Waiting time at RDCs: do you get paid for it?

By Gary Webster · Updated 18 October 2026 · 7 min read

Every driver knows the shape of the day: booked for 06:00, tipped at 11:40, five hours of your life spent in a queue with a ticket and a porta-loo. Whether those hours show up on your payslip depends on your contract, how the time is recorded, and whether you keep your own record. Here's what actually determines it.

The short answer

There is no single UK law that says "all waiting time must be paid at full rate". What there is:

Your contract. Most RDC-based contracts pay an hourly rate for all working time, or a reduced rate after a threshold (the first hour unpaid, half pay after two, and so on). What counts as working time is where the argument lives.
National Minimum Wage rules. Time when you're required to be at the workplace and available for work generally counts as working time for NMW purposes, even if you're waiting. If your pay divided by your NMW hours drops below the legal minimum, that's a problem for the employer, and it's why blanket-unpaid waiting is rare in writing.
Working time rules. Waiting that isn't a genuine period of availability counts as "other work" under the Road Transport (Working Time) Regulations. See the POA guide for that boundary.

So: waiting is usually payable, sometimes at a reduced rate, and only vanishes from your payslip when it's mis-recorded as POA or break, or when nobody counts it because you didn't either.

Why the tacho record decides your pay

Operators pay off the record. If four hours at the gate went down as POA, the payroll sees no hours. If it went down as break, same result. The correct treatment for unpredictable waiting at an RDC gate is normally other work: you're at the employer's disposal, you can't leave, and you don't know how long it will take. That's not break, and it usually isn't POA either, because the duration isn't known in advance.

The queue is not your rest. Record what actually happened, and the pay argument becomes arithmetic instead of opinion.

What to do about it, in order

Read your contract before you need it. Find the waiting-time clause. If there isn't one, waiting defaults to the argument that it's working time, which is usually the stronger position. Know the number before the day it matters.
Record your own times. Gate in, gate out, trailer number, who told you what and when. A photo of the ticket on your phone is time-stamped evidence. One week of notes is worth more than a month of complaints.
Check your card matches reality. If waiting time has been logged as POA or break and it shouldn't have been, say so, in writing, to your transport manager. Keep it factual: "Friday 12th, gate 3, 09:10 to 13:25, four hours recorded as POA, no advance duration given."
Put the number on the table. Four unpaid hours a week at £15 is £60, or £3,000 a year. Frame it that way and it stops being moaning and becomes a cost the firm knows you can count.
If it's systemic, it's not just you. Persistent unpaid working time can be raised with ACAS (free, confidential) and NMW shortfalls with HMRC. Drivers rarely want the war; they want the hours counted. Both routes exist if the quiet version fails.

The words to use with the traffic office

Factual beats furious every time. Something like:

"Happy to wait when the load's not ready, that's the job. I need it recorded as other work, not POA, because no one could tell me how long it would be, and I need the pay to follow the record. Can you confirm how gate time is paid under my contract?"

Written, not shouted across the yard. Most firms know exactly what the rules are; a driver who clearly knows too changes the arithmetic of fobbing you off.

Before you take the job: ask about the gates

When you're comparing offers, the advertised rate is only half the story. Ask:

How many RDC or port collections per week, on average?
What's the average turn time at the worst customer?
How is gate time recorded and paid, from the first minute or after a threshold?
Is there detention pay passed through from customers?

A £14 job that pays all gate time beats a £16 job that doesn't, on any week with two long waits. Run both through the calculator and you'll see it in one screen.

Where to check the rules yourself

For the current position, check GOV.UK on the National Minimum Wage and working time, DVSA guidance on recording waiting and POA, and ACAS on raising pay disputes. This guide is general information, not legal advice, and rules change.

The unpaid day, dissected. Chapter 3 of Know Your Worth, "The Unpaid Day", takes a long RDC day apart hour by hour. It's also the free sample chapter, no email needed.

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General information, not legal advice. Next: period of availability explained.