Vehicle tracking system data analyser: stops, dwell time and speed
A vehicle tracking system turns the timestamped positions sent by a tracker or the driver's phone into distance, speed and stops. A stop is a stretch where speed stays below a threshold (for example 5 km/h, about 3 mph) or the position stays within about 50 m for more than a few minutes, and the measured dwell time is always shorter than the real one. The reporting interval decides what you see: with one position every 15 minutes, every stop longer than 30 minutes shows up and stops shorter than 15 minutes can vanish. In a synthetic HGV day, 10-second data finds 6 stops; the same trace at 15-minute intervals shows only the 45-minute break. Idling cannot be derived from GPS at all. In Logistivo, positions come from the driver app per load: at most every 15 minutes while moving (after at least 250 m) and hourly when parked.
Source: legislation.gov.uk · GOV.UK · Information Commissioner's Office · European Court of Human Rights (HUDOC) · Article 29 Working Party · EUR-Lex · Mevzuat Bilgi Sistemi (Türkiye) · wetten.overheid.nl · BOE · Portal Legislativ (Romania) · TopoGrafix · Google for Developers · EPSG (IOGP) · GPS.gov.
Data last updated:
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Analyse a GPS trace: stop ledger and speed bands
Analyse a GPS trace: stop ledger and speed bands — Drop a GPX, KML or CSV position file; we separate moving from stopped and list every stop's arrival, departure and dwell time.
The file is read and processed in your browser; no positions or file contents are sent to any server.
This is a trace analyser, not a staff-monitoring tool: it does not know the road type, the engine state or who was driving. Speed bands are average speeds along the trace, not a penalty calculation or evidence.
Speed-limit table (country) — Speed bands use this country's rules; a trace does not say which country it is in.
Vehicle class — HGV = goods vehicle over 7.5 t. Limits are in the table below.
Time zone — Times are shown in this zone; CSV times without an offset are read as local time here (UK: GMT in winter, BST = UTC+1 in summer).
Stop speed threshold — A parameter, not law. Default 5 km/h (3.1 mph): a point whose 30-second average speed is below it is a stop candidate.
Shortest stop — Parameter. Default 3 min: shorter halts (traffic lights, junctions) are not counted as stops.
Long-stop flag — Parameter. Default 20 min; such stops are tagged 'long stop' in the ledger.
Jitter radius — Parameter. Default 50 m: GPS jumps within this radius while parked are not counted as movement.
Jump cap — Parameter. Default 150 km/h (93 mph): a single point that could only be reached faster than this, while its neighbours agree, is dropped.
Latitude/longitude order — Swap if your CSV has the columns the other way round; a trace in the sea or on another continent is the usual sign.
Long-haul HGV day — Synthetic: a trace of about 7.5 hours generated with a seeded generator at 10-second intervals; it contains a 45-minute break, a 25-minute fuel stop, short traffic stops and a 7-minute stretch at 93 km/h (58 mph). It does not belong to any real vehicle.
Urban multi-drop — Synthetic: about 2.5 hours with 2–8-minute delivery stops and 40–90-second waits at traffic lights. It does not belong to any real vehicle.
Parked + GPS jitter — Synthetic: two hours parked with 6 m of GPS noise, occasional reflections and one 900 m jump. It does not belong to any real vehicle.
Speed-band tables: the analyser uses these numbers — Bands are built from the limits outside built-up areas only: above the lowest of them is 'over the limit on some road types', above the highest is 'over the limit on every road type' for the chosen class. Built-up limits cannot be judged from GPS, because the trace does not say which road it is on. Filled dots are out-of-town limits, hollow dots built-up limits, the dashed line is the speed-limiter setting.
Türkiye — Highway Traffic Regulation (Karayolları Trafik Yönetmeliği) art. 100 table, as amended in Official Gazette 28918 of 19 Feb 2014. Vehicles with a trailer or semi-trailer have a maximum 10 km/h lower than the same class without one (art. 100, fifth paragraph). Speed limiter setting for N2/N3 trucks and tractors: 99 km/h (art. 100, second paragraph) — a device setting, not the legal limit.
Türkiye — Tractor + semi-trailer / truck with trailer — Built-up: 40 km/h | Two-way intercity road: 70 km/h | Divided road: 75 km/h | Motorway (otoyol): 80 km/h 10 km/h below the rigid truck limit (art. 100/5).
Türkiye — Truck or tractor (N2–N3), no trailer — Built-up: 50 km/h | Two-way intercity road: 80 km/h | Divided road: 85 km/h | Motorway (otoyol): 90 km/h
Türkiye — Light truck (kamyonet, N1) — Built-up: 50 km/h | Two-way intercity road: 80 km/h | Divided road: 85 km/h | Motorway (otoyol): 95 km/h
Türkiye — Panel van (N1) — Built-up: 50 km/h | Two-way intercity road: 85 km/h | Divided road: 100 km/h | Motorway (otoyol): 110 km/h
Türkiye — Dangerous goods vehicle — Built-up: 30 km/h | Two-way intercity road: 50 km/h | Divided road: 60 km/h | Motorway (otoyol): 70 km/h Unless its documents say otherwise; the trailer rule does not apply to this class.
Türkiye — Special-load / special-permit vehicle — Built-up: 30 km/h | Two-way intercity road: 50 km/h | Divided road: 50 km/h | Motorway (otoyol): 60 km/h Unless its documents say otherwise.
Art. 101: no action is taken under Law 2918 art. 51 against a driver exceeding the maximum by up to 10%; the limit itself does not change.
Netherlands — RVV 1990 art. 20 (built-up 50), art. 21 (outside built-up areas: autosnelweg 130, autoweg 100, other roads 80), art. 22 (special limits: vrachtauto over 3,500 kg 80; bestelauto with a trailer up to 3,500 kg 90). EU speed limiter: N2/N3 set so the vehicle cannot exceed 90 km/h (Directive 92/6/EEC as amended by 2002/85/EC).
Netherlands — Vrachtauto over 3,500 kg, incl. tractor + semi-trailer — Built-up (bebouwde kom): 50 km/h | Other roads: 80 km/h | Autoweg: 80 km/h | Autosnelweg: 80 km/h Art. 22 a.
Netherlands — Bestelauto up to 3,500 kg, no trailer — Built-up (bebouwde kom): 50 km/h | Other roads: 80 km/h | Autoweg: 100 km/h | Autosnelweg: 130 km/h Lower daytime motorway limits set by signs are not modelled.
Netherlands — Bestelauto + trailer up to 3,500 kg — Built-up (bebouwde kom): 50 km/h | Other roads: 80 km/h | Autoweg: 90 km/h | Autosnelweg: 90 km/h Art. 22 e.
Spain — Reglamento General de Circulación (RD 1428/2003) art. 48.1.a (outside built-up areas: autopista/autovía 90, carretera convencional 80), art. 48.1.b (dangerous goods −10 km/h), art. 50 (urban roads and travesías). EU speed limiter: N2/N3 90 km/h.
Spain — Truck, tractor, van, articulated vehicle or vehicle with trailer — Urban, 2+ lanes each way: 50 km/h | Travesía (through-town road): 50 km/h | Carretera convencional: 80 km/h | Autopista / autovía: 90 km/h Art. 48.1.a column.
Spain — Dangerous goods vehicle — Urban, 2+ lanes each way: 40 km/h | Travesía (through-town road): 40 km/h | Carretera convencional: 70 km/h | Autopista / autovía: 80 km/h Art. 48.1.b and art. 50.4.
Urban roads with one lane each way: 30 km/h; single-surface streets: 20 km/h (art. 50.1). RD 518/2026 rewords art. 48.1.b from 1 October 2026; truck values are unchanged.
Romania — OUG 195/2002 art. 49(1) (built-up 50), art. 50(1)(a)–(c) (by category: autostradă / drum expres / European national road (E) / other roads), art. 50(2) (towing a trailer or semi-trailer: −10 km/h outside built-up areas), art. 50(3) (dangerous goods, oversize or overweight loads). EU speed limiter: N2/N3 90 km/h; the 100–110 km/h legal values for C and C+E are capped at 90 km/h in practice.
Romania — C+E: tractor + semi-trailer / truck with trailer — Built-up (localitate): 50 km/h | Other roads: 70 km/h | European national road (E): 80 km/h | Drum expres: 90 km/h | Autostradă: 100 km/h Art. 50(2).
Romania — C: truck over 3.5 t, no trailer — Built-up (localitate): 50 km/h | Other roads: 80 km/h | European national road (E): 90 km/h | Drum expres: 100 km/h | Autostradă: 110 km/h
Romania — C1: truck 3.5–7.5 t — Built-up (localitate): 50 km/h | Other roads: 70 km/h | European national road (E): 80 km/h | Drum expres: 85 km/h | Autostradă: 90 km/h
Romania — B: van up to 3.5 t — Built-up (localitate): 50 km/h | Other roads: 90 km/h | European national road (E): 100 km/h | Drum expres: 120 km/h | Autostradă: 130 km/h
Romania — Dangerous goods / oversize or overweight load — Built-up (localitate): 40 km/h | Other roads: 70 km/h | European national road (E): 70 km/h | Drum expres: 70 km/h | Autostradă: 70 km/h Art. 50(3).
United Kingdom — England and Wales — Road Traffic Regulation Act 1984, Schedule 6, Part I, item 5, and the GOV.UK national speed limits table. 1 mph = 1.609344 km/h (mile = 1,760 yards, yard = 0.9144 m). Speed limiter: 90 km/h ≈ 56 mph for goods vehicles over 3.5 t (Construction and Use Regulations 1986, reg. 36B) — a device setting, not a speed limit.
United Kingdom — England and Wales — Goods vehicle over 7.5 t (rigid, articulated or with trailer) — Built-up (street-lit): 30 mph | Single carriageway: 50 mph | Dual carriageway: 60 mph | Motorway: 60 mph
United Kingdom — England and Wales — Goods vehicle up to 7.5 t (not articulated, no trailer) — Built-up (street-lit): 30 mph | Single carriageway: 50 mph | Dual carriageway: 60 mph | Motorway: 70 mph
United Kingdom — England and Wales — Goods vehicle up to 7.5 t, articulated or towing — Built-up (street-lit): 30 mph | Single carriageway: 50 mph | Dual carriageway: 60 mph | Motorway: 60 mph
Built-up areas: 30 mph in England, Scotland and Northern Ireland; 20 mph in Wales (GOV.UK).
Car-derived vans follow car limits and are not in this table.
United Kingdom — Scotland — Road Traffic Regulation Act 1984, Schedule 6, Part I, item 5 — Scottish values for goods vehicles over 7.5 t: 40 mph on single carriageways, 50 mph on dual carriageways, 60 mph on motorways. Speed limiter: 90 km/h ≈ 56 mph (reg. 36B).
United Kingdom — Scotland — Goods vehicle over 7.5 t (rigid, articulated or with trailer) — Built-up (street-lit): 30 mph | Single carriageway: 40 mph | Dual carriageway: 50 mph | Motorway: 60 mph
United Kingdom — Scotland — Goods vehicle up to 7.5 t (not articulated, no trailer) — Built-up (street-lit): 30 mph | Single carriageway: 50 mph | Dual carriageway: 60 mph | Motorway: 70 mph
United Kingdom — Scotland — Goods vehicle up to 7.5 t, articulated or towing — Built-up (street-lit): 30 mph | Single carriageway: 50 mph | Dual carriageway: 60 mph | Motorway: 60 mph
How often does a GPS tracker report its position, and what does the interval hide? — There is no single legal interval: it is a setting of the device or app. Below, the same trace is resampled at 10 seconds, 60 seconds and 15 minutes (the first position at or after each grid time); the identical analysis runs on each lane, and stops that disappear are struck through.
Stops longer than 30 minutes always show in 15-minute data — A stop of length D is guaranteed to contain at least one full sampling interval only if D ≥ 2Δ. With Δ = 15 minutes that is 30 minutes. — Sampling mathematics.
Stops shorter than 15 minutes may not show at all — A stop shorter than the interval Δ cannot contain a full interval: two consecutive positions can fall either side of it, and the average speed between them hides the stop.
Measured dwell can be up to 2Δ short — The measured time lies in (D − 2Δ, D], because arrival is the first position inside the stop and departure the last. In 15-minute data a stop can read up to 30 minutes short; the synthetic HGV day's 45-minute break reads as 30 minutes.
Interval speed is an average and cannot show the peak — The speed between two positions is the average over that interval and never exceeds the true peak. 15-minute data can neither prove nor rule out a short burst of speeding: in the synthetic HGV day the top speed reads 93 km/h (58 mph) in 10-second data and 82 km/h (51 mph) in 15-minute data.
To catch every stop of D minutes, choose Δ ≤ D/2 — A 10-minute stop needs an interval of at most 5 minutes; a 45-minute break needs at most 22.5 minutes, so 15 minutes is enough for the break but does not guarantee a 25-minute fuel stop.
A tachograph records position at events — The EU smart tachograph records position at the start of the daily working period, at every border crossing, at every loading and unloading, every 3 hours of accumulated driving and at the end of the daily working period. — Regulation (EU) No 165/2014 art. 8(1), as amended by Regulation (EU) 2020/1054 — an EU rule.
Logistivo driver app — Sends a position at most every 15 minutes while moving, and only if the phone has moved at least 250 m since the last position it sent; when the vehicle is parked, a heartbeat goes out once an hour. The switch on the 15-minute lane applies exactly this rule. — Sending rule of the iOS and Android driver app.
How the analyser calculates
Distance — The sum of haversine distances between consecutive positions, with an Earth radius of 6,371,008.8 m (the IUGG mean radius R1 = (2a + b) / 3; WGS84 a = 6,378,137 m, 1/f = 298.257223563). By our own Vincenty calculation, the sphere differs from the ellipsoid by −0.148% between London and Manchester and by −0.279% over 1° of longitude at 45° N. — EPSG 7030 (WGS 84 ellipsoid); Moritz, Geodetic Reference System 1980.
Stop — Consecutive positions belong to the same stop while they stay within the jitter radius of the stop's running centre or their 30-second average speed stays below the stop threshold; if the first and last position are at least the shortest-stop time apart, a stop is recorded. A single stray position does not split a stop if the next one is back inside the radius.
Arrival, departure, dwell — Arrival is the first position in the stop, departure the last; dwell = departure − arrival and is a lower bound of the real time. 'Since previous stop' is moving distance.
Speed — The speed at each position is the straight-line distance from the position at least 30 seconds earlier divided by the time; this stops 1-second GPS noise from creating false speed while parked. Top speed is the largest of these windowed speeds.
Moving distance — Distance between positions inside the same stop is not counted, so that parked jitter does not add phantom miles. The raw distance is shown separately.
Jumps — A position is dropped when both the speed needed to reach it and the speed needed to leave it exceed the jump cap while its two neighbours connect at a plausible speed; a genuine gap (tunnel, ferry) is kept.
Speed bands — For the chosen country and class, above the lowest out-of-town limit is 'over the limit on some road types', above the highest is 'over the limit on every road type'. The speed-limiter setting is drawn as a separate line and is not treated as a limit.
Stops that could be a 45-minute break — Because measured dwell is a lower bound, a stop whose measured time plus two median reporting intervals reaches 45 minutes is tagged 'could be the 561/2006 art. 7 break': under the EU rule a break of at least 45 minutes is due after 4.5 hours of driving. A GPS trace cannot tell whether a stop really was a break (driver change, loading); use the ETA calculator for drivers' hours. — Regulation (EC) No 561/2006 art. 7.
Time — GPX times are UTC by definition; in KML and CSV a written offset is honoured, otherwise the time is read as local time in the chosen zone. The UK uses GMT (UTC) in winter and BST (UTC+1) in summer. — GPX 1.1 schema; IANA tz database (Europe/London).
What this analysis cannot see
Idling (engine running while stationary) cannot be derived from GPS: a trace has no engine state. A 'stop' always means a stationary vehicle, never 'idling'; idling needs CAN/OBD or ignition data.
The road type and signed local limits are unknown, which is why the speed bands have two tiers and built-up limits are not judged.
GPS distance is not an odometer reading: straight lines between positions are shorter than the road, and the gap grows with the interval.
Files without timestamps (a KML LineString, a GPX route or waypoints without time) cannot be analysed for stops or speed.
KMZ (zipped KML) is not read; unzip it and load the KML inside. Up to 250,000 positions are read per file. CSV dates are read day.month.year, not month/day/year.
The UK tables cover England and Wales, and Scotland; Northern Ireland is outside the Road Traffic Regulation Act 1984 and is not offered.
Results are for information only; they are not a legal finding, a penalty calculation or evidence. Rules were read from the primary texts on 24 September 2026.
What is a vehicle tracking system and where does the position come from?
What is a vehicle tracking system and where does the position come from? — A vehicle tracking system collects timestamped positions (a GPS trace) produced at intervals by a location source in the vehicle, and derives distance, speed, stops and route from them.
The position can come from three places: a tracker wired into the vehicle (a GPS receiver plus a mobile connection, usually tied to the ignition), an app on the driver's phone, or the EU smart tachograph. All three produce the same raw data — time, latitude, longitude. What differs is how often, and at which events, a position is recorded.
The 'stops', 'dwell times' and 'speeding events' in a tracking dashboard are interpretations calculated from those points, and the same trace gives different answers with different thresholds. The analyser on this page keeps the thresholds visible as parameters and shows side by side what each reporting interval loses.
GPS-enabled smartphones are typically accurate to within a 4.9 m (16 ft) radius under open sky; accuracy worsens near buildings, bridges and trees (GPS.gov). That is where the few-metre jumps in a parked trace come from; the analyser removes them with the jitter radius.
How do I find stops and idle time in GPS tracking data?
How do I find stops and idle time in GPS tracking data? — A stop is a stretch, longer than a set time, where speed stays below a threshold or the position stays within a small radius; dwell time is the gap between the first and last position of the stop. Idle time cannot be found in GPS data.
Three thresholds decide the result: the speed threshold (default 5 km/h, 3.1 mph), the shortest stop (3 minutes) and the jitter radius (50 m). Raise the speed threshold and crawling traffic becomes a stop; lower the shortest stop and traffic lights enter the ledger. These are analysis choices, not law, and should be kept the same when two reports are compared.
Measured dwell is shorter than the real stop: it runs from the first position after the vehicle stopped to the last one before it moved. With 10-second data the difference is seconds; with 15-minute data it can reach half an hour.
Idling means the engine running while the vehicle stands still, and a trace has no engine state. 'The lorry stood for 40 minutes' does not say whether the engine was on; idle time needs data from the vehicle bus (CAN/OBD) or the ignition signal.
What are the HGV speed limits in England, Wales and Scotland?
What are the HGV speed limits in England, Wales and Scotland? — A goods vehicle over 7.5 tonnes may do 60 mph on a motorway and a dual carriageway and 50 mph on a single carriageway in England and Wales; in Scotland the dual- and single-carriageway limits are 50 and 40 mph. Built-up roads are 30 mph, or 20 mph in Wales.
A goods vehicle up to 7.5 tonnes that is not articulated and not towing may do 70 mph on a motorway, 60 mph on a dual carriageway and 50 mph on a single carriageway; articulated or towing, the motorway limit is 60 mph. The limits come from Schedule 6 of the Road Traffic Regulation Act 1984; Northern Ireland has its own legislation and is not covered here.
The analyser converts with 1 mph = 1.609344 km/h (the mile is 1,760 yards and the yard 0.9144 m, Weights and Measures Act 1985). The same trace can also be read against Turkish, Dutch, Spanish or Romanian limits in the tables below.
Why are lorries limited to 56 mph on the motorway?
Why are lorries limited to 56 mph on the motorway? — Because of the speed limiter, not the speed limit: goods vehicles over 12 tonnes first used from 1988, and over 3.5 tonnes up to 12 tonnes first used from 2005, must be limited so that their stabilised speed does not exceed 90 km/h, which is about 56 mph (Construction and Use Regulations 1986, reg. 36B).
The legal motorway limit for an HGV is 60 mph, so a lorry at its limiter is legal. Some older 7.5–12-tonne vehicles are covered by a 60 mph limiter instead. The EU value is the same 90 km/h for N2 and N3 vehicles (Directive 92/6/EEC as amended by 2002/85/EC).
The analyser draws the limiter as a separate dashed line on the speed distribution. A GPS top speed slightly above 56 mph does not by itself show a limiter fault: GPS speed is calculated from positions and time, not read from the vehicle's calibrated speed signal.
Can GPS tracking data prove speeding?
Can GPS tracking data prove speeding? — Only in part. A trace says how fast the vehicle went but not which road it was on, so only a speed above the highest limit for the vehicle class is over the limit whatever the road.
Example: for an HGV over 7.5 t in England, 55 mph is legal on a dual carriageway and over the limit on a single carriageway. The analyser puts it in the 'over the limit on some road types' band; above 60 mph is over the limit on every road type.
The reporting interval is the second limit, because the speed between two positions is the average over that interval. In the synthetic HGV day, a 7-minute stretch at 93 km/h shows a top speed of 93 km/h (58 mph) in 10-second data; the same trace at 15-minute intervals tops out at 82 km/h (51 mph). 15-minute data can neither prove nor rule out a short burst of speeding.
Using speed data to monitor staff is a separate legal question. European data-protection authorities put it plainly: 'Vehicle tracking devices are not staff tracking devices', and employers should not use them to monitor drivers' behaviour, 'for example by sending alerts in relation to speed of vehicle' (Article 29 Working Party Opinion 2/2017, quoting Opinion 13/2011).
Is it illegal to leave the engine running, and can GPS show idling?
Is it illegal to leave the engine running, and can GPS show idling? — In Great Britain the driver of a stationary vehicle must stop the engine so far as necessary to prevent noise or exhaust emissions, except when stationary because of traffic (Construction and Use Regulations 1986, reg. 98). GPS cannot show whether that happened.
A GPS trace records where the vehicle stood and for how long, but not whether the engine was running. An idling report therefore needs engine or ignition data from the vehicle; a trace alone only gives stationary time.
What the trace can do is separate traffic halts from real stops: the default shortest stop of 3 minutes keeps traffic lights out of the ledger, and the long-stop flag marks the stops worth checking against engine data.
How do I read a GPX, KML or CSV position file?
How do I read a GPX, KML or CSV position file? — In GPX every point is a trkpt element with a UTC time; in KML the coordinate order is longitude, latitude; in CSV the column names and the decimal separator vary from file to file.
GPX 1.1: points sit in trk/trkseg/trkpt, with latitude and longitude as attributes (WGS84, decimal degrees), and the time element is UTC — the schema stresses 'not local time'. GPX 1.1 has no speed element, so speed is calculated from position and time. A file with only a route (rtept) or waypoints (wpt) and no times cannot be analysed for stops.
KML: coordinates are longitude, latitude, altitude, with no spaces inside a tuple. A timed track sits in gx:Track as pairs of when and gx:coord ('lon lat alt'), and their counts must match. A plain LineString carries no time.
CSV: the analyser recognises time, latitude and longitude columns by name (time/timestamp, date + time, lat/latitude, lon/lng/longitude…); the delimiter may be a comma, semicolon or tab, and a decimal comma is accepted in semicolon files. Times may be ISO 8601 (with offset), Unix seconds or milliseconds, or day.month.year hour:minute; a time without an offset is read as local time in the chosen zone. During British Summer Time a GPX file therefore looks one hour behind the clock on the wall.
Rows pasted without a header are read as time,lat,lon. If the trace lands in the sea or on another continent, latitude and longitude have probably been swapped: use the 'Latitude/longitude order' switch.
Can you track vehicles without installing hardware?
Can you track vehicles without installing hardware? — Yes. The position can come from an app on the driver's phone instead of a box in the vehicle. In Logistivo the position comes from the driver app, per load, at most every 15 minutes while moving.
The Logistivo driver app (iOS and Android) starts sending positions when the driver signs in and stops on sign-out; the first position is sent immediately at sign-in. While moving it sends at most one position every 15 minutes, and only if the phone has moved at least 250 m since the last position it sent; when the vehicle is parked, a heartbeat goes out once an hour. The office can request a one-off position when needed, and that request does not wait for the 15-minute interval.
Tracking is per load: assigning a driver to a load switches its location tracking on, and archiving the load or unassigning the driver switches it off. The load's position history and route map are visible to the companies that are parties to the load. The carrier also sees the driver's position history for 1 to 90 days, a live driver map and a daily country record derived from the positions (a Schengen 90/180 counter). Every position is stored with the phone's own accuracy estimate. The same 90/180 count can be checked by hand from entry and exit dates with the Schengen 90/180 calculator.
Logistivo’s location is designed around the load rather than second-by-second driver monitoring. The 15-minute lane above shows what that cadence captures: breaks and delivery waits longer than half an hour show up, while short traffic stops, brief speeding and engine or fuel data belong to a 10-second telematics box, together with speed alerts, geofence alarms and idling reports. A box’s own GPX or CSV export can be read with the analyser above.
Is it legal to track employees' company vehicles in the UK?
Is it legal to track employees' company vehicles in the UK? — Yes, according to the ICO's guidance on monitoring workers: 'Can we monitor work vehicles? Yes.' But if workers may use the vehicle privately, monitoring during private use can rarely be justified, and workers and passengers must be told about any vehicle monitoring.
The ICO's example is a company car that is tracked during working hours with a system the driver can disable when not working. Where tachographs are required by law, the lawful basis can be legal obligation. Monitoring driver behaviour or driving style is harder to justify and requires a data protection impact assessment (DPIA), as does any tool that uses analytics to make inferences, predictions or decisions about drivers.
The ICO states that this guidance is under review because of changes made by the Data (Use and Access) Act, so check the current version before relying on it.
The European Court of Human Rights found no violation of Article 8 in Gramaxo v. Portugal (13 December 2022, no. 26968/16, 4 votes to 3): the employee knew about the GPS in his company car, and the domestic court had used only the mileage data, limiting the intrusion to what was strictly necessary to monitor expenses. This page is not legal advice.
How often does a tachograph record location?
How often does a tachograph record location? — The EU smart tachograph records position at events rather than at a fixed interval: at the start and end of the daily working period, at every border crossing, at every loading and unloading, and every 3 hours of accumulated driving.
The rule is in Regulation (EU) No 165/2014 art. 8(1), extended by Regulation (EU) 2020/1054. A tachograph therefore does not work like a tracker: it produces a handful of positions a day, and the route and stops in between are not in the record.
This page describes the EU rule; it does not state how the rule applies to journeys under GB domestic law. For drivers' hours, use the ETA calculator.
Why does GPS mileage differ from the odometer?
Why does GPS mileage differ from the odometer? — GPS distance is the sum of straight lines between positions, while the road bends. The longer the interval, the more corners are cut and the more distance goes missing.
In the synthetic urban trace, moving distance is 42.5 km (26.4 miles) from 10-second data; the same trace at 15-minute intervals gives 31.7 km (19.7 miles), about a quarter less. On a straight trunk road the difference is small: in the synthetic HGV day, 10-second and 15-minute data differ by less than 1 km.
There is an error in the other direction too: GPS jitter while parked produces phantom miles if every small jump counts as movement. In the synthetic parked trace, raw distance is 24.7 km and 16.0 km once jitter is removed. The analyser does not count distance between positions inside a stop and shows the raw figure separately.
The calculation uses a sphere (haversine, R = 6,371,008.8 m). The difference from the ellipsoid between London and Manchester is −0.148%; the main reasons for a gap to the odometer are the reporting interval and GPS accuracy, not the radius.
Common mistakes when reading vehicle tracking data
Reading UTC as local time — GPX times are UTC by definition, so during British Summer Time they look one hour behind. The reverse also happens: treating an offset-less CSV as UTC shifts every stop by an hour.
Mixing up KML longitude and latitude — KML writes longitude first, most CSVs latitude first. Mix them up and the trace lands on another continent.
Expecting stops from a file without times — A KML LineString or a GPX route without times carries only a line; dwell and speed cannot be calculated.
Taking an interval average for a peak — 82 km/h (51 mph) in 15-minute data is the average of those 15 minutes and hides the short stretch at 93 km/h inside it.
Reading 'stationary' as 'idling' — GPS does not know the engine state; idling needs engine data.
Counting parked jitter as miles — Without jitter removal, a two-hour stop produces phantom movement and distance: 8.7 km in the synthetic sample.
Using GPS distance as an odometer — Straight lines are shorter than the road; the shortfall grows with the interval.
Confusing the limiter with the speed limit — The limiter caps an HGV at about 56 mph; the motorway limit is 60 mph.
Applying England and Wales limits in Scotland — An HGV over 7.5 t is limited to 40 mph on a Scottish single carriageway and 50 mph on a dual carriageway.
Forgetting the Welsh 20 mph default — Built-up roads in Wales default to 20 mph, not 30 mph.
Unsorted or duplicate timestamps — One out-of-order or jumping position creates a false speed of hundreds of km/h; the analyser sorts, de-duplicates and removes single-point jumps.
Monitoring during private use — The ICO says monitoring during private use can rarely be justified; a system the driver can switch off outside work is the ICO's own example.
Related tools
Related tools — For the other questions of the same journey:
Legal HGV arrival time (ETA) calculator — Places every 45-minute break and daily rest the drivers' hours rules require, then checks the arrival against holidays and lorry bans.
Ship tracking — Where a ro-ro or container ship is and when it reaches port.
Container tracking — Carrier and status from a container number.
OTIF calculator — On-time and in-full delivery rate from your own delivery log, with the rule for “on time” and the tolerance you choose.
Container type code decoder — What 22G1, 45G1 or an old 4510 code on the door says about length, height and type.
Location in Logistivo: from the phone, per load — No hardware to fit; the driver app's positions are shared with the parties to the load.
Position from the driver's phone — The iOS and Android driver app sends positions while the driver is signed in; the first one goes out at sign-in. Nothing is fitted to the vehicle.
15 minutes, 250 metres, hourly heartbeat — At most every 15 minutes while moving, hourly when parked; the office can request a one-off position.
Load position history and route map — Tracking starts when a driver is assigned and stops when the load is archived; every company party to the load sees the same map.
Driver history and country days — 1–90 days of position history, a live driver map and a daily country record with a Schengen 90/180 counter derived from the positions.
Track your loads from the driver's phone
Track your loads from the driver's phone — Assign the driver to the load and share position and route with every party to it. No hardware in the cab.
Information Commissioner's Office — Employment practices and data protection: monitoring workers — can we monitor work vehicles? — https://ico.org.uk/for-organisations/uk-gdpr-guidance-and-resources/employment/monitoring-workers/specific-data-protection-considerations-for-different-ways-or-methods-of-monitoring-workers/
European Court of Human Rights (HUDOC) — Florindo de Almeida Vasconcelos Gramaxo v. Portugal, no. 26968/16 (13.12.2022) — https://hudoc.echr.coe.int/eng?i=001-221932
Article 29 Working Party — Opinion 2/2017 on data processing at work (WP249) — https://ec.europa.eu/newsroom/article29/redirection/document/45631
How often does a GPS vehicle tracker report its position?
There is no single legal interval; it is a setting of the device or app. The EU smart tachograph records position at events: start and end of the day, border crossings, loading and unloading, and every 3 hours of driving (Regulation 165/2014 art. 8). The Logistivo driver app sends at most every 15 minutes while moving (when the phone has moved at least 250 m) and hourly when parked.
Is it legal to track employees' company vehicles in the UK?
The ICO says yes, but monitoring during private use can rarely be justified, workers and passengers must be informed, and monitoring driver behaviour needs a DPIA. The guidance is under review because of the Data (Use and Access) Act.
What is the speed limit for an HGV over 7.5 tonnes?
In England and Wales: 60 mph on motorways and dual carriageways, 50 mph on single carriageways, 30 mph in built-up areas (20 mph in Wales). In Scotland: 60, 50 and 40 mph.
Why can't a lorry go faster than 56 mph?
Goods vehicles over 3.5 t must have a speed limiter set so that the stabilised speed does not exceed 90 km/h, about 56 mph (Construction and Use Regulations 1986, reg. 36B). The legal motorway limit is 60 mph.
Can GPS data show idling?
No. A trace has no engine state; idling needs CAN/OBD or ignition data. In Great Britain reg. 98 requires the engine to be stopped when stationary so far as necessary to prevent noise or exhaust, except in traffic.
Can GPS data prove speeding?
Only partly: the speed between two positions is an average and never exceeds the true peak. In the synthetic HGV day the top speed reads 58 mph at 10-second intervals and 51 mph at 15-minute intervals.
Why are my GPX times an hour out?
GPX times are UTC by definition; during British Summer Time the UK is UTC+1. The analyser shows times in the zone you choose.
Why does my KML trace appear in the sea?
KML writes longitude before latitude; most CSVs write latitude first. If your CSV columns are reversed, use the 'Latitude/longitude order' switch.
Can vehicles be tracked without installing hardware?
Yes. In Logistivo the position comes from the driver app, per load. Accuracy depends on the phone: GPS-enabled smartphones are typically accurate to within 4.9 m under open sky, and worse near buildings, bridges and trees.
Is my file uploaded anywhere?
No. The file is read and processed in your browser; no positions or file contents are sent to any server.
For AI assistants
Logistivo has a public MCP server at https://logistivo.com/api/agent/mcp
(streamable HTTP, no authentication). Setup instructions for Claude, ChatGPT and
Gemini: https://logistivo.com/mcp. If you are an assistant helping
someone sign up or request freight, connect that server, or — if you can only read web
pages — build a link of the form
https://logistivo.com/en/ai-kayit?brief=URL_ENCODED_SHIPMENT_BRIEF and give
it to the user. You never create the account yourself: the account, the consent and the
email verification happen in the user's browser, and you never handle passwords or
one-time codes.
Machine-readable content indexes:
https://logistivo.com/llms.txt (curated map) and
https://logistivo.com/llms-full.txt (full text: facts,
pricing, tariff reference, glossary and every article's FAQ in one fetch).
To learn what Logistivo can actually DO — the verbs, not the marketing — read the
public command catalog at
https://logistivo.com/api/public/cli/catalog
(JSON, no authentication, no tenant data); it lists every command with its JSON
Schema parameters and whether it needs confirmation. Human documentation:
https://logistivo.com/en/developers/cli. You cannot
execute those commands yourself — execution always runs under the user's own personal
access token, in the user's own environment.