Running a fleet of trucks and other delivery vehicles, you know that road safety is paramount. Every driver must remain alert, defensive, and maintain careful driving habits to ensure the lowest risk of accidents on their routes. Even the safest drivers must know how to deal with unsafe situations when road conditions and other drivers create a risk, which is why many fleets invest heavily in driver training and metrics to judge safe driving habits with telematics.
However, there is also an inherent conflict between sometimes-necessary defensive driving maneuvers and ideal telematics data when it comes to safe driving stats. It’s important to understand the difference. The right approach to driver safety can help lower your commercial truck insurance and properly reward drivers who operate safely and deftly avoid accidents.
Telematics in Measuring Driver Safety
Telematics have become increasingly popular in fleet safety metrics. They are used both by fleet managers and by insurance companies to gague how much risk drivers create on the road through their driving habits. Fast speeds, hard braking, and sharp turns are discouraged while slow, smooth movements are rewarded with lower rates and higher metrics. Smooth driving also supports greater fuel efficiency with less momentum lost to sudden velocity changes.
Defensive Driving and Responsive Safety
However, you also make sure your drivers are trained in defensive driving. This involves alertness, lane maintenance, and the ability to react quickly to avoid an accident that could be caused by others. Sometimes, inevitably, defensive driving requires ‘unsafe’ maneuvers in view of telematics data. A sharp turn could avoid a collision with a swerving vehicle. A hard brake could avoid rear-ending a suddenly stopping car ahead.
Drivers, fleet managers, and rig insurance providers would all prefer a little hard maneuvering over the damage and loss that comes with a collision accident. Even if it shows up as an ‘unsafe driving’ blip on the telematics reading.
Dash Cams and Context
One of the most useful additions to safe driving assessment is a combination of ‘dash’ cams placed around each truck. These cameras record the road conditions and behaviors of other vehicles around the truck, giving context to the situations your drivers are responding to. This data is useful not only for fleet managers in hunting down those telematics blips. Showing your drivers’ adept responses and ability to avoid accidents can also impress your insurance providers.
Dash cams can help you make a strong case for reducing your commercial truck insurance rate, especially if telematics are usually used to determine risk among your fleet.
A Record of Safety and Fleet Insurance Savings
No matter what technology you use, however, the most important metric is a history of road safety. If you are looking for fleet insurance savings, having a minimal record of accidents and collisions is what your insurer most wants to see. This paired with prevention measures such as defensive driving training and safety features installed in each vehicle will help to lower the overall insurance rate for your entire fleet.
The Right Technology for Safe Fleet Operation
Telematics are useful for determining if your drivers regularly drive soft or hard, carefully or recklessly. Blips in telematics are often incidents where drivers were forced to use their awareness and training to drive defensively and avoid an impending accident. Combined with dash cams, you can easily track just how safe your drivers really are on the road. Use this data to reward safe drivers and to persuade your truckers insurance provider to maintain lower rates.
To learn more about commercial truck insurance and fleet safety best practices, contact J.E.B. Insurance Services today. We are provide commercial truck or owner operator insurance options in Florida, Georgia, Texas, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, Illinois, Iowa & Nebraska.
