Your drivers are your biggest asset – the success of your fleet business relies on their dedication, hard work, and devotion to duty. However, negligence can easily creep into any business protocol, ruining things for the business owner. You must ensure that your workers stay dedicated and careful about their role in the whole enterprise.
Not only must you train your drivers to be extra vigilant on the road and exercise safe driving practices for the sake of your business, but you also have to educate them about their regulatory duties. This is extremely important, and you must pay special attention to ensure that things go smoothly for all involved.
If you do so, you will ace all inspections and stay prepared for them year-round.
Plus, you’ll be able to bring the insurance premiums down to an affordable minimum!
#1) Begin With The Regulatory Stuff
On-road safety is important, rather vital, for your fleet operations, but what goes on before and after each travel is just as much worthy of your attention for fleet risk management.
You must prioritize maintenance and safety checks for your vehicles above everything else. By law, the company must ascertain that all of its cars are in peak condition and perfectly safe before letting the drivers take them out on the streets.
Of course, this also puts some responsibilities on the drivers, and you must see to it that they understand their obligations and follow through with the guidelines you provide in this regard.
If the drivers notice something out of order or if they feel that the car is not perfectly safe, they should share this information with you immediately so that you can set things straight.
This applies to both before the trips and afterward.
Inspecting Fleet Vehicles Before Trips
These inspections or checks are not to be taken lightly, by law, the driver must check whether or not the vehicle they’re driving is perfectly safe. They must check the status of their fleet car both before and after each shift. For the pre-trip inspection, the driver must make sure that:
- The service brakes are functioning properly
- The hand brake is working fine
- The steering mechanism operates without friction
- The car’s reflectors and lights are working properly
- The tires are in perfect shape, inflated optimally, and that there is no sign of wear
- The car’s horn works fine
- The wipers function properly
- All the mirrors are clear and set perfectly
- The coupling devices are functioning optimally
Following this, they should also check out the previous inspection report for the car to see if there have been any troubles with their ride recently.
If something was indeed out of order the last time, the current inspecting driver must first make sure that the said issue was resolved and then initial their report, stating that the problem was fixed. If no repairs were needed, i.e. the air pressure in the tires was less than ideal (simply fill them up), then the driver must attest that repairs were not needed.
In addition to all the basic checks, the driver must also check out the emergency stuff, such as fire extinguishers, to ascertain that all is indeed well.
Inspecting Fleet Vehicles After Trips
Much like the pre-trip inspection, the driver must also check the fleet’s status after their shift, and this covers the same stuff as described earlier. The driver must ascertain that the car is in fine/safely operable condition, plus they must also check the emergency equipment once more.
If they happen to stumble upon something out of the ordinary, they must report it immediately by mentioning the issue in their inspection report. Then, the company must check the issue, see if any repairs are required, and fix things however possible. Once these fixes are done, the company may then want to submit the vehicle to commercial vehicle roadworthiness testing in order to ensure that it is safe to be driven and ready to be returned to the fleet.
The driver on the next shift must check if the necessary steps were taken to resolve the issue from the previous day, as discussed earlier.
#2) Launch Training Programs For Your Fleet Drivers
Next, you need to train your drivers and share with them your expectations as an employer. You should also make it clear that you’ll be checking on them to make sure they follow through with the protocol you’ve set in place.
If your fleet cars have additional components to be inspected, for instance, you can simply make an “inspect everything” policy so that nothing stays out of notice. Depending on your specific type of fleet, you may also implement mandatory walk-around inspections to be done before resuming travel after parking the fleet vehicle for some time.
This way, your driver will make sure that everything is in perfect order.
Share your expectations and requirements clearly and use fleet tracking software to ensure that your instructions are followed thoroughly.
#3) Make A Routine & Follow Through With It
Having a routine is convenient; it is harder to forget doing something or missing important bits during the inspection this way. If you set a fixed pattern for your drivers to follow during the inspection, you’ll make things simpler for them.
For instance, you could follow a five-step inspection routine:
- Engine compartment inspection
- Inspecting the in-cab region
- Doing a walk-around inspection
- Inspecting the lights and reflectors
- Checking the brakes
The idea is to make your drivers more responsible for these inspections and general vehicle safety.
Bottom Line
Compliance with inspection requirements is not something you can achieve at the eleventh hour – it takes dedication, awareness, and action on your part to make a difference. Think of every day as inspection day, don’t fret about it, but don’t take things lightly either. Maintenance of industry standards and compliance with your company protocols will keep things running smoothly for everyone, otherwise, you might as well pack up your business setup.
The fleet business is highly competitive, you can’t afford to have one or more of your vehicles out of action due to non-compliance with inspection requirements – not to mention the penalties associated with failing to meet the said standards. Think of this regulatory routine and driver safety as your red line, and don’t let anyone cross it.
Hopefully, with all this information at hand, you’ll be much clearer about what you have to do!
