WHAT LINKS ACCIDENTS WITH RISK MANAGEMENT?

It is mostly the case that fleets buy risk management as a separate service to accident management.  In fact most fleets still use the insurer helpline for managing claims.  This way of doing things is due partly to tradition and partly because very few risk management providers are set up to provide an integrated claims service into what they do

In reality, accidents have everything to do with risk management.  They often demonstrate a lack of a safety culture, they offer clues as to how to reduce risk and they also demonstrate whether any risk initiatives are working or not.  However, despite this, claim statistics are normally only considered once a year around the renewal date of the fleet policy.  

If claims are only viewed once a year then fleets are likely to miss improvement opportunities by linking them, as they occur, with other gathered risk management data in order to arrive at an accurate overall risk profile of each driver.  So let us look at some of these potential links between risk management and the occurrence of motor fleet accidents:

LEGAL SAFETY LINK - The government provides some of the rules for legal compliance that are designed to reduce accident frequency such as the need to have safety policies in place and under what circumstances fleets and individuals can be legally liable for non-compliance.  Best practice dictates that fleets need to comply and this means looking proactively at how best to avoid accidents in the future.

DATA LINK - Accident data accumulates on an ongoing basis so the same constant approach should be applied for any risk management initiatives.  Regular reviews of management information should reveal how claims are influencing risk and perhaps more importantly, how and whether risk initiatives are reducing claims.  This data link is essential if the aim of the fleet is to reduce insurance and claim cost.

 

TELEMATICS LINK - Telematics systems that constantly monitor driving behaviour can often ‘predict’ which drivers are most likely to have an accident and some will issue an alert for impacts that exceed a pre-agreed G-force that may indicate an accident has occurred.  Additionally, the technology can often confirm the liability position in a claim by providing visual evidence.

 

INSURANCE LINK - The calculation of the fleet insurance premium is arrived at from looking at many angles including historic claims performance and current/future risk management initiatives chosen by the policy-holding fleet.  So from an insurance point of view the two services are intrinsically linked.

CAUSATION LINK - Another key link is the opportunity to gather more information about causation factors through the claims notification process.  Learning more about why an accident occurred allows a much more prescriptive approach to designing course material for driver training, which in turn would make such training far more effective.

 

CONSTRAINTS ON LINKS

Having established there are several links between claims and risk management, let us now examine what would be needed to make those links function: 

 

TECHNICAL SKILLS - First of all, claims always occur historically but risk has a constant eye on the future.  This means somebody needs to look at what has happened in order to plan what should happen from that point.  This link has technical implications for systems, skills and experience.

OPERATIONAL SKILLS - Secondly, unless considerable training is put in place, the intricacies of dealing with a complex claim requires very different skills to those required to interpret a telematics data stream or indeed to decide on what would be the appropriate remedial action for a driver with varying risk results from claims, telematics and licence check data.

SYSTEMS - The software requirements to manage claims are different to those required to deliver a multi-dimensional risk management solution.  The system would not only have to relate dynamic data to both the driver and the vehicle but also need to have embedded coding designed to identify high risk data from different angles.

All these practicalities might explain why it is rare to find a fleet risk management provider who can truly integrate their services with the requirements of a full accident management service, although there are some in the UK.  The advantages of linking accident management with a risk reduction program as a truly consolidated and single solution are considerable for all the reasons listed here.


At RVM our integrated approach allows us to help fleets to implement effective safety policies, analyse trends and identify high risk drivers. Our Driver Training program is targeted, timely and appropriate. The result is lower accident rates, improved driver safety, and reduced costs. Contact us on 01132248800 to find out more.