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Driving for Better Business

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Metworks has no depots, only offices and so its operatives carry everything they need in the back of the van. It was initially a challenge to impress upon drivers that the respon-sibility for staying within proscribed weight limits was their personal responsibility. However, on-board scales, which show total weight and distribution over the axles and sound an alarm if overloaded, have helped in reinforcing drivers’ sense of responsibility. 45 of the 200 vans now have these scales and Joe intends to roll them out throughout the fleet.

Driving for Better Business

Metworks – Safe Loading

Metworks uses Teletrac Navman. “We’ve seen our greatest benefit through the use of telematics,” he says. “Speeding has reduced by 75%. With less speeding, we’ve seen lower vehicle maintenance costs, and lower fuel costs, both down by around 10%.” Joe is very aware that risk-taking in driver behaviour is likely accompanied by risk taking in others. “We explain to the drivers why we don’t tolerate speeding even of one, two or three miles over the limit.”

Driving for Better Business

Metworks – Telematics

  • Consistent reduction in insurance premiums year on year since 2019
  • 23% reduction in claims in 2022 compared to 2019
  • Speeding review time reduced from 1.5 hours to 10 mins (2018 vs 2022)
  • Won AFP Fleet Bursary based on improvements

Driving for Better Business

Miele – Business Benefits

Van drivers receive in-vehicle training from AA DriveTech, and Mandy has also extended in-person training to all car drivers. She says occasional resistance to delaying a driver’s vehicle allocation until they have had adequate training was quickly overcome by managers’ acceptance of the safety issue. “Our role is to be supportive, not obstructive,” she says.

Driving for Better Business

Miele – Driver Training

Miele’s car drivers tend to plan their own schedules, while the van fleet is scheduled by Head Office. Mandy says the drivers themselves were keen to engage with the idea of fleet safety, but organisationally she realised Miele was lacking key governance components. When the previous fleet manager left some years previously, fleet governance was decentralised and split between the two separate departments. In 2018 42% of licence checks were incomplete; this was of paramount importance and Mandy worked to achieve 100% licence compliance which Miele now maintains. The company also lacked a driver handbook and there were no fleet inductions for new employees. Mandy created a series of communications which emphasised driving as a critical part of other roles, and worked with HR to make fleet induction a standard part of a new recruit’s training. In Jan 2020, she also took fleet ownership of the 150 van drivers, whose driving risk was more complex, given their high mileage. Mandy says: “Whenever a driver is on the road in a branded vehicle, they are an ambassador for the brand, and their behaviour reflects upon the company as a whole. It was therefore imperative that they keep themselves and other road users safe.” The driver handbook is condensed to 15 pages, but is nonetheless very thorough, and very clear about what is and isn’t acceptable for drivers. It can be used by the HR department, as disciplinary evidence, as drivers are expected to read it, and sign to say they have understood the expectations and policies it contains. Mandy reinforces this with regular bulletins emphasising topics such as the unacceptability of mobile phone use while driving, speed limits and other safety essentials. The handbook also covers driving posture, driver well-being and what to do in the event of a collision.

Driving for Better Business

Miele – Fleet Activity

Although the company already had Webfleet telematics installed in 2018, no one within the fleet department was responsible for analysing the data. Mandy focused first on speeding data, sharing inappropriate speeding incidents with the drivers concerned. She emphasised that it was an endorsable offence and put other road users at risk. With the support of line managers, the messages were accepted, and a speeding data report which used to take an hour and a half to peruse now takes ten minutes. She says drivers started to realise that:

  1. Driving was a professional component of their job
  2. A loss of their driving licence could equal the loss of their job in some circumstances
  3. A potential collision is only ever one distracted moment away
Miele’s insurer offers a driver behaviour portal which is useful for monitoring overall driver performance; however, driver behaviour is averaged over the week and so the telematics data is needed to show exceptional events such as excessive speed. Mandy encourages line managers to notice when a driver’s overall scores are dipping, because it can be an indicator of a deeper problem. She says it is an ‘arm around the shoulder’ approach.

Driving for Better Business

Miele – Telematics

On a day that started out just like any other, Bob Adams, a van driver very similar to many of those that work for you, begins his day’s work schedule. Some very common examples of poor driver safety management align and result in a serious incident involving a cyclist – but was it the driver’s fault or what is the employers? We examine what went wrong, why it went wrong, and what a subsequent investigation and prosecution could look like.

Driving for Better Business

Mock Trial – Poor Driver Safety Management

NH monitors driver behaviour through in-vehicle telemetry, and Martin is currently determining new parameters for recording exception events. However, since the introduction of the first hybrid vehicles in 2019, he has observed a pattern of improvement which he believes is inspired by the new drivelines. “Harsh braking, harsh acceleration and speeding have all diminished substantially,” he says. The vehicles are also kitted out with high-end safety equipment including radar guided cruise control, autonomous emergency braking systems, side impact protection and collapsible steering wheels. “We’ve chosen Volvos and BMWs, which are designed with safety as the number one priority, much like National Highways.”

Driving for Better Business

National Highways – Better Driving

Summary of business benefits achieved by National Highways with the support of the Driving for Better Business programme. Including lower emissions and improvements in the resilience of the fleet.

Driving for Better Business

National Highways – Business Benefits

National Highways traffic officers and inspection fleets operate 24/7 365 days of the year. Furthermore the traffic officer fleet covers 1.5m miles a year. Therefore, fleet reliability is essential. Moving to plug in hybrids has actually improved the resilience of the fleet, says Martin, as using the electric motor decreases strain on the engine. Regenerative braking also tends to mean brake pads last longer. “We’ve reduced vehicle off road days from three to two per year on the traffic officer fleet. That’s the equivalent of three officer shifts saved,” he says. The inspection fleet has seen even greater improvement with off road days dropping from two per year to 0.8.

Driving for Better Business

National Highways – Fleet Resilience

Network Rail is very conscious of the risk of fatigue, as its workers often fix railway lines at night when services are naturally reduced. “In principle we would like to be able to analyse our shift patterns to see if we can lower the risk of driver fatigue,” he says. “We are currently looking at systems and talking to other operators to ascertain the best ways of doing this.”

Driving for Better Business

Network Rail – Fatigue

Network Rail has created control processes and also a process definition document which looks at organisation, responsibility and accountability, data collection and objectives. Road risk sits within health and safety, one of Network Rail’s 16 core processes. A proper governance structure means it can be measured, managed and monitored appropriately. The company’s internal auditors reviewed its fleet management and offered a series of recommendations. These included setting up a national forum – the Road Risk Safety Group. This helps to manage risk and also reports into the industry road risk group. A lead has been appointed for risk and fatigue, which, says Simon, are too often inseparable factors. The lead has a support team, including a road risk technical specialist. This specialist has created a new driving manual, and new driving standards, on which all staff have been briefed.

Driving for Better Business

Network Rail – Good Governance
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