When your underwriter knows the explicit safety details of your fleet, you’re both at the same table — and you’ll find greater stability in your fleet insurance costs whilst ensuring fleet safety.
Telematics provide those details to influence loss severity and claims frequency, a revolutionary concept in road safety, fleet safety, and risk management. Instead of simply noting that trucks operate in higher risk and higher hazard areas — a limited measure of a fleet’s hot spots, used for decades to assess fleet safety — insurance companies can use real-time data to see that drivers are operating responsibly in those areas.
That data yields risk factors such as where drivers are going, how long it takes them to get there, and how they’re maneuvering lanes of traffic. As a result, determining insurance rates becomes much more nuanced, which can save you money in today’s hard insurance market.
Telematics not only removes
guesswork, but often illustrates deeper insight into the fleet characteristics. In fact, in-cab alerts for harsh braking and harsh acceleration have been
shown to reduce the frequency of those behaviors by up to 40%.
That’s good news for fleets worried about operating in a high-risk territory and yielding an automatic spike in insurance rates.
But telematics is only half the battle in increasing transparency and improving risk. You have to implement risk-management best practices based on the telematics data you gain. Here’s how to make your fleet safer:
- Know your numbers
The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) Safety and Fitness Electronic Records (SAFER) scores affect your risk profile, so monitoring and understanding those scores can better equip truck owners to be proactive and get in front of problems before they start.
Telematics allow underwriters to understand more about your fleet and confirm the validity of those scores regarding the number of miles your drivers are covering, or on which routes you have inspections. It may be helpful to review your SAFER scores against your telematics data and determine which areas to focus on for improvement of your fleet.
- Maintain regular touchpoints with drivers
Are drivers aware of the leadership’s north star? Do they know what your business goals are for the operation? Be upfront and clear. Monthly or bi-monthly safety meetings are a good way to do this, either in person or virtually.
Providing incentives like gift cards for actions such as clean inspections and consistent meeting attendance are other ways to build a good rapport with drivers and maximize their productivity in the process. Also, consider basing bonuses or other rewards around telematics data, and build trust by asking for — and truly listening to — feedback, questions, and concerns.
- Identify issues before they become a problem
It’s imperative to see issues before inspectors do by making sure equipment is safely maintained and roadworthy. Ensuring your drivers know how to do pre- and post-trip inspections will help minimize accidents, severity of accidents, and decrease the number of violations during Department of Transportation (DOT) inspections. At the same time make sure you’re replacing old & outdated trucks.
Using telematics is key for informing fleet management and better trucking operations overall. The more transparency agents and underwriters have with fleet owners, the better the relationship can be between the insurance carrier and the fleet operators — and the better the assessment of the fleet’s safety in a volatile market.
For more information on how to use telematics to improve your risk, contact
Nirvana Insurance.
