Building a Safer Fleet with Telematics Technology
Vendors say their systems have moved beyond simple vehicle tracking to help fleets predict and proactively coach their riskiest drivers.
For utility fleets, a truck is a toolbox, workshop and commute all rolled into one machine. Driving to and from jobsites presents a certain level of inherent risk exposure – exposure that will likely increase if operator behavior does not align with industry regulations and best practices. Today’s telematics systems can help to mitigate exposure. Vendors say the technology has matured from basic vehicle tracking to become a core component of fleet safety programs.
According to Willem Petersen, head of driver risk and safety for Geotab (www.geotab.com), the company’s clients often seek out telematics systems to help them prevent both vehicle crashes and the lingering consequences. “The cost of a collision goes far beyond the damage to the vehicle and even the downtime of the vehicle.”
Geotab’s plug-in devices read engine data and utilize GPS and motion sensors. When a device detects a vehicle impact, it alerts the fleet manager in near real time and sends them a buffer of rich data for event reconstruction and efficient claims workflow purposes.
The bigger payoff for fleets results from linking crash data to the driving behavior that preceded the crash. Geotab has trained a predictive collision risk model on detected collisions, pairing behaviors such as hard braking, tailgating and camera-detected distraction with road type, traffic density and time of day. The output is a ranked list of the riskiest drivers and their habits, which fleet managers can use to plan and conduct coaching sessions.
Assessing Risky Behavior
Lucas Van Houten, director of product at Samsara (www.samsara.com), described a similar approach to risk mitigation. The company studies crashes across its customer base and reviews data from the weeks before each one. Their discovery?
“Not all behaviors are created equal,” Van Houten said.
For example, a driver who uses a cellphone multiple times on a congested freeway presents greater risk than a driver who engages in the same behavior on an empty back road. Samsara’s coaching priority feature weighs such factors – including night driving and freezing conditions – to provide managers with a short list of drivers to coach.
As Van Houten pointed out, “The top 10% riskiest drivers account for about 50% of all crashes,” which means that time-strapped managers can prioritize risk management with a small group of drivers who represent higher-than-average risk.
Context matters, too. Hard braking, for instance, is much more likely in dense city traffic than in rural areas. Petersen said Geotab benchmarks drivers against similar vehicles, vocations and regions, separating the risk of where and when someone drives from behavior within the operator’s control.
Battling Big Brother
Utility fleet professionals understand that in-vehicle cameras can prompt worries about Big Brother. Petersen urged employer transparency with employees and union representatives about what gets recorded and why.
Van Houten said that driver resistance usually fades once a pilot program begins, often after footage exonerates a colleague. He described one driver for a large client who buckled up after receiving an in-cab alert. When another vehicle T-boned his truck minutes later, causing it to roll, the driver was able to walk away from the crash.
Samsara customers are given the option to configure their privacy settings, such as programming inward-facing cameras to alert drivers without uploading footage to managers.
Overall, Van Houten said, “Most driving is safe driving, and we should recognize that.” Rewards are included in the Samsara platform. Geotab is currently gathering driver feedback about their rewards add-on offering.
Proven Results
Telematics systems have delivered proven results. Samsara cited a utility supply and construction company with 1,200 vehicles in 10 states. Their insurance claim costs dropped from $1.4 million to under $25,000 after implementing telematics; collision claim frequency fell by 75%. Although this example is extreme, Van Houten said, he explained that it is not uncommon for fully committed customers to see reductions of more than 70%.
Petersen reported roughly 10% fewer driving events due to tuning thresholds and alerts alone, with that number expected to grow as automated coaching is added. In the United Kingdom, Geotab helped United Utilities improve driver safety scores by 25% after they adopted driver behavior reporting and training.
Beyond Safety
Telematics data also helps fleets with vehicle uptime. Van Houten said that Samsara’s maintenance tools compare fault codes across similar vehicles, flagging the minor codes that tend to escalate within two months as well as those that never escalate, which allows shops to skip needless work. For utilities, Samsara lets crews request anonymized road images from other vehicles on its network. The images can be used to check on a downed line or pothole before anyone is dispatched.
Lastly, telematics documentation can serve as meaningful evidence during litigation. Petersen said nuclear verdicts were a hot topic of conversation during a recent safety conference he attended. The bottom line is that fleets must be able to demonstrate that they took adequate measures to prevent vehicle crashes and implemented appropriate safety measures to protect personnel from serious injury or death should a crash occur.
About the Author: Gary L. Wollenhaupt is a Colorado Springs-based freelance writer who covers the transportation, energy and technology sectors for a variety of publications and companies.