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Why Lightfoot has trumped telematics

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Many companies who turn to Lightfoot have had telematics systems for years which have always provided a wealth of data to managers who are then relied on to communicate this information back to drivers in a top-down way – inefficient, ineffective and outdated.

 Companies have realised that this approach is fundamentally broken and the wrong way around. Instead, they look to Lightfoot’s bottom-up approach to engage drivers in real-time and reward them for their performance, empowering those in the driving seat to drive change.

 Do you want to know more about Lightfoot’s unique approach? Click here.

How self-installed vehicle tracking became an unlikely fleet management hero during ‘Lockdown’

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Back in the summer of 2019, Kinesis launched a new low cost, easy-to-install tracking device named Kinesis atom. At the time, the company purely wanted to offer fleet managers an introduction to vehicle tracking at an affordable price.  However, during the height of the Coronavirus outbreak, and the subsequent ‘lockdowns’, the device has been adopted by thousands of customers in the UK, Ireland, Germany, Belgium, Italy, Spain, Portugal and Malaysia.

Designed for vehicles of all shapes and sizes, the Kinesis atom can be self-installed quickly and provides information on the location and performance of drivers. There is no need to have a professional installer on site. Lockdowns across the world were affecting the way fleets operated with many having to take extra precautions. As you can imagine, given the new restrictions on movement, this became very appealing to fleet managers.  

“We listened to the needs of customers and it was clear that many would start using vehicle tracking if it was easier to install. The Kinesis atom makes tracking simpler at an inexpensive price to reduce the entry level for more vehicle owners”, said Gerville Coe, Group Managing Director of Telematics at Radius. 

“When the pandemic struck, governments decided to lock their countries down and this product became a timely solution given the constraints fleet managers were facing. Like other telematics providers, we were unable to send professional installers to our customer’s premises, but the atom can be installed by anyone, so it was appealing in the lockdown climate. 

The atom is very much aimed at commercial vehicle owners that do not have the luxury of technical teams or IT experts on hand and the results were fantastic. Our customers have been telling us just how helpful the Kinesis atom has been.”, Coe added.

The installation of Kinesis atom does not require any in-depth training or technical know-how; it is as easy as connecting jump leads. The atom device comes pre-configured so installation and activation can happen instantaneously. In addition, Kinesis atom can easily be moved between vehicles.

Kinesis atom has widened the appeal of vehicle tracking, bringing benefits such as improved customer service, better resource utilisation, safer driving and reduced fuel costs. 

Customers can buy it online via www.kinesisfleet.com

Every journey taken by a vehicle is displayed on an online dashboard that enables customers to see where vehicles have been and for how long. 

The Kinesis atom also reports on driver performance metrics including speeding, and it provides a Geofencing feature that enables businesses to easily create virtual zones which trigger an alert when vehicles either arrive or leave a specific area (or a point of interest).

The tracking device also gives users the power to match fuel transactions with vehicle distances travelled to give accurate fuel usage data. By matching fuel card transactions with vehicle location, owners and managers can be alerted of any potentially fraudulent activity.

Kinesis atom was a timely addition to the market during Lockdown, but it is clear that vehicle tracking devices like this will continue to play a big part in fleet management during the years to come.

INDUSTRY SPOTLIGHT: RAC Telematics & Duty of care

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Telematics can support duty of care obligations by keeping records for regulatory purposes in a central, easy-to-reach place. The online portal enables businesses to prove they are meeting their obligations in the case of an accident. Telematics software can also support employers by identifying the length lone workers are on site, showing working hours, highlighting excessive speeding and vehicle health, and providing alerts in case of accident.  

Thanks to the level of data coming out of a telematics system, employers with a mobile or remote workforce are able to execute risk profiling and establish where duty of care focus must be spent.

Telematics systems, such as RAC’s, produces driver benchmarking and driving risk scores based on telematics trip data. This information and scoring, identifies key areas where employers can deploy policies and training programmes to help keep its driver community safe.  Additionally, our system can monitor driver performance, highlight areas of risk and even alert employers in the event of an accident. This unique technology meets both operational and duty of care needs. 

www.rac.co.uk/business/telematics

Lightfoot: Delivering robust returns for some of the UK’s largest and most complex fleets

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Many of the companies who turn to Lightfoot have had telematics systems for years which have always provided a wealth of data to managers, who are then in turn relied on to communicate this information back to drivers.

Companies have realised that this approach is fundamentally broken and the wrong way around. Instead, they look to Lightfoot’s bottom-up approach to engage and rewards drivers, empowering those in the driving seat to drive change.

To demonstrate this bottom-up approach, during the months of September and October 2020, Lightfoot are offering a free 6-week trial to any UK-based fleet over 100 vehicles (subject to terms & conditions).

The Lightfoot trial is unique in the industry and provides a clear comparison of fleet performance before and after Lightfoot deployment – this leads to a robust ROI case study for fleet owners to evaluate at the end of the 6-week trial.

Should you like to know more, please complete the demo request form here.

Where are your business vehicles right now?

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By Radius Payment Solutions

Radius Telematics provides vehicle tracking systems for business vehicles around the world.  

We help fleet managers, regardless of the number of cars, vans or HGVs they oversee with a system and hardware that gives them the information they need to drive their organisations forward.  

How do your drivers behave on the roads?  

With our user-friendly software, you can manage any fleet easily. Get information on speeding, harsh braking and other safety data, find out where each vehicle has been all day or see what your drivers see, through forward-facing dashboard cameras that record HD footage.  

Help your HGV drivers see better 

Do your HGV drivers have blind spots? We can fix them all.  

  • Side scanners and sensors 
  • external rear- and side-view cameras linked to a monitor in the cab 
  • nearside sensors with speed triggers 
  • left-turn audible alarms 

Need advice on London’s Direct Vision Standard?  

If you operate in Greater London, we can kit up your HGVs with all the vision equipment you need to comply with the new law. If you’re not aware, businesses will soon be liable for sizeable fines if they do not meet specific benchmarks. But don’t worry, we’ll talk you through what you need to do!

Contact us on 0800 056 4432 and speak to an fleet management expert today…

www.kinesisfleet.com/kinesis-vision/

Free Trial Offer of the game-changing fleet management solution

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Lightfoot’s unique driver safety technology is delivering robust and sustained returns for some of the UK’s largest and most complex fleets.

During the months of August and September, Lightfoot is offering a free 6-week trial to any UK-based fleet of over 100 Vans and/or Cars (subject to terms & conditions).

The Lightfoot trial is unique in the industry and provides a clear ROI forecast for fleet owners by comparing vehicle and driver performance with and without Lightfoot. 

Should you like to know more – please complete the demo request form here.

Get the complete picture with RAC Advanced Telematics

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It goes without saying that one of the biggest assets for a company is its fleet, keeping your business on the move day-in day-out.

But while you trust your colleagues to adhere to all the rules and regulations governing commercial vehicles, how can you measure and improve driver behaviour?

At RAC this is something we researched comprehensively with the Transport Research Laboratory before launching our RAC Advanced Telematics box.

Our driving behaviour scores are based on real risk measures including braking levels, acceleration rates, speeding, night time driving and urban environment driving.

The algorithms we’ve developed for the RAC Advance system have been trusted and endorsed by six of the top insurers who utilise our RAC Black Box insurance for certain high risk groups such as young drivers.

The RAC methodology has excellent correlation between scoring and behaviour and immediately shows where driving style can be improved.

For us it’s key that the data being gathered by the device in-car, can be quickly and clearly presented to the user, in order to provide real insight and value to the fleet managers. So drivers are able to monitor and benchmark their scores on an easy-to-use driver app and absorb hints and tips to better improve their driving score.

At the same time fleet managers are able to track these scores within the Management Information System accessible on a 24/7/365 portal to assist them to intervene with bad driving behaviours or reward good driving behaviours.

Research into the benefits of utilising telematics to impact driver behaviour suggests:

  • 43% Decrease in accidents
  • 55% Less fuel usage
  • 31% Reduction in maintenance spend
  • 49% Reduction in speeding incidents

Interested to hear more? Get in touch for a system demonstration and to find out about our six months free offer.

For more information, contact Tracey Speke.

T: 07773 035055

E: tspeke@rac.co.uk

Changing driver behaviour through telematics: First step, safety culture

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By Nick List, Customer Success Director, Europe at eDriving

Telematics solutions are fast becoming commonplace among fleets. No longer valued only for their “track and trace” capabilities, telematics solutions are now able to provide a vast array of behavioural insights to help fleet managers improve driver safety and wellbeing. 

Fleet managers have the ability to see real-time driver safety performance and promptly identify trends, both positive and negative. However, for behaviour-based telematics to measurably impact on work-related road risk, it’s important for an organisation to already have a solid safety culture in place. 

A commitment to safety

Organisations that introduce telematics as their “driver safety solution” without first having a solid safety culture are less likely to experience a long-term reduction in collisions and incidents. By a solid safety culture, I mean having in place policies, procedures, risk assessments, training, and most importantly, effective two-way communication between the driver and their immediate manager; all in the wider context of an organisation-wide commitment to safety, including senior leadership.

Without policies that detail what is reasonably expected of drivers in terms of their behaviour – in relation to speeding, distraction, braking, cornering, for example – how do drivers know that they need to improve? And, even with telematics data, how do drivers know what behaviours they are aiming for? 

Don’t underestimate the role that line managers play in your safety culture or the influence they have on your organisation’s safety operational balance (i.e. maintaining the same level of importance for safety as for operations). As well as providing ongoing training to drivers, it’s equally important to train managers so that they too fully understand the influence they have in helping keep drivers safe as well as recognising how best to engage with drivers. 

Interpreting telematics data

The output from telematics can be overwhelming. That’s another reason why a solid safety culture is so important. If you know what your organisation is aiming toward, you can use telematics data to guide drivers towards your safety goals. Most telematics providers will issue manager reports that give insights into driving behaviours such as speed versus posted speed limit, braking, acceleration and cornering. At eDriving, our smartphone telematics programme, Mentor by eDrivingSM, also provides feedback on phone manipulation, whether that be a phone call (handheld or hands-free), text, accessing social media or even just moving the phone to view a notification. 

It’s important that the data supplied by your telematics provider is useful and relevant to your organisation, and that you are supported in acting on this data. eDriving’s Mentor programme does this automatically, prescribing micro training modules within the smartphone app, tailored to the driving behaviours that have been identified; including distraction, speeding, scanning, braking etc. In addition, Mentor’s manager dashboard can automatically identify the 10% of drivers most at-risk in any given month and assign Manager-Driver OnetoOnes®to discuss and develop action plans for improvement. 

Effective regular communication

Communication with drivers is fundamental… Consider this: a driver has telematics installed and regularly triggers warnings about their driving behaviour, If their manager does nothing about these warnings it won’t take long for a driver to realise that they can simply ignore them. Without analysis and discussion, risky driving behaviour will never be changed. 

Again, that brings us back to the importance of a solid safety culture. Drivers need to be aware of the interventions that will occur should they fail to meet the organisation’s safe driving requirements. And don’t forget to address how good driving behaviours will be rewarded as that’s equally important. 

Formal communication (as in the case of Manager-Driver OnetoOnes) will ideally be supported by regular informal communication, whether that be in the form of face-to-face chats, driver emails, newsletters, team discussions or posters. Feedback, feedback and more feedback goes a long way to maintaining a strong safety culture over time. 

Transparency for drivers

One of the biggest concerns drivers have about telematics is their privacy. But, a solid safety culture addresses privacy concerns at the outset. And, the subsequent introduction of telematics will only serve to reinforce your mission of ensuring drivers make it home safely every day, rather than triggering concerns. If your whole organisation is aware of your commitment to safety, drivers are more likely to view telematics in a positive light. Enabling them to see how they’re performing and areas in which they can improve will further boost their engagement. 

eDriving’s Mentor programme has full transparency for drivers and acts like a fitness coach in that it prescribes drivers with their own personal validated driving score that is recalculated after every trip and accompanied by feedback related to specific driving behaviours including acceleration, braking, cornering, distraction and speeding. Drivers can immediately see areas in which they could do better and can even join colleagues in competing for the best scores using the gamification feature, “Circles”. 

To summarise, if you’re considering a new telematics programme, or assessing the effectiveness of an existing one, first look to your safety culture. Could it be strengthened? If so, it’s worth investing your time in creating a solid foundation before focusing your efforts on telematics solutions. Yes, behaviour-based telematics can be a valuable tool for reducing collision and claim rates, but only when deployed into a company culture that truly puts safety first. 

Nick List is eDriving’s Customer Success Director for Europe. 

About eDriving

eDriving helps organisations to reduce collisions, injuries, licence endorsements and total cost of ownership through a patented closed-loop driver behaviour-based safety programme that reduces collisions by up to 67%. The risk management partner of choice for many of the world’s largest and safest fleets, eDriving has served over one million drivers in 45 languages and 96 countries over its 23 years in the industry and has been recognised through 70+ client and partner awards.

eDriving will be exhibiting at Safety & Health Expo in London from 18-20 June and presenting a panel discussion on Using a Closed-Loop Approach to Measure, Manage & Reduce Driver Risk at 2:00-2:30 p.m. on 19 June in the Operational Excellence Theatre. More information.

Visit www.edriving.com.

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