Fleet Owners Making Safe Driving A Priority

November 7, 2017 | by Marketing Team

Truck Driver Safety Priority | Thunder Funding

Just this past October, the Commercial Vehicle Safety Alliance and the FMCA’s annual Operation Safe Driver Week raised awareness for both drivers and fleet owners around all things to do with driver safety. The goal of the week was simple: To “help improve the behavior of all drivers operating in an unsafe manner through educational and traffic enforcement strategies to address individual’s exhibiting high-risk driving behaviors.”

Stricter Enforcement: Truck Driver Violations On The Rise

The trucking industry and media have already noticed that police officers have been more strict in their monitoring of both passenger and commercial vehicles. Officers are on the lookout for dangerous driving behaviors including speeding, distracted driving, texting while driving, not using a seatbelt, following too closely, improper lane changing, and failure to obey traffic signals.

In 2016, enforcement officers issued roughly 21,000 warnings and citations with almost 12,000 of those citations given to drivers of commercial vehicles. Speeding, failure to obey traffic signals, failure to wear seatbelts, and using handheld phones made up the majority of these truck driver violations.

More Fleet Managers Reinforcing Safe Driving Practices

Operation Safe Driver Week may be over, but more and more fleet managers are continuing the conversation around safe driving practices with their drivers. Some tried and true ways to reinforce safe driving include the following:

  • Spend additional time with new hires to review the fleet’s safety policies and procedures.
    Make safe driving practices a discussion topic at every driver meeting.
  • Include safe driving tips in all your driver communications whether it be via an email, a company video, or even a newsletter.
  • Have your dispatchers reinforce seatbelt and handheld phone policies during their interactions with drivers.

 

Operation Safe Driver Week has given fleet owners a great reason to keep the conversation going about driver safety with their team. In our eyes, nothing is more important than keeping your drivers, your vehicles, and the people they share the road with safe and sound. 

Be sure to check out our blog for more trucking industry news and trends from the team at Thunder Funding!

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