As a fleet manager who is interested in trying to keep down the cost of your fleet, motor fleet insurance premiums is probably an area where you don’t feel you have as much control. However, if you are willing to put in some time and effort then you can actually reduce your fleet insurance cost.
Your first port of call would be to speak with a specialist insurance broker with Fleet Risk Management expertise who can provide a number of risk management strategies to reduce accident frequency, vehicle damage and third party claims.
Many businesses miss a trick and spend more time concentrating on getting a better deal from an insurance provider and think less about concentrating on making their business more appealing in terms of reduced risk.
There are a number of ways to keep your fleet insurance cost down, here are a few:
Develop a safety culture within your fleet
Developing a safety culture within the organisation can help to reduce your fleet insurance costs. By gradually encouraging positive behavioural changes to your fleet’s driving habits, you can lower potential risks and experience fewer future collisions. This can be maintained via variety of methods such as regular communications, safety discussions, campaigns, and driver feedback sessions.<
>Implementing training to improve driving standards can also impact on your fleet car insurance, but it is important to enforce regular checks to ensure drivers maintain these standards.
Ultimately, by making your fleet car drivers aware of the effect’s claims can have on insurance premiums you can influence driver behaviour and self-awareness. There are many ‘self-inflicted’ fleet insurance claims that can often be attributed to impatience, and a little forethought can go a long way.
Focus on reducing accident frequency
As part of implementing a safety culture it is also important to ensure that operating practices and procedures allow for employees to drive safely to reduce fleet car insurance costs. Vehicles need to be properly maintained and kept in a safe and roadworthy condition as well as providing training and support on relevant aspects such as heavy-loading, or providing a clear loading area, etc.
You should also not ignore the importance of keeping your fleet as up to date as possible to reduce wear and tear risks, as well as benefiting from current fleet car developments. Fleet managers that can demonstrate awareness of the safety issues facing their organisation and acting on new developments in the industry are ideally placed to secure improved terms.
Fitting CCTV cameras can also help keep fleet insurance cost down as they can capture footage to help protect the company against any inaccurate, fraudulent and needlessly costly claims. But you need to communicate the benefits of these to the drivers and explain that it is not a ‘big brother’ tactic, but more to help settle claims and disputes.
Careful driver selection
To help keep your fleet car insurance costs low, you will want to ensure a low turnover of drivers. Driver selection has a huge impact on fleet car insurance premiums – and once you get a good driver it is important to hold on to them. When employing drivers it is vital to undertake original licence checks and medical examinations to identifying any mental or physical inadequacies.
Throughout employment it is also recommended to provide reminders of company policy, particularly in terms of use of drugs, alcohol and mobile phones whilst driving.
Some emploers also chose to restrict the age of their drivers to over 25, lowering their risk and reducing premiums.
Build relationships with fleet car insurance providers
Building a valuable relationship with a specialist insurance broker who can get actively involved in your businesses risk management can help to actively reduce the number of claims your business makes against your fleet car insurance.
It is generally not recommended to chop and change provider in the ultimate chase to a lower premium, but to develop a relationship with a specialist broker or insurance provider who will understand your business and focus on getting you the better policy to suit your needs.
A specialist insurance broker will already have built strong relationships with the right insurers and know exactly how to present your business to them. Your fleet may change numerous times throughout the year, whether it be down to the number of cars or upgrading vehicle makes and models, or losing and acquiring drivers.
A valued relationship will help you to automate such changes to your policy quickly and with ease.
Telematics can reduce your fleet insurance costs
The use of telematics can monitor and look to improve harsh braking, acceleration, cornering, lane changing and speed versus speed limits. Telematics can play a huge part in an overall risk management strategy and reducing overall fleet car insurance costs.
But only those who have the time to work closely with the data generated by telematics can benefit from such technology. For a lot of smaller organisations this is just too time-consuming and requires a large rollout plan in terms of educating the drivers and analysing your data.
As well as telematics, use other technology to reduce your fleet insurance costs
To keep your fleet insurance cost down, you can install and utilise other vehicle technologies such as dashboard cameras as well as CCTV cameras. Dashboard Cameras are amazing and capturing footage of any accidents as they happen, this saves time on trying to determine who was at fault during an accident, rather than go through a lengthy hearsay argument.
You can also utilise fleet technology. Fleet technology allows you to monitor your vehicles, their downtime and how often they need to go in for maintenance. If you look after your vehicles, it won’t just reduce your maintenance costs, but your fleet insurance costs too. As a result, it won’t just reduce your maintenance costs, but your fleet insurance costs too.
Time taken to report incidents
The cost of many Third Party claims can be heavily impacted by the speed with which the actual claim is reported and the quality of information provided. By reporting an incident as quickly as possible the insurer can reduce the time it takes for the claim to be settled and seek to keep costs to a minimum. A specialist insurance broker will also have the contacts and experience at hand to deal with such claims swiftly.
With this in mind it is important to give careful consideration to incentive schemes that reward ‘best’ drivers. Unless communicated correctly such schemes can deter drivers from reporting any damage and ultimately negatively affect your fleet car insurance premium.
>Conversely, by providing your drivers with an information pack and camera within their vehicle to assist them in the event of an accident, you can help speed up any claims process and ensure accuracy of information.
Carry out regular risk assessments
As a fleet manager, it is in your best interest to carry out regular risk assessments on your vehicles. Risk assessments are different to vehicle maintenance, risk assessments look at various data to determine how safe your drivers are driving and reviewing claims history to see where areas of improvement can be made.
Risk assessments will help give you a better understanding of the health of your fleet, where the risks are and what you can do to prevent them from happening. A thorough risk assessment and future plan will help to reduce your fleet insurance cost as it shows you are proactively trying to reduce the chances of risk.
Overall the key objective for motor fleet operators is to reduce their collision rates, which will contribute to reducing the ultimate claims cost.