Driving for Better Business

Matt has supported the investment in a new driver training programme with Lightfoot. The app gives drivers real time coaching and alerts as they drive, as well as giving them feedback at the end of the day. It coaches them to work on areas for improvement, and challenges them to maintain strong performance. “This is more effective for us than using driver trainers,” says Matt. The company has conducted a successful trial with Lightfoot, which suggests the financial savings will be substantial. “Their ethos is to make your drivers ‘elite’ which means they score 85% or above. They then they reward drivers for driving well, which has a positive impact on our business,” he says. Matt has pushed the Lightfoot implementation on quickly so that he can use the data in renewal negotiations. “We have fewer claims and run a safer fleet and as the product was insurance endorsed, I’m expecting a positive conversation for next year’s renewal,” he says. Lightfoot offers:

• Driver behaviour tool
• Telematics
• EV compatibility
• Weekly in-app prizes for compliant driving or improvement
• Effective coaching without removing drivers from the road for specific courses
• Vehicle diagnostics to allow proactive maintenance
• Full management visibility of driving behaviour

The first 40 electric vehicles will join the fleet later this year and early adopters will get specific training during the detailed handover process. It is important to educate the drivers that electric vans are automatic, and more responsive to both brake and accelerator.

Matt has signed up for FORS as a way of improving protocols and professional standards. He says this supports the company in concentrating on the correct areas of education for drivers and their responsibilities.

Group Fleet Manager Matt Neale is responsible for the 500 light commercial vehicles used by another of Platform HG’s subsidiaries which services tenanted properties. Although all of Platform HG’s workforce is united by their overall status as part of the Platform HG charity, technically Matt and his driver workforce are employed by separate companies. He also has to co-manage the workforce, whose direct line management is concerned with the core activity of maintaining properties, while Matt’s concern is the safe and reliable operation of the fleet. The need to extend standard compliance protocols throughout the fleet is compounded by the fact that Platform HG was formed in 2018 and is a merger of two different housing associations. Therefore, historically the workforce has varied training and experience when it comes to fleet safety. Matt, who joined the organisation last September, has been working hard to bring everyone onto the same safety page. A member of the Association for Fleet Professionals, he is effectively the first qualified fleet manager the organisation has ever had. He has unrolled an ambitious programme of governance and improvement over the past six months and currently has 24 ongoing projects. Some of the initial projects included:

• Asset identification – vans were dispersed and some effectively abandoned
• Selling all owned stock so the whole fleet would be modern and leased
• Introducing FleetCheck Fleet Management System
• Taking on FMG Accident management
• Trialling driver behaviour app Lightfoot
• Employing Fleet Check to do mandatory checks of all driving licences
• Setting up a task force, with a driver user group
• Implementing weekly vehicle checks with images
• Reliverying with speed limit and cyclist stickers
• Organising a driver app for compliance and a driver manual
• Toolbox talks
• Policy discouraging mobile phone use

If your vehicle has been mothballed during COVID-19 you will need to do a thorough vehicle check before heading back out on the road.

If you’ve been previously furloughed, or haven’t driven much during the lockdown, you may be unsure what to expect, but there are some key things you need to know before you and your vehicle get back on the roads.

This session was recorded at The Health & Safety Event 2021 and features Barry Wilson - Commercial Fleet Consultant, FleetCheck

This session was recorded at The Health & Safety Event 2021 and features Dr Julie Gandolfi - DriverMetrics

Meet the employers that are prepared to step forward to champion good practice in work related road safety, and who can demonstrate those business benefits by sharing their own stories. Take a look at the challenges they faced, how they met those challenges, and the benefits they’ve seen as a result – across all areas of their business, including collision reduction, lower fuel costs, lower insurance premiums and reduced maintenance costs.

Identify gaps in your current management practices and areas that could be improved.

When in comes to safe loading of vehicles and load security it might be easy to dismiss it as something that is simply a box that needs to be ticked as part of your other driving for work compliance duties. The real story is very different. There are a number of incidents that have happened over the years, many in recent memory, where innocent passers by have been killed or seriously injured because a load was not secure or a commercial vehicle was overloaded...

It’s very easy to assume that driver safety is the responsibility of the driver however, when it all goes wrong, investigators will look up and down the full transport chain. Nina will look at how that responsibility is shared throughout the transport chain from the driver right up to the top of the company, even looking at clients and suppliers where their actions could have impacted on how the risk was managed. This session was recorded at The Health & Safety Event 2022 and features Nina Day – Transport Sector Policy Advisor, HSE