What to do with RMPD and SENT when PUESC is down

Friday, 14:40. The dispatcher uploads the CMR, clicks "send", and PUESC returns an error. Again, the same. The truck in Dorohusk is loaded, the driver is due to leave at 15:00, and there is no reference number. The dispatcher writes in the chat: "PUESC is down, what do we do, go or wait?"

This article explains what Polish law counts as unavailability of the register, how to check whether it really is an outage and not your own internet, and what to do with RMPD and SENT while the system is silent: where to write, in what format, what counts as proof, and whether the driver may set off. For a reader outside Poland: PUESC is the customs and tax portal where both notifications are filed, GITD is the Chief Inspectorate of Road Transport, KAS is the National Revenue Administration.

In brief: unavailability of the register means a failure or technical break of PUESC itself, not your own internet or your inability to use it (PUESC FAQ 01.06) · checking takes a minute: the "Niedostępności" notices on PUESC and our monitor PUESC status, which polls the service before every filing · in an outage an RMPD is filed with a replacement document as a PDF completed in Latin characters, sent to awaria.zezwolenia@gitd.gov.pl; the GITD auto-reply is the proof (art. 28b ust. 7 of the Road Transport Act, § 2 of the regulation of 25.10.2024) · in an outage a SENT notification is filed with a replacement document to awaria.sent@mf.gov.pl with the tax number and document number in the subject line (§ 9 of the notifications regulation) · without a reference number or a replacement document with confirmation the driver must refuse to start (art. 28c ust. 2, art. 10 ust. 1 of the SENT Act) · a gap in locator data caused by unavailability of the register is not fined (art. 22 ust. 2b of the SENT Act) · from 11.09.2026 to 22.09.2026 our monitor recorded no PUESC outage at all, so "it's down" most often means a queue, not a failure.

When PUESC is down, RMPD and SENT do not disappear: instead of the register you file a replacement document by e-mail, the RMPD to GITD and the SENT notification to KAS. The automatic reply confirming receipt is the document for the duration of the outage, which the driver carries together with the PDF. Without a reference number and without such a document with confirmation the driver may not set off.

What the law counts as PUESC unavailability

Unavailability of the register is a failure or technical break of the register itself that makes it impossible to file, complete or update notifications and to receive replies. That is how PUESC defines it in its answer to question 01.06, adding that lack of internet access on your side, or inability to use it, is not unavailability of the register. The line matters, because the replacement procedure may be used only when PUESC is down, not when the Wi-Fi at the truck stop is.

PUESC announces technical breaks in advance in the "Aktualności" section, group "Niedostępności", with date and hours, for example "21:00 to 23:00 the SENT system and all its services will be unavailable". An unannounced failure is rarer, and that is when dispatchers lose their footing. For the record: a reference number is valid for 10 days from issue (art. 11 ust. 1 of the SENT Act), so a notification filed the day before the run survives any break.

How to check whether PUESC is really down

Three steps, two minutes. First: open "Aktualności" on PUESC and see whether a break has been announced for this hour. Second: open our monitor PUESC status. Before every filing Sigil polls the SEAP service on PUESC and logs every exchange; the page shows the time of the last check, the last confirmed exchange and outages over 90 days. From the start of measurement on 11.09.2026 to 22.09.2026 the monitor recorded no outage. Third: try again after 10 minutes. In our experience the PUESC queue is slower in the afternoon, and "down" often means "answers in a minute instead of 4 seconds".

Is an "internal error" message that disappears on retry unavailability of the register? No. Unavailability is a state in which filing is impossible at all, not one failed attempt. Document the attempts with timestamped screenshots: if you end up filing a replacement document, those screenshots explain why.

What to do with an RMPD when the register is down

In an outage the RMPD is filed with a replacement document. So says art. 28b ust. 7 of the Road Transport Act: the foreign operator sends the Chief Inspector of Road Transport a replacement document with the notification data and obtains confirmation of receipt from GITD. The procedure is set out in the regulation of the Minister of Infrastructure of 25 October 2024 (Dz.U. 2024 poz. 1604), and it is short.

The form comes from the GITD page gov.pl/web/gitd/sent, with an editable version in Polish, English and Russian. It is completed on a computer in Latin characters (§ 2 ust. 5): GITD accepts neither handwritten nor Cyrillic forms. It is sent as a PDF to awaria.zezwolenia@gitd.gov.pl. The subject line carries a document number in three parts separated by "##": the date as YYYY.MM.DD, the country code of registration and the registration number of the motor vehicle, for example 2026.09.22##UA##AA1234BB (§ 2 ust. 1). The GITD auto-reply confirming receipt is the confirmation; without it the notification is not filed and the message must be sent again.

May the driver leave if the dispatcher has sent the PDF but the auto-reply has not arrived yet? No. The carrier must hand the driver the reference number or the replacement document together with the confirmation of receipt, and without them the driver must refuse to begin the carriage (art. 28c ust. 1 and 2). The auto-reply usually arrives within minutes; the driver carries the PDF and the confirmation e-mail on the phone. An update of the notification during the outage also goes by e-mail with the same document number and the reference number in the subject (§ 2 ust. 4).

What to do with SENT during an outage

SENT has its own procedure on the same principle. The consignor, consignee or carrier, each for their own data, sends a replacement document to awaria.sent@mf.gov.pl (§ 9 ust. 1 of the regulation of the Minister of Finance of 28.08.2019 on notifications, consolidated text Dz.U. 2021 poz. 1345). The subject line carries the tax number and the sender's own document number separated by "##". The document may be sent as a PDF or as XML conforming to the PUESC specification (§ 9 ust. 4); the template is an annex to the regulation. The receiving authority is the Director of the Tax Administration Chamber in Zielona Góra (§ 11).

The consignor or consignee must hand the carrier the replacement document and the confirmation of its receipt (art. 9 ust. 6 of the SENT Act), and the driver carries both for the whole carriage (FAQ 01.16). Without a number, a replacement document and confirmation the carrier must refuse to accept the goods for carriage (art. 10 ust. 1). The carrier's completion of the notification during an outage, that is the locator number and vehicle data, also goes by e-mail with the reference number in the subject (§ 9 ust. 3).

What about the locator and fines during an outage

The locator works as always: an outage of the register does not excuse a switched-off locator, but it does excuse a gap in data. The act says so directly: the 10,000 zł fine for a gap in geolocation transmission is waived if the gap resulted from unavailability of the register (art. 22 ust. 2b of the SENT Act). PUESC in answer 04.35 asks you to follow the notices on the portal in that case. For the carrier it means one thing: do not switch off the e-TOLL PL app or the OBU, and keep a screenshot of the unavailability notice.

What does a run without a replacement document cost? The same as a run without a notification: RMPD 12,000 zł, about 141,000 ₴, from the tariff annexed to the Road Transport Act (załącznik nr 3, lp. 3.2a); SENT 20,000 zł, about 235,000 ₴, for the carrier (art. 22 ust. 1 of the SENT Act). NBU rate 11.74 ₴/zł on 21.09.2026. The PUESC outage does not appear in the fine decision unless the carrier shows that a replacement document was filed and confirmed.

An account cannot be opened during an outage, because the registration form lives on the same portal. How to go through it once PUESC is back is shown step by step in Registering on PUESC as a non-EU carrier, step by step.

How a driver tells a register outage from a failure of his own locator, and what to do in each of the sixty minutes, is laid out in What a driver should do when GPS loses signal in Poland.

What to do

1. 1Check whether it is an outage: "Aktualności" on PUESC, the PUESC status monitor, a retry after 10 minutes. Take timestamped screenshots.
2. 2For an RMPD download the form from gov.pl/web/gitd/sent, complete it on a computer in Latin characters, save as PDF.
3. 3Send the PDF to awaria.zezwolenia@gitd.gov.pl with the subject date##country code##registration number. Wait for the auto-reply and keep it.
4. 4For SENT send the replacement document to awaria.sent@mf.gov.pl with tax number##document number in the subject, as PDF or XML.
5. 5Hand the driver the PDF and the confirmation e-mail before departure. Without confirmation the driver does not go.
6. 6Keep the locator on. A data gap caused by an outage of the register is not fined, but only if there was an outage.
7. 7Once PUESC is back, file the notification in the register if the carriage is still under way, with what the replacement document contained.

What not to do

• ✗Do not call your own internet, or one failed attempt, an outage. A replacement document without real unavailability is a notification that never happened.
• ✗Do not send the driver off with the PDF alone and no auto-reply. Confirmation of receipt is half the document (art. 28c ust. 2).
• ✗Do not complete the form by hand or in Cyrillic. GITD accepts only a PDF completed on a computer in Latin characters (§ 2 ust. 5).
• ✗Do not switch off the locator "because nothing works anyway". The waiver in art. 22 ust. 2b covers a gap caused by the register, not by the driver.
• ✗Do not leave filing until the day of departure. A reference number is valid for 10 days; filing the day before removes the outage problem.

Where technology fits in

Before every RMPD filing Sigil polls the SEAP service on PUESC and logs every exchange; those logs are what the PUESC status page is built from. If PUESC does not respond, the declaration can be downloaded as XML and filed by hand, and once the connection is back the system checks its status again by itself. CMR data go into the RMPD one to one, the dispatcher confirms, and nothing is sent without that confirmation. How the declaration statuses look, including during a break, is in the help article Checking RMPD statuses; when a notification is rejected after the service is restored, the codes are taken apart in The most frequent reasons PUESC rejects filings. Which PUESC account is needed for filing is explained in Which PUESC account a carrier needs.

Sigil does not send the replacement document to GITD: it is an e-mail from the carrier, and the confirmation comes to the carrier.

Sigil handles RMPD declarations. The SENT notification is filed by the consignor, consignee or carrier, and the replacement document in an outage is sent by the obliged party itself.