How Telematics Can Protect Drivers on and off the Road

By Sean Briscoe, Vice President of Loss Control

The greatest safety threat on the road for commercial drivers isn’t road hazards or weather, but distracted driving. It’s also one of the most frequent causes for accidents connected to insurance claims. Unsafe driving from commercial drivers may not always be the cause of accidents, but when it is, it’s often a result of uncorrected driver behaviors. Fortunately, telematics can help Identify these unsafe behaviors and raise awareness of bad habits before an accident occurs.

Telematics records distracted driving practices such as speeding, harsh braking and quick acceleration. Some tools even offer video recording options.

Communicating the metrics collected by the software as actionable insights for drivers helps to create a formula for improvement, including emphasis around the potential consequences of these behaviors, not just for the company, but for the drivers and others.

Depending on the severity of the claims, the fault may rest with individual drivers. This can result in the suspension or complete loss of a driver’s Commercial Driver’s License (CDL), leaving them out of work and potentially liable in a civil lawsuit. As the frequency and severity of nuclear verdicts grow, neither lumber businesses nor their drivers should underestimate the importance of telematics in the claims process, as well as in helping to drive the company’s safety best practices.

Prioritizing a Culture of Safety

Telematics helps cultivate a culture of safety. Some of the ways business owners can create a system of accountability to reinforce safety standards and keep commercial drivers protected on the road include:

• Strict Hiring Requirements: Lumber business owners should pay close attention to a driver’s past safety record and whether their CDL is current during the hiring process. MVR (motor vehicle record) data can be useful in the hiring process as it provides lumber business owners with a prospective employee’s driving history, CDL status, violations and more.
• Improve Training: Reexamine the onboarding process to ensure safety standards are thoroughly addressed, with consistent follow-up trainings to keep information fresh.
• Correct Unsafe Driving: Fleet managers should work with drivers to identify and correct dangerous habits before accidents occur and if behaviors continue, be willing to remove unsafe drivers from the team.

The pace and rising costs of litigation have evolved formerly common insurance claims into serious threats to driver livelihoods as well as the lumber industry’s reputation. The greatest strategy in avoiding these costly claims is to build and maintain a culture of safety, using telematics to hold drivers accountable and working with the right insurer to identify and mitigate related risks.