Keeping a trip logbook

With the logbook you record individual trips in Berta – with date, route, odometer readings and a category. It works the same way for every vehicle type, whether it's a car, motorcycle or camper. That's the basis whenever you need to separate business from private driving: at the end of the year you export a PDF that documents the trips, their split and every correction in a way anyone can follow.

How do I turn the logbook on?

The logbook is switched on per vehicle and is free for everyone – it isn't behind Berta Pro. You enable it right in that vehicle's logbook; for shared vehicles, only the owner can. Once it's on, the home screen gains a quick action for a new trip. Switch it off again and the logbook is merely hidden – the trips you recorded stay.

What's in a trip?

Each trip entry stores:

• the date of the trip,
• the start and end odometer – the distance driven is the difference,
• an optional starting point and the destination,
• the category: business, private or commute,
• business partner and purpose – for business trips you have to give at least one of the two.

How do I add a trip?

You fill in the trip form: date, odometer readings, route and category. Two helpers save you typing:

• Odometer by photo: for both the start and the end reading you can photograph the dashboard. Berta reads the number out of the image, you check and confirm it – the trip is then marked as captured by photo.
• Use my location: if you allow location access, Berta can fill in your current location as the address for the start or the destination. Berta does not track your trips in the background; you decide for each trip what gets stored.

What are logbook gaps?

A logbook is only worth something if it's complete. So Berta compares the odometer readings of your trips against the ones already in your vehicle record – from fill-ups, charging sessions, workshop visits and plain odometer readings. If a stretch between two readings is unaccounted for, Berta flags that gap. Tap it and the trip form opens with the affected range prefilled, so you can add the missing trip.

Can I edit a trip afterwards?

You can edit a trip freely for 24 hours – but that window is measured from the day the trip happened, not from when you typed it in. So a trip you log several days late can already be locked the moment you save it, exactly as if it had been entered on time and left untouched since. Once a trip is locked, it's locked deliberately: a logbook you can quietly rewrite loses its value as evidence. Instead of overwriting, you create a correction with a reason. The corrected trip appears as a new entry, the original stays visible and is marked as superseded. In the list, badges show you which trips are locked, corrections, or superseded.

What happens if I delete a trip?

While a trip is still within its edit window, deleting it doesn't erase it: Berta marks it as withdrawn, keeps your reason attached if you gave one, and leaves it visible in the logbook and in a dedicated section of the yearly PDF. That way an export can never look complete while quietly missing a trip you removed. Once a trip is locked, it can no longer be deleted at all – a correction is the only way to adjust it.

How does Berta protect the logbook against being rewritten later?

Every trip you create, edit or withdraw is added, in order, to an internal tamper-evident chain: each entry is cryptographically linked to the one before it. If an old entry were changed outside the normal app flow, the chain would no longer line up. The yearly PDF prints a short verification value for that chain – a fingerprint of everything recorded up to that point. It's Berta's own internal check rather than an independent certificate, but it does mean that, unlike a plain spreadsheet, the app itself can tell whether something already recorded was silently changed.

How do I export my logbook?

From the logbook you generate a PDF for a selected year. It contains:

• the vehicle data,
• the table of every trip that year with date, route, purpose or business partner, start and end odometer, distance and category,
• the split by category (business, private, commute),
• the correction history, in which superseded trips remain listed,
• the withdrawn trips, each with its reason if one was given,
• a tamper-evidence verification value for the internal chain of entries.

The PDF is laid out so you can hand it on as evidence – share or save it straight from the app.

Two things are still missing from the logbook today: an export reviewed with tax advisors, and an inbox where you classify unclassified trips with a swipe. So give each trip its category as you record it, and check the yearly PDF with your tax advisor before relying on it.

How does the logbook relate to costs?

The logbook and the costs tab work off the same odometer readings: every fill-up, charging session and service with a recorded reading counts towards the gap check – and those same readings are the basis for consumption and cost per km. The more consistently you record mileage, the better both sides get. You'll find the breakdown of your spending under Costs and receipt capture under Capturing.