Accidents happen, and last year 170,500 involving personal injury happened on Britain’s roads – a 6% decline on 2007’s levels.

But while the Department for Transport figures show a downward trend (and a reduction of 14% in the number of fatalities), that’s still an awful lot of collisions happening on the road.

And, as company car drivers cover more miles than private motorists in general, the fleet proportion of risk is greater.

Which gives fleet managers a real headache, not only in terms of damaged vehicles and injured drivers, but also in terms of the business case – vehicle downtime, appointments missed, and extra costs to the company in terms of increased insurance premiums.

There is also the extra time and effort involved in sorting out insurance claims, particularly when a third party is involved.

So how can fleets reduce their accident rates? It’s a huge question, with many different answers and approaches.

If an accident does happen, costs can mount quickly in terms of lost working hours, replacement car costs and increases in insurance premiums.

FMG Support specialises in fleet incident management and roadside repair and recovery management, and works with clients to create tailored solutions which minimise downtime, control costs, fine tune operations and manage risks.

The company has partnerships with a number of blue-chip companies, including Xerox, Royal Mail and Northgate.

A spokesman says: “Accident management can save fleets thousands of pounds a year.

“Properly managing an incident, negotiating lower repair bills with a network of bodyshops, targeting uninsured loss recovery and capturing and controlling third party accidents are all key elements to the accident management service.

“Also crucial is the ability of the accident management provider to assess fleet performance, highlight problems and offer risk reduction solutions.”

FMG Support has devised a 10-point plan which will help fleets choose the right accident management provider.

Experience

Check the company’s experience, flexibility and customer base. Does it work with customers with a similar fleet to yours? Will it assign you an account manager dedicated to finding cost savings?

Data

Find out its average repair costs and benchmark it against the market, using the Motoring Facts and Business Information (MFBI) Trend Tracker Survey.

Vehicle downtime

How does it manage vehicle off-road (VOR) times – driver communication at every stage is critical. The industry average VOR time is 12 days – leading accident management companies can reduce this to eight days or less.

Legal issues

Ask your provider about its in-house expertise regarding legal and uninsured loss recovery services.

Contact

Does the company have a UK centre with 24-hour service and access to in-house experts? If not, does it at least have operators with a detailed knowledge of the UK’s road network and vehicles?

Technology

Demand technology that offers rapid, quality and useful information to keep you in control. You should be able to track incident claims, view vehicle damage images and see repair costs and completion dates in real time.

Network

Find out the size and quality of the repairer network and ask to see key performance indicators – the network is critical to providing fast, quality repairs across the country.

Accreditation

Confirm what qualifications and experience the company’s engineers have, and establish its commitment to the PAS125 scheme – the BSI’s industry agreed technical specification for vehicle body repair.

Innovation

What is the company doing to keep ahead of the changing needs and challenges that your business faces.

Is it adaptable so it can change its services to suit you on an on-going basis?

Results

Look for a proven track record from your supplier that demonstrates impressive improvements to the bottom line through quantifiable results and case studies.

The driver

Reducing accident rates starts with the person behind the wheel – are they entitled to drive, familiar with the vehicle and fit to drive? These questions need answering before an employee drives on business.

Fleet managers should check drivers’ licences to ensure they have the right categories on their licence. For HGVs and minibuses there is an additional Certificate of Professional Competency requirement.

Licences can be checked with the DVLA, although consent is needed by employees for these checks to be made under the Data Protection Act.

Fleet managers also need to ensure staff are fit to drive, through a process of self-declaration, in terms of eyesight and medical conditions.

Finally, have in place a robust policy on drugs and alcohol which states that it is unacceptable to drive while under the influence.

Also, staff using prescription medication should inform the fleet manager immediately.

Source: BVRLA Guide to Driving at Work. www.bvrla.co.uk

Driver Training

There’s a wide choice when it comes to training drivers – classroom sessions, internet-based tests, behind the wheel training and risk profiling.

There is no cover-all approach, with each company offering different services.

So it is important to review your fleet and drivers before committing to a provider, and then set down what objectives you want to achieve by going through driver training.

Steve Johnson, director of communications at DriveTech, says: “There is no ‘one size fits all’ solution, but there are ‘must haves’.”

Johnson says that any practical training must be carried out by Approved Driving Instructors who are on the DSA Fleet Register, and there must be geographical coverage to meet your needs.

He adds: “The supplier should be able to demonstrate good customer retention and be happy to provide references. They should also be willing to sign up to a service level agreement.”

Drive & Survive managing director Seb Goldin says: “Driver training is much more than learning driving basics in a blanket approach.

"An overall driver risk management programme is tailor-made and can assess an individual’s attitude to driving situations, the environment they drive in, and the risk this
combination poses, even before they even step into a vehicle.

"A risk management programme not only ensures a safer driver, but also leads to many environmental and economic benefits as well.”

As well as ensuring staff who drive for business have a company handbook laying out rules, training and risk profiling can also help a fleet manager identify drivers who may pose a higher risk of having an incident.

Normally this is staff who cover high mileages, but aggressive and risk-unaware drivers can also be caught in the net. Once identified, further specialist training can be given to lower their risk profile.

Key suppliers:

  • www.accidont.co.uk
  • www.bigredfleet.com
  • www.bsm.co.uk
  • www.ddt.co.uk
  • www.drivesense.co.uk
  • www.drivesurvive.co.uk
  • www.drivetech.co.uk
  • www.driving-monitor.co.uk
  • www.e-trainingworld.com
  • www.fleetcraft.co.uk
  • www.fleetdriverservices.co.uk
  • www.iamfleet.co.uk
  • www.peakperformance.co.uk
  • www.rac.co.uk/business
  • www.roadmarque.com
  • www.rospa.com/drivertraining
  • www.theaa.com/drivingschool

 

Case study: Xerox

Document company Xerox signed a deal with FMG Support to maximise its uninsured loss recovery (ULR) rates while minimising vehicle downtime and saving money across its 1,200-vehicle fleet.

FMG put together a solution to include incident management, rental damage management and ULR.

An insurance-trained liability expert deals with all claims, helping to return value to Xerox in an average of 42 days. It also uses its Ingenium software which allows Xerox to monitor results through the system’s regular reports and also measures the performance of insurers by analysing statistics.

As a result, FMG recovered 22% of Xerox’s total spend on repairs in year one, rising to 31.5% the following year.

Kevin Smith, GB fleet controller at Xerox, says: “Our fleet performance improvement is a direct result of FMG Support’s continuous development of internal processes and technology.

“Its commitment to working with us, understanding our requirements and meeting our needs means the results just keep getting better.”