card, 28 days; vehicle, 90 days. If a driver has no download on record, or the latest one is more than 28 days old, they appear on the dashboard as overdue.

To do this it logs the .DDD downloads that are uploaded to the company's archive, going by the file name. It does not read their contents: it does not calculate driving or rest times, does not detect infringements and does not download the tachograph. The download is done with the download equipment; the program logs the file and watches the deadline.

Where the dates come from

The dates come from the records. Each coach's record holds its ITV and maintenance, its fuel and kilometres, and the vehicle documents; each driver's holds their details, documents and expiry dates. If a date has not been entered, there is no alert: the dashboard can only warn about what it knows.

That is why, when you start, the most worthwhile thing is to enter the fleet with its dates and the drivers with their expiry dates. It is the second step suggested on the Bus Center home page itself, right after creating the account.

The driver sees their own papers too

In their portal, the driver sees their own papers that expire in 30 days or less: the driving licence, the CAP and the tachograph card. They do not have to wait for the office to tell them.

When they renew one, they can send the paper as a photo from their mobile, with the new expiry date. The date they propose goes into their record only when the office approves the document, and it is logged who approved it and when. That way the record is brought up to date without anyone having to type the date twice. More on the portal in the drivers section (in Spanish) of the home page.

What Bus Center does not do

Alerts are shown on the dashboard, so someone has to look at it. Bus Center does not renew anything or book appointments, does not know a date nobody has entered, and does not replace your adviser on what each rule requires. What it does is put what falls due soon in front of you, in one list.