Guide · covers NHVAS and the HVA scheme · checked against the NHVR's documents on 28 September 2026

What the NHVR actually requires in your maintenance records

The law does not hand you a form. It hands you a duty, and then, if you are accredited, a scheme that says what an auditor will want to see. There are two of those schemes running at once right now. Here is which one you are on, what each of them asks you to keep, and how long to keep it.

The short version

Every party in the chain has a primary duty under the Heavy Vehicle National Law to ensure the safety of their transport activities so far as is reasonably practicable. That includes how vehicles are maintained, and it applies whether or not you hold any accreditation. Reasonably practicable is a test you pass with evidence: you have to be able to show what you checked, what you found, what you did about it and when.

If you are accredited, the records are spelled out, but the two schemes spell them out differently. NHVAS has eight numbered Maintenance Management standards, listed below, and a quarterly compliance report. The HVA scheme, which replaced it on 1 August 2026, has no numbered maintenance standards and asks instead for records showing the work is being done as part of normal operations. What both want on the ground is identical: the daily check, the fault report, the repair record and the service schedule. Where they part company is retention. NHVAS says three years, and the 2026 HVA guideline names no period in years at all.

Which scheme are you on

Two accreditation schemes are running at once right now, and they ask for different things. If you hold NHVAS accreditation today then you are still on NHVAS, because it has not been switched off, and the eight numbered Maintenance Management standards further down are the ones your auditor will work through. If you came in after 1 August 2026, or you have already moved across, you are on the Heavy Vehicle Accreditation scheme, where there are no numbered maintenance standards at all and the requirements are written as outcomes instead. If you hold no accreditation then neither set binds you, but the primary duty does, and the records both schemes ask for are the plainest evidence that you are meeting it.

The practical test is your own paperwork: the label on the vehicle and the wording on your accreditation certificate will name the scheme you are in. That matters more than any transition date, because the NHVR has said operators have up to three years to move and, as far as we could find, has not published a final calendar date for it.

The daily checks, faults, repairs and service records this page describes are the ones AssetPass keeps as the work happens, under either scheme. Send your asset list and it comes back loaded.

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The duty everybody has

The primary duty provision of the HVNL puts the duty on ten kinds of party: the employer of a driver, the prime contractor, the operator, the scheduler, the consignor, the consignee, the packer, the loading manager, the loader and the unloader. The regulator's own advice on that duty says each of them must consider how heavy vehicle procurement and maintenance is undertaken and managed. A further provision adds a duty on executives to exercise due diligence to make sure the business complies.

In its regulatory advice on maintenance the NHVR describes what reasonable control measures look like: a systematic service schedule that follows the manufacturer's specifications, a daily checklist, a recording and reporting system for faults, defects and maintenance history, faults responded to and fixed in a timely manner, and grounding an unsafe vehicle until the defect is rectified. Read that list twice. It is the accreditation standards in everyday clothes, and it is what a reasonable operator is expected to be able to show whether they carry an accreditation label or not.

What changed on 1 August 2026

The amended Heavy Vehicle National Law commenced on 1 August 2026. With it came the Heavy Vehicle Accreditation scheme, and its own guideline says plainly that it replaces NHVAS. The accreditation types it offers are General Safety Accreditation, General Safety Accreditation with the Maintenance Assurance Program, and Alternative Compliance Accreditation for fatigue and for mass. Maintenance is the Assurance Program, not the Alternative Compliance stream, which is worth being precise about because the older tier lists in circulation put it in the wrong place. The Assurance Program carries on the exemption from the annual inspections that form part of registration, in New South Wales and Queensland.

The bigger change is in how an audit works. Instead of ticking through one module, the auditor assesses a whole of business safety management system, which the guideline builds from five connected components: leadership and commitment, risk management, safety systems, assurance, monitoring and improvement, and people. Maintenance is one thread running through that rather than a box of its own, which is why the maintenance wording is now about records showing the work happens rather than about criteria to satisfy.

If you hold NHVAS accreditation today, nothing stopped on the day. The NHVR's own implementation material puts it this way:

It's important to note that the existing National Heavy Vehicle Accreditation Scheme (NHVAS) will continue to operate during a transition period.
HVNL implementation FAQs, NHVR

The same material gives the length of that period without giving it an end:

Operators currently accredited in the NHVAS will have up to three years to transition to the new scheme.
HVNL implementation FAQs, NHVR

Three years from what is not spelled out, and we could find no published calendar date for the end of the transition anywhere on the NHVR site, so we are not going to quote you a deadline. The useful date is your own accreditation expiry. The daily records did not change either way: the daily check, the fault report, the repair record and the service schedule are what they were. What does not carry across is the three year retention number, as the section on how long to keep it explains below.

What the HVA scheme asks for

The NHVR's Heavy Vehicle Accreditation Scheme Operator Guideline 2026 states the change in one line:

The HVA scheme replaces the National Heavy Vehicle Accreditation Scheme (NHVAS).
Heavy Vehicle Accreditation Scheme Operator Guideline 2026, NHVR

Where NHVAS set out eight numbered Maintenance Management standards, the HVA guideline sets out none. We searched it for the phrase Maintenance Management Standard 5 and could not find it, nor any numbered standard in that form. Maintenance instead sits inside the Maintenance Assurance Program, which runs under General Safety Accreditation, and the guideline organises it as four groups of controls: daily check controls, fault recording and reporting controls, fault repair controls, and maintenance schedules and methods controls.

The wording is outcomes rather than audit criteria, and three sentences carry most of it. The first is the one that describes what a maintenance record is for:

Keep records showing that Daily Checks, fault reporting and maintenance work are being carried out as part of day-to-day operations.
Heavy Vehicle Accreditation Scheme Operator Guideline 2026, NHVR

The second is the fault loop, and note that it asks for three things rather than one, a log, a check and a ranking:

Ensure reported faults are logged, checked and ranked for repair.
Heavy Vehicle Accreditation Scheme Operator Guideline 2026, NHVR

The third sits under the heading Maintenance schedules and methods controls, and it is the one most operators are thinnest on, because a schedule with intervals but no task list only answers half of it:

Have maintenance schedules in place that set out the service intervals and clearly show the work to be done at each service.
Heavy Vehicle Accreditation Scheme Operator Guideline 2026, NHVR

The daily check survives the change intact, and the guideline is careful to say what it is not:

The Daily Check focuses on safety-critical components and markers and is not a detailed mechanical inspection.
Heavy Vehicle Accreditation Scheme Operator Guideline 2026, NHVR

Read the three requirements together and the day to day paperwork has not changed at all. A daily check with a date and a name on it, a fault raised and ranked, a repair closed out, a service schedule with intervals and tasks. What changed is that nobody will hand you a numbered criterion to tick. You are asked to show the records exist and that the work is happening as part of normal operations, which is a harder thing to fake and an easier thing to satisfy if you were already doing it.

The auditor's designation changed too, and the old phrasing now matches neither scheme:

Your operation will be audited by a HVA scheme approved auditor.
Heavy Vehicle Accreditation Scheme Operator Guideline 2026, NHVR

Approved auditors are those registered on the NHVR register of approved auditors.
Heavy Vehicle Accreditation Scheme Operator Guideline 2026, NHVR

So if you are writing to somebody about booking an audit, an NHVR auditor and an NHVAS auditor are both the wrong phrase now. The term is a HVA scheme approved auditor, from the NHVR register of approved auditors.

The eight NHVAS standards, as the records they produce

This section is NHVAS only. If you have moved to the HVA scheme there are no numbered maintenance standards to work through and the section above is yours. If you are still on NHVAS, which most accredited operators are, these eight are what the auditor works through. Auditors read them as requirements; it is more useful to read them as the pieces of paper, or rows, that each one expects to exist.

Standard 1: Daily check

A daily check for each vehicle on the days it is in use. The record shows when it was done, who did it and how it was recorded. Any fault found goes onto the fault report, not into somebody's head.

Standard 2: Fault recording and reporting

A way for a driver to record a fault during a journey and report it to whoever does the maintenance, as soon as reasonably practicable. It covers the trailer as well as the prime mover.

Standard 3: Fault repair

Each reported fault is identified, assessed and acted on, with a repair priority. If a fault is deferred or monitored rather than fixed, the record names the person who made that decision. When the repair is done, the record shows it was rectified and, where appropriate, tested.

Standard 4: Maintenance schedules and methods

Periodic maintenance schedules with identified service periods that describe the tasks to be completed. Nominated vehicles have an annual mechanical inspection recorded on an approved checklist.

Standard 5: Records and documentation

Documented evidence that the system is actually operating: a register of the nominated vehicles, a register of who holds which responsibility, and evidence for every step, the daily checks, the fault reports, the repairs and the services. This is the standard everything else reports to: if it is not written down with a date and a name, it did not happen.

Standard 6: Responsibilities

The authorities, responsibilities and duties of everyone involved in running, administering and checking the system, current, clearly defined and documented.

Standard 7: Internal review

A quarterly review and an annual review that the system is doing what the procedures say. The quarterly one produces a compliance statement, accepted and signed by the responsible person, setting out what the system did over the quarter. The items it lists are below.

Standard 8: Training and education

The people who hold a position under the system are trained in, and familiar with, the procedures they are meant to carry out, and there is a record of that too.

What the daily check covers

The NHVAS standard lists what the daily check inspects, and the HVA guideline describes the same walk around in outcome wording rather than a list. It is short on purpose under both: a look over before it moves, not a service.

Wheels and tyres, including a visual check of pressure and tread
Lights and reflectors
Windows, mirrors and wipers
Structure and bodywork
Brakes
Tow couplings and drawbars
The accreditation label and the intercept report book

The record has to show when it was done, who did it and how it was recorded, and any fault found goes straight onto the fault report. A tick sheet in the cab with no name and no date meets none of that.

Faults, deferrals and repairs

Under both schemes a driver has to be able to record a fault when it happens and report it to whoever does the maintenance as soon as reasonably practicable, for the trailer as well as the prime mover. On the workshop side, each fault is assessed and given a priority. The HVA guideline compresses that into one sentence, which is worth holding on to as a test of your own system: reported faults are logged, checked and ranked for repair. Two details catch people out. If a fault is deferred or put on watch instead of fixed, the record must name the person who made that call. And when the repair is done, the record shows the fault was rectified and tested, not just closed.

The NHVAS quarterly compliance report

This one is NHVAS only. We searched the 2026 HVA guideline for a quarterly compliance statement and could not find one, so if you have moved across, do not go looking for this obligation in the new scheme. Under NHVAS, once a quarter you write a report on how the module went, and the Maintenance Management Accreditation Guide sets out what goes in it:

Every quarter, you must write a compliance report that lists: the number of nominated vehicles in your fleet; the number of daily checks on nominated vehicles and the number of daily checks that were missed. Daily checks are counted on a per vehicle basis, not vehicle combination basis (e.g. for a B-double combination, this comprises three daily checks); the number of services completed and the number of services that were missed; the total number of fault repairs and total incidences when faults were not rectified; the number of notices issued for a vehicle not complying with vehicle standards regulations.
NHVAS Maintenance Management Accreditation Guide, June 2021, NHVR

The line about counting each unit separately is the detail that catches people out, and it is the reason a count taken per combination will not reconcile.

1Nominated vehicles
2Daily checks undertaken, and the number missed, counted per unit and not per combination
3Services completed, and the number missed
4Fault repairs, and the times a fault was not rectified
5Notices issued for a vehicle not complying with vehicle standards regulations

Most of those are counts of things that were done, and any system that records the doing can produce them. The awkward one is daily checks missed, because to count a miss you have to know which assets worked on which days. Be wary of any software that prints that number without knowing that. A guess on a signed report is worse than a blank.

How long to keep it

Under NHVAS, three years, and the citation for it is narrower than most pages claim. The rule is in the NHVAS Maintenance Management Accreditation Guide of June 2021, under the heading Documents you must keep:

All documents must be kept for a minimum of three years for audit purposes.
NHVAS Maintenance Management Accreditation Guide, June 2021, NHVR

It is not in Standard 5, and Standard 5 sets no retention period at all. That is the attribution you will see repeated everywhere, and it is wrong. Maintenance Management Standard 5 in the NHVAS Business Rules and Standards is headed Records and documentation, and its statement is about sufficiency of evidence rather than a period of time:

Documented evidence must be maintained to demonstrate the effective operation of the Maintenance Management System in accordance with the Maintenance Management Standards.
NHVAS Business Rules and Standards, Maintenance Management Standard 5, NHVR

We read Standard 5 through, statement and criteria, looking for a period in years, and could not find one. Its criteria are about what must exist: a documented procedure and a register for the nominated vehicles, documentary evidence that the daily check is being done, that faults on the road are recorded and reported, that reported faults are repaired within the nominated deferred time frames, that vehicles are maintained to the set periodic service schedules, and a register of everyone holding a responsibility under the accreditation. A requirement that records exist is not a requirement that they be kept for a set time, and the two get run together constantly.

There is a second three year rule inside NHVAS and it is narrower than it sounds. It sits at Standard 7, Internal review, clause (8), and it is a document control rule about superseded versions of your own procedures rather than about maintenance records. The Accreditation Guide states the same rule in plainer words:

You must keep a record of any changes to documents and procedures. The original documents and procedures must be kept for a minimum of three years.
NHVAS Maintenance Management Accreditation Guide, June 2021, NHVR

So if you rewrite your daily check procedure, you keep the old one. That is a different obligation from keeping the checks themselves, and it is the one most systems quietly fail, because procedures get overwritten in place.

The 2026 HVA guideline sets no retention period in years at all. It replaces the number with a proportionality test:

Keep records in a format and for a length of time that allow for audit and review, without creating more administrative tasks than needed for the risk profile of the business.
Heavy Vehicle Accreditation Scheme Operator Guideline 2026, NHVR

We searched that guideline for a retention period expressed in years and could not find one. The only figure in years we did find in it concerns a compliance history declaration at application, which is a different thing from how long you hold your maintenance records. That second clause about the risk profile of the business is worth reading twice if you run ten assets rather than two hundred.

Outside accreditation the law names no period that we could find. Three years remains a sensible floor either way, because it is the number NHVAS audits worked to and because an HVA auditor still has to be able to review something. But it is the NHVAS answer rather than a timeless one, and an operator moving across should be working from their own scheme's words and not from a number they remember. The seven year figure you may meet appears in none of the NHVAS Business Rules and Standards, the Maintenance Management Accreditation Guide or the NHVAS Audit Framework.

What an auditor will ask to see

Put plainly, and in roughly the order they ask: the daily checks for an asset they pick, with dates and names. The faults raised from those checks and from the road, and what happened to each one. Any deferral, and who signed it. The repair records, closed out. The service schedule for that asset, with intervals and tasks, and the evidence each service happened when it was due. Who is responsible for what, written down. On NHVAS, the last quarterly compliance report. And then the same again for an asset you did not expect.

That list is the same under both schemes, which is the quietly reassuring part of this page. The HVA wording asks you to keep records showing the work is being carried out as part of day to day operations, and the evidence that satisfies it is the evidence NHVAS asked for. If your records are in order today, the transition is an administrative job rather than a rebuild.

Where a spreadsheet stops being enough

A spreadsheet holds a service schedule well. It does not hold a daily check done by a driver at six in the morning, a fault reported from the road with a photo, or the name of the person who deferred a repair, and it cannot count the quarter for you. Most operators who fail a maintenance audit have done the maintenance. What they cannot do is show it.

What AssetPass keeps

Every prestart is filed with the date, the person and photos on the items that failed. Every fault is a record with who raised it and when, and it stays open until a jobcard closes it, showing what was done, by whom, and what it cost, or somebody dismisses it as a duplicate or as needing no work. Service schedules run on kilometres, hours or days and turn red when they slip. Tests proved by a certificate, like a hose pressure test, keep every certificate against the asset. Crew licences, medicals and tickets carry their own expiry. And the compliance statement for any period counts prestarts filed, faults raised, unresolved and resolved, jobcards completed, services overdue and tests done and overdue, exactly, and says on its own face that it does not estimate daily checks missed.

It is $7 an asset a month, $35 minimum, ex GST. One rate for every asset, unlimited users and no contract. The Assistant, which reads a photographed paper jobcard and files it against the asset, is an optional extra at $2 an asset a month. Send us the asset list you already have and we will build it and hand it back loaded, or open an account and paste your rows in yourself. Either way it is thirty days free and we do not take a card to start.

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The Maintenance Assurance Program under the HVA scheme The prestart checklist guide The heavy vehicle inspection checklist guide NHVAS and HVA audits: what the auditor asks to see

Questions people ask

Has NHVAS been replaced?

Yes, and not yet, both at once. The Heavy Vehicle Accreditation scheme commenced on 1 August 2026 and the NHVR's Heavy Vehicle Accreditation Scheme Operator Guideline 2026 says the HVA scheme replaces the National Heavy Vehicle Accreditation Scheme. But the NHVR's implementation material also says the existing NHVAS will continue to operate during a transition period, and existing accreditation stays valid. So both names are live right now, and most accredited operators are still on NHVAS.

How long do I have to move from NHVAS to the HVA scheme?

The NHVR says operators currently accredited in the NHVAS will have up to three years to transition to the new scheme. Three years from what is not spelled out, and we could find no published calendar date for the end of the transition, so we are not quoting a deadline. The date that actually governs you is your own accreditation expiry, which is on your certificate. The NHVR has a page headed NHVAS transition to HVA scheme and it is linked at the bottom of this page.

Which scheme am I on, and which part of this page applies to me?

If you hold NHVAS accreditation today you are on NHVAS, and the eight numbered Maintenance Management standards apply to you. If you came in after 1 August 2026 or you have already moved, you are on the HVA scheme, where there are no numbered maintenance standards and the requirements are written as outcomes. If you hold no accreditation, neither applies, but the primary duty under the Heavy Vehicle National Law does, and it is satisfied with the same evidence.

What maintenance records does the HVA scheme want?

Three sentences in the Operator Guideline carry most of it. Keep records showing that Daily Checks, fault reporting and maintenance work are being carried out as part of day to day operations. Ensure reported faults are logged, checked and ranked for repair. And have maintenance schedules in place that set out the service intervals and clearly show the work to be done at each service. In practice that is the daily check, the fault report, the repair record and the service schedule, which is what NHVAS asked for too.

How long do I have to keep maintenance records?

Three years under NHVAS, on the citation that actually supports it: the NHVAS Maintenance Management Accreditation Guide of June 2021, under the heading Documents you must keep, says all documents must be kept for a minimum of three years for audit purposes. The 2026 HVA guideline sets no period in years at all, asking instead for records kept in a format and for a length of time that allow for audit and review, scaled to the risk profile of the business. Outside accreditation the law names no period we could find. Three years is a sensible floor either way.

Does Maintenance Management Standard 5 require three years?

That is not where we found it. Standard 5 is headed Records and documentation and its statement is about sufficiency of evidence: documented evidence must be maintained to demonstrate the effective operation of the Maintenance Management System. We read it through looking for a period in years and could not find one. The three year rule inside the Business Rules is at Standard 7, Internal review, clause 8, and it is a document control rule about keeping superseded versions of your own procedures. The rule that supports the broad claim is in the Accreditation Guide, so that is the one this page cites.

What does an auditor actually want to see?

Daily checks with a date and a name on them. Faults recorded as they were found, with who reported them and when. Repairs closed out with the fault rectified and, where appropriate, tested. Where a fault was deferred, the name of the person who decided that. A service schedule with the intervals and the tasks, and evidence the services happened. Who is responsible for what, in writing. On NHVAS, the last quarterly compliance report. The list is the same under both schemes. One thing has changed: the person is now a HVA scheme approved auditor, registered on the NHVR register of approved auditors, rather than an NHVAS auditor.

What goes in the NHVAS quarterly compliance report?

The Maintenance Management Accreditation Guide says you must write a compliance report every quarter listing the number of nominated vehicles, the number of daily checks and the number missed, the number of services completed and the number missed, the total fault repairs and the times a fault was not rectified, and the number of notices issued for a vehicle not complying with vehicle standards regulations. Daily checks are counted per unit and not per combination. We could find no equivalent quarterly report requirement in the 2026 HVA guideline. AssetPass counts prestarts filed, faults raised, unresolved and resolved, jobcards completed and services overdue exactly. It does not estimate daily checks missed, because it does not know which assets worked on which days, and it says so on the statement rather than printing a guess.

Sources

Every quotation above was read off these documents on 28 September 2026, and each one was checked from at least two directions before it went up. Two of the links, the NHVR's transition pages, are here for you rather than as citations: we could not read their contents, so nothing on this page is quoted from them. If the NHVR changes any of these, this page is wrong until it is checked again, and the date at the top will tell you.

Whichever scheme you are on, the evidence is the same and it has to exist before the auditor asks. Send your asset list and we will set it up and hand it back loaded.

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This is a guide, not legal advice. If your operation is accredited, your auditor and the NHVR's own guidance material are the final word.