Updates to Geotab ELD Functionality

Special Bulletin for Transflo Telematics, ELD, and HOS Customers

 

Announced: June 20, 2025

Geotab is releasing a new update to help you keep your Electronic Logging Device (ELD) logs accurate and compliant. This update addresses an issue that occurs when a driver switches vehicles while in an active special driving category, such as Personal Conveyance (PC), Yard Move (YM) or an HOS-exempt status.

Drivers will see a confirmation prompt when they switch vehicles while an exemption is active. This change confirms the driver's time is always recorded correctly and that their ELD functions as expected.

No action is required to enable this update to the existing Geotab Drive app functionality. Drivers should be made aware that if they switch vehicles while in a special driving category, they will see a new prompt and must make a selection to ensure their logs are recorded correctly.

To understand how it will work, follow these example steps:

 

  1. As a driver in vehicle V1, activate an HOS exemption such as PC or YM.

  2. For any number of reasons, have the same driver switch to vehicle V2.

  3. The following new Exemption Confirmation prompt will appear at some point in 2025, perhaps as early as July 2025:

  4. Decide how to proceed:

    • End Exemption: Tap this option to end the PC or YM exemption. The special driving category will end at the time of the vehicle change. The driver will then be in a standard ON duty or DRIVE status in their new vehicle.

    • Yes: Tap Yes to continue the exemption. The system will create a new PC, YM, or HOS-exempt record that is correctly associated with the new vehicle. The time of the vehicle switch is clearly tracked and all compliance rules apply correctly to the new vehicle.

     

Announced: May 1, 2025

As part of data best practices and in an effort to ensure systems continue to operate at peak efficiency, Geotab will issue requests to fleet administrators to remove or purge data older than two years. From April to September of 2025, Geotab has started automatically applying a 2 or 4 year retention period to all customers. Database administrators will have 3 weeks to adjust the retention period before data is deleted.

By default, data retention is set to 2 years. In cases where organizations have specific data retention requirements that differ from the standard two-year policy, database administrators can manually adjust retention settings to meet those requirements. The time period options vary based on the category of data up to a maximum of 8 years (not recommended and subject to change; to improve performance we recommend shorter data retention time periods with 2 years as a standard default setting).

Data categories include:

  • Driving and Exception data

  • Fuel Transaction data

  • HOS data

  • Asset Inspection data

  • Personal Trip data

 

Note: Retain all data necessary to satisfy your organization's legal and regulatory requirements. After Geotab data is purged, telematics providers including Transflo no longer have any access to that data. All Transflo customers can continue to purge or download your data using the myGeotab fleet management application.

 

 

Learn more at https://support.geotab.com/en-GB/mygeotab/doc/release-notes.

 

As previously announced in early 2025, Geotab released modifications to their ELD functionality to align with compliance directives issued by the FMCSA and Transport Canada. Geotab Drive, Transflo HOS, and Transflo Mobile+ apps have automatically received the updated functionality when it was released. These changes are specifically related to the handling of Maximum Personal Conveyance Limits and Time Recorded for Automatic On-Duty Status Changes.

As a leading Geotab partner and reseller, Transflo highly recommends that carriers and drivers review the changes to understand how these changes could impact your Hours-of-Service (HOS) management and operational policies. Details can be found on the Geotab Support site at the links provided below:

 

Future Change:

Jurisdiction:

Learn More:

FMCSA USA:

Transport Canada:

Automatic On-Duty Timing Change

Before this change: After a vehicle comes to a stop for six (6) full minutes, the automatic ON-duty not driving status is back-dated to six (6) minutes earlier.

After this change: After a vehicle comes to a stop for six (6) full minutes, the automatic ON-duty not driving status is created. This can result in a six-minute difference between the current functionality and the upcoming change. If a driver manually changes their status before the automatic change, their manual changes are preserved and the automatic status change will not occur and will not change their status.

Yes

Yes

Geotab Release Notes

Draft Document

Auto vs. Manual Changes After a Stop

Maximum Personal Conveyance Limit for US Drivers*

Drivers in the US can no longer automatically exit Personal Conveyance (PC) once they reach the maximum PC distance set for their user. Instead, a new system log is created for Administrators to use that can be reported on. This allows Administrators to track the drivers in their fleets that exceed their expected PC use in a day, but does not automatically put the driver into Drive status once they reach the expected maximum PC limit.

Yes

No**

Geotab Release Notes (scroll down to Jan 31, 2025)

Draft Document

Start or Stop a Personal Conveyance HOS Exemption

Set a Maximum PC Distance Per Day

 

Notes:

* The updated Personal Conveyance limit exceeded message will only display within the Geotab dashboard.

** When using PC under Canadian HOS/ELD regulations, drivers will continue to be switched to DRIVE status automatically when they have exceeded 75.0 km for the day.