Inspections, insurance and servicing: how to never miss a machinery deadline on the farm

The deadlines every farm machine comes with, from tractor insurance and roadworthiness tests to sprayer inspections and oil changes by engine hours, and how to keep track of them without a calendar on the wall.

On a farm with a few machines there are more deadlines than you'd think: insurance policies, roadworthiness tests, sprayer inspections, oil and filter changes. Each one is simple on its own, but together they add up to dozens a year. And a missed one tends to show up at the worst moment, in the middle of harvest or out on the road.

The deadlines a machine comes with

• Third-party insurance: compulsory in the EU for every registered tractor, trailer or vehicle. Driving, or in some countries even just keeping, a registered vehicle without valid cover can mean a hefty fine.
• Roadworthiness tests: registered tractors and trailers need periodic technical inspections. The intervals depend on your country, and the next due date is on your test certificate.
• Sprayer inspection: under EU rules on the sustainable use of pesticides, sprayers in professional use must be tested at an approved station, in most cases every 3 years. Without a valid test you may not spray with it.
• Servicing: oil, filters and fluids changed every so many engine hours or kilometres, as the manufacturer's manual says.
• Optional policies: machinery damage cover, harvest-time combine insurance or building cover, each with its own end date.

Why deadlines slip

• Policies end in different months, because the machines were bought in different years.
• The engine-hour meter is read at the tractor, while the service plan is in a notebook back at the house.
• The test gets remembered by whoever happens to be driving the machine, not whoever is responsible for it.
• The repair history stays on invoices in a binder, so it's hard to show when you sell the machine.

One record for every machine

The simplest approach is to keep everything about a machine in one place: the registration number, policies with their end dates, the next test date, the meter reading and the service history. Then instead of digging through a binder, you look at one record and see straight away what needs doing.

How AgroDuty handles it

In the AgroDuty Garage every machine has its own record with service history, inspections, insurance policies and an engine-hour counter. You enter a policy or test end date once and the app reminds you ahead of time, so there's room to compare insurance quotes or book the test station before the season. You update the meter reading by the machine, even with no signal, and the cost of every repair goes straight into the farm's finances.

Your whole farm in one app

Barn, fields, garage and finances on one phone. Get AgroDuty and leave the notebook in the drawer.