DriverCare
Duty of care and Corporate Social Responsibility are key issues in business. As such, creating a culture of safety is a topic that is high on the agenda for fleet owners. Driver care can significantly reduce your fleet costs.
Consider these factors:
- 1 out of 3 accidents are caused by inappropriate speed
- Speed has a substantial impact on safety and the severity of an accident
- In 2017, the amount fatalities in traffic is on the rise again. Specialists say this is probably due to distracted driving and smartphones
- One out of three work accidents are traffic accidents
- Perception that drivers of company cars have another driving behaviour
Up to 40% of work related deaths are cause by road collisions and yet many organisations do not have a driver care policy integrated into their fleet policy.
Investing in road risk prevention can significantly save your organisation, time, money and more importantly lives.
Put quite simply, if you have an employee drive for business related activity then you have a duty of care to that employee to manage their risk. A vehicle is considered a place of work. Under the obligations, an employer must take reasonable care to protect employees from the risk of foreseeable injury or death whilst at work.
Driver care and the 3 key areas that require attention
The driver
The Driver vetting and selection. Induction process. Licence checking and robust Accident reporting process
The vehicle
Is the vehicle fit for purpose? Has the vehicle been maintained according to the service schedule?
The journey
Managing driver fatigue. Planning and hours behind the wheel and driving style eg. speed, braking and acceleration
The driver and vehicle are process driven and easier to implement. The real issue is point 3, the driver and their behaviour.
What is the solution?
Our driver care programme starts with the organisation first. The culture and setup needs to be understood to see how company expectations affect driver distraction.
Distraction is the biggest factor for the majority of accidents. That includes distraction inside the vehicle and also in the drivers head. So, if the company setup is one of time pressure to make a number of deliveries for example, the external distraction of meeting these deadlines does affect driving behaviour. This then relates to internal stress and sub optimal conditions for driving in general.
This is particularly true for novice drivers who lack driving experience.
Do you have a driver care policy?
We analyse the history of your fleet activity to identify trends of driver accident rates, and fuel usage. This data is normally readily available within your company itself or from your leasing and/or insurance company. An approximative evaluation of driver behaviour can be measured based on the average deviations of the driver with respect to the normal fuel consumption of their specific vehicle (qualified by the OEM) and the frequency and severity of accident damages.
The next step is to involve your drivers. After all it is their behaviour that contributes directly to your fleet costs of fuel, repairs and insurance premiums.
Driver communication is key
The effectiveness of this approach will reside in the convincing message of the communication programme. Typically, the driver behaviour communication consists of:
- a periodic report via push mail
- a driver benchmark of normal fuel consumption and average accident statistics
- a peer group benchmark to help show in a fair way from data analysis where behaviour improvement can be achieved
Effective communication helps raise the importance of driver care and safety and the result is a motivated team of drivers encouraged to improve their driving behaviour. The added bonus is your demonstration and input into Corporate Social Responsibility plans for you company as a whole.
Open and transparency discussions on driving behaviour help create a safety culture that in turn reduces fleet costs. The aim is create drivers who are ACTIVE not PASSIVE whilst in their vehicles.
