Defra's is the second tracking system your yard needs. The EA already asked for the first.
Most of the trade talk this year is about Defra's system, the one that goes live on 1 October. Worth remembering that it is the second tracking system the regulator asks of an ATF. The first is in the Environment Agency's appropriate measures for permitted ELV facilities, the standard your permit is inspected against, and it has been there since before anyone said "digital waste tracking".
Section 3 is the part that describes a tracking system. The quotes below are the EA's own words.
What the EA already expects your records to do
Weigh it on arrival, and record it. "You must assess the weight of each load of ELVs on arrival" and "must record the weight in a suitable ELV tracking system."
Know what is on site, right now. The system must report "the total quantity of ELVs present on site at any one time", broken down by type, with each vehicle's physical location. That is the inspector's first question, answered before they walk the yard.
Keep the records for years. Pre-acceptance records "for at least 3 years in a suitable ELV tracking system following receipt of the ELV". Acceptance records for at least two more after the vehicle is treated or leaves.
Keep a copy somewhere else. "You must store back-up copies of computer records off site." A diary in the office drawer has no answer to that line. A cloud record meets it by construction.
Reject properly. You need "clear criteria that you use to reject non-conforming ELVs" and a written procedure for recording and tracking them, including telling the customer.
Mind the quarantine clock. "Quarantine storage must be for a maximum of 14 working days" unless the EA agrees an extension. A marked area, separate from everything else, and a deadline that does not pause for the weekend rush.
The honest reading
Not every line is a must. An electronic system is a "should": the guidance allows equivalent information held another way, and plenty of yards run on paper and pass inspections. The appropriate measures are also guidance rather than a statute. But they are what your permit compliance is assessed against, and your compliance band prices your permit, so the gap between "should" and "must" is measured in subsistence charges.
Two systems, one gate
So from 1 October the law describes two records for the same car. Defra's waste receipt, reported within two working days. And the EA's tracking record, held on site for years, from pre-acceptance to final treatment. Different regulators, different deadlines, same thirty seconds at the gate.
That is why BreakerHQ records the arrival date, who brought it, the weight, the hazards and the reclassification as one record, files the Defra receipt from it, and keeps the lot as an evidence pack an inspector can hold. One entry at the gate, both systems fed. The parts we do not cover yet, like a pre-booking diary and a quarantine clock, are on the list, and what yards ask for first is what gets built first, so tell us.