Any fleet’s top priority is safety. Fleet drivers need consistent and regular training on safety, and fleet managers must monitor their behavior and ensure they are exhibiting safe behaviors from their training. Let’s go over both safe driving practices for drivers and how fleet managers can track that these safe driving practices are in use.
Safe Driving Practices
This section will explore driving tips to help fleet drivers avoid accidents and stay safe on the road.
- Eliminate Distracted Driving: This means no cell phone use, no eating while driving, and driving when you can focus entirely on the task at hand.
- Eliminate Fatigued Driving: Drivers often feel tired early in the morning or late at night, also in the early afternoon after lunch. Look out for heavy eyes, yawns, or lane drifting.
- Be Cautious in Poor Conditions: Rain, ice, snow, fog, and wind are all conditions that can make driving unsafe. Drivers should go slower and leave more space between themselves and the car ahead.
- Engage in Defensive Driving: Defensive driving is some of the most critical training for fleet drivers. Never assume another driver knows your intentions or sees you, and keep a safe distance from everyone.
- Keep Vehicles Maintained: Vehicle maintenance is often overlooked, but if your vehicle isn’t in its best shape, it can cause problems on the road. Before a trip, always review your vehicle maintenance checklist and report any issues to a manager.
- Use a Seat Belt: Many drivers who sit in their trucks day after day begin to forgo their seatbelts. But this is a significant problem with an easy fix. In many states, wearing a seatbelt is the law.
- Avoid Speeding: While you always want to stay with the traffic flow, you should never speed excessively on your trips. This is particularly important in school zones and adverse weather conditions.
- Never Drink and Drive: This should go without saying, but it never hurts to reinforce one of the most important rules of the road. Drinking and driving doesn’t only raise the risk of an accident but also losing your job and your license.
How to Enforce Safe Driving Practices
Your first step in enforcing safety regulations is, of course, to create rules. Your fleet's safety policy must be regularly monitored and adjusted. To learn how to create a fleet safety policy, read our blog article: “What is a Fleet Safety Policy?”
Once you have the rules written out, how do you enforce them? Technology has come a long way in helping fleet managers ensure their drivers are safe behind the wheel without micromanaging. Let’s highlight some of those features now.
- Dashcams: Dashcams aren’t just for recording what happens in an accident. AI dashcams like Azuga’s AI SafetyCam can also record what’s happening inside the cab and automatically detect signs of distracted driving.
- Telematics: Telematics paired with fleet management software tracks unsafe driving behaviors like speeding, hard cornering, and harsh braking. Your fleet management software can clean this data up into easily-digestible reports.
- Maintenance Alerts: We now know that maintaining your vehicle is crucial to ensure fleet safety. Maintenance alerts tell you when it’s due for regular maintenance. The technology also pairs with telematics to alert you when a problem needs immediate attention.
- Driver Rewards and Coaching: All of this monitoring is well and good, but what does it mean if nothing comes of it? Reward good drivers with a rewards system backed by accurate data, and coach drivers who need it with contextualized training videos.
Discuss Your Safety Goals with Azuga
Azuga’s comprehensive fleet management software makes it easy for you to accomplish your fleet safety goals, no matter what they are. Schedule a demo with an Azuga expert to discuss your goals and what technology solutions we have that can help accomplish them.
