Chain of Responsibility Training for Executives, Directors & Boards

The Heavy Vehicle National Law (HVNL) places a specific executive officer duty on directors, officers, and senior managers of parties in the chain. If your business sends, carries, receives, loads, or schedules heavy-vehicle freight, you personally carry CoR exposure — separate from the corporate entity’s. The NHVR has prosecuted executives personally, with penalties up to $3 million per offence for a corporation and significant personal fines and imprisonment for officers. This page outlines what executives and directors need to know, and how to document your understanding. Online, self-paced, under an hour, $69.

  • NHVR and HVNL aligned
  • Executive officer duty framed
  • Online, self-paced, under 1 hour
  • $69 — documented evidence of understanding
  • Delivered by FMS — RTO 45189

The executive officer duty

The HVNL requires executive officers of parties in the chain to exercise due diligence to ensure the body corporate complies with its primary duty. This is substantially aligned with the WHS model law’s officer duty — but it’s a separate statutory duty under the HVNL, prosecutable in its own right. Due diligence includes:

  • Acquiring and keeping up-to-date knowledge of transport activities
  • Understanding the nature of operations and the hazards and risks
  • Ensuring the business has appropriate resources and processes
  • Ensuring processes for receiving and considering information on incidents, hazards, and risks
  • Ensuring processes for compliance verification
  • Verifying the resources and processes are in place and being used

What executives and directors need to know

  • Your personal duty — the executive officer obligation under the HVNL
  • Primary duty of the business you’re responsible for
  • Penalties — corporate and personal, civil and criminal
  • How CoR intersects with WHS primary duty and industrial manslaughter offences
  • What a defensible CoR management system looks like
  • What “documented due diligence” means in practice
  • NHVR investigation process — how executives surface

Who this suits

  • CEOs, MDs, GMs of businesses with heavy-vehicle freight exposure
  • Directors — executive and non-executive
  • CFOs, COOs, CPOs with operational CoR touchpoints
  • Supply chain executives
  • General counsel and company secretaries
  • Senior ops managers of transport operators, 3PLs, consignors, and receivers

How the course works

  1. Enrol online — $69.
  2. Immediate LMS access.
  3. Self-paced — under an hour.
  4. Knowledge check — pass to issue.
  5. Certificate of completion — for your file.

Why FMS

  • RTO 45189, Brisbane-headquartered
  • Framed for executive and board-level audiences — not driver-level content
  • Documented evidence of awareness — a component of due-diligence
  • Volume pricing and tailored board-briefing sessions available on request

Beyond awareness — the TLIF0009 option

For senior operational leaders (HSE managers, compliance managers, national transport managers) who need to own the CoR management system, the accredited TLIF0009 — Ensure the safety of transport activities unit is the AQF-level B2B qualification. See: TLIF0009 course.

Will board-level CoR liability go away?

No — the trajectory is the opposite. Industrial manslaughter offences in most states, combined with NHVR’s assertive posture on executive prosecutions, mean director-level CoR liability is getting sharper, not softer. Automated transport, AI-driven dispatch, and telematics-backed surveillance don’t replace the executive officer duty — they provide the evidence base that investigations draw from. See: AI-proof careers in Australia.

Document your understanding — $69, under an hour

Online CoR awareness framed for executives, directors, and boards. A practical due-diligence step.

Enrol — $69

Frequently asked questions

I’m a non-executive director — am I really in scope?

If you’re an officer of a body corporate party to the chain, the executive officer duty can apply. The analysis is case-by-case — this training is practical, documented evidence of awareness.

What about industrial manslaughter?

Most states now have industrial manslaughter offences that can run alongside CoR and WHS prosecutions. The combined exposure is significant — documented CoR understanding is one defensible control.

Is a 1-hour online course enough?

For awareness and documented understanding, yes. For building the CoR management system itself, pair it with TLIF0009 for your compliance manager and professional legal advice for your board.

Can we arrange a board briefing?

Yes. Contact us for tailored board and executive briefings.

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