A fleet manager’s guide to incident management

How do you prepare for an incident before it happens?

Preparation shapes the outcome of an incident, so start by agreeing roles in advance:

• Who notifies the insurer?
• Who leads the investigation?
• Who supports drivers and their families?

Part of this is making sure emergency information is easy for drivers to find. FleetCheck Driver stores digital contact lists securely in one place, so drivers aren't searching for a number at the worst possible moment.

You also need strong policies. A good one covers driver welfare and fitness, vehicle safety, telematics and tacho data, driver location, and legal protection, with clear guidance on communication and legal representation. If you don't have a driving-for-work policy yet, start there.

But a policy only works if it’s properly implemented. That means ensuring systems to assess, monitor, and support driver fitness, from licence checks to mental health awareness.

What should a driver do at the scene of a crash?

Drivers need to know what to do when they come across a crash, whether it involves their vehicle or not. 30% of pre-hospital deaths could be prevented with timely bystander intervention. That could save up to 200 lives a year. Your driver may be the only trained, calm person on the scene for the first few minutes.

Mark broke this down into 3 competencies:

1. Emergency communication

Drivers need to identify exactly where they are. What3Words, Google Maps and GoodSAM can all give a precise grid reference for the emergency services.

They also need to describe what they see and triage it. Is this hospital-level, minor, or a near miss? Telling the call handler whether it's code red, amber, or green gives them immediate clarity.

Mark's biggest point: don't assume someone else has made the call.

2. Scene management and safety

Personal safety comes first. Drivers shouldn't put themselves at risk to intervene. If they're safe, they can secure the scene and make themselves known to the emergency services with anything useful.

They should also capture the evidence they need quickly: licences, telematics, dashcam footage. This feeds directly into your insurance claims and overall risk profile.

SMS Energy covered this at our customer conference earlier this year. They use FleetCheck Driver to report collisions to their insurers and fleet team straight away, often same day within the hour. This has saved them £7,000 in hire costs on just three claims last quarter and given them a 75% first notification of loss (FNOL) rate, well above the industry average. Their insurer gave them a significant rebate last year off the back of that claims performance.

3. Medical support

Drivers should account for every victim, then work in this order:

1. Find the quiet ones first. Someone screaming is breathing and unlikely to die in the next 15 minutes, the target time for trained professionals to arrive. Silent casualties are the priority, and the ones to direct the blue lights to.
2. Check and clear airways if they're blocked.
3. Cover external bleeds and apply pressure.
4. Carry out CPR if needed.

Why should you investigate every collision?

A rigorous incident investigation tells you how to stop the same thing happening again. Too often it begins and ends with asking the driver "what happened then?" and either blaming or clearing them based on the answer. A proper investigation goes wider than that.

Mark shared from experience that a collision is rarely the fault of the vehicle alone. Almost without exception, it comes down to human performance: your driver, or other drivers around them.

He said the cause is usually one of four ‘known unknowns’:

• Distraction: Any kind of distraction, but especially mobile phones, which have killed more people on UK roads than anything else by a considerable margin. Even hands-free calls are dangerous, so a strict no-mobile policy is worth having.
• Fatigue: There's no test for it, so this one is about prevention, not detection. Look beyond the working day. A second job or a long daily commute leaves a driver tired before they start. Track working hours and build rotas that give drivers proper rest.
• Drug and alcohol impairment: Impairment is relatively easy to test with breathalysers. Worth noting this isn't just recreational drugs. Things like painkillers and hay fever medication can impair a driver and make them fail a drug test too.
• Medical conditions: Know your driving demographic and watch for diabetes, cardiovascular issues, metabolic issues, obesity, and sleep apnoea. If your driver isn’t fit to drive, don’t shy away from the hard conversation.

Conclusion

If your drivers see something on the road, a collision, stranded vehicle, or debris on a carriageway, they should call National Highways on 0300 123 5000. If it's life-threatening, call 999.

There's plenty you can do to prevent and minimise your risk. But when crashes do inevitably happen, a prepared, pragmatic response is what changes the outcome. Look beyond the driver's actions to ask the harder questions.

For more information, or to explore how FleetCheck can help you better manage your incidents, get in touch with the team.