As a business owner or a fleet manager, you know that you need to be well prepared to handle slamming accidents with fleet vehicles in addition to other potential accidents. This statement may seem obvious, but when you are busy handling other tasks for your business, thinking about accidents won’t be the first thing on your mind. To help prevent these accidents from happening, it is best to equip your vehicle with technology so you can monitor your driver’s habits and put safety measures into place. 

What Are Slamming Accidents?

Have you ever followed too closely to the driver in front of you, and you accidentally hit the rear of their vehicle when they stopped? That is one example of slamming accidents.

Other examples include people who commit insurance fraud by staging and causing accidents intentionally to receive money from your commercial auto policy. There are criminals out there who prey on commercial drivers and know exactly how to make an accident look like it’s your fault, so you have to pay them.

T-Bone Accident

Another example of a slamming accident is the t-bone accident. In this situation, the fraudster will wait for your company vehicle to cross into an intersection.

Once in the intersection, they will then accelerate and hit your company vehicle. When the police arrive at the scene, there will be “witnesses” who will claim your driver ran a red light or stop sign, putting you at fault.

The Wave

With the wave, a criminal will watch for a vehicle to switch lanes. The criminal will allow the driver to change lanes in front of them, but once the driver starts to maneuver over, the criminal will accelerate, hitting the backside of the commercial vehicle.

In the eyes of the auto insurance company, they will see the commercial vehicle at fault since they switched lanes into oncoming traffic. To make matters worse, the fraudster may have additional passengers randomly show up and claim injuries that never happened.

Preventing Slamming Accidents With Fleet Vehicles

To prevent slamming accidents with fleet vehicles, you will want to speak with your drivers about the dangers of staged accidents. Many criminals prey on commercial drivers because they know that almost every commercial fleet carries high limit commercial auto policies. They also know that it is hard to argue injuries and liability if your driver rear-ends their vehicle.

Use Technology

To help exonerate your drivers if they fall victim to staged accidents, you can install dashcams into your vehicles. Dashcams created nowadays do more than just record what happens out in front of the vehicle; they now have ways for you to see inside of the cab.

This allows you to see if your employee drives distracted. Depending on the type of dashcam you purchase, there are even options for you to coach and speak with your driver in real-time. 

Other Benefits of Dashcams

There are dashcams out there that also record driver habits. This includes harsh braking, speeding, and hard turning. 

Additional detectable driver habits:

• Following too closely
• Lane departure
• Crash detection

If your driver does any of the above habits, the dashboard camera will send you that data in real-time. With this data in hand, you can then coach your driver about their habits and get them back on the right track.

Why Monitor Your Fleet With Dashcams?

There are many reasons you should monitor your fleet, especially if there are any events resulting in acceleration or hard braking. If any of your drivers fail to maintain a safe distance between them and the vehicles around them, there is a higher chance an accident may occur. 

Types of Fleet Accidents

Even with dashcams installed and a training protocol in place, you cannot do too much to prevent accidents. They happen more often than we would like to admit. In general, there are five common types of fleet accidents.

Backing Accidents

Responsibility for backing safely is on the driver backing from a parked position. Backing accidents are dangerous only if your employee neglects to ensure that it is clear before backing up.

To prevent this from happening, be sure to coach your team to familiarize themselves with the area when pulling in and when leaving. This helps your driver understand how much room they have to back out and any potential blind spots.

Rear-End Collisions

Rear-end collisions usually happen when traffic comes to a slow stop and the driver in front of your employee’s vehicle slams on their brakes, causing your driver to hit the back of their car. To help prevent this, be sure to train your fleet on driving with enough space between them and the vehicle in front of them. You can use dashcams to monitor when your employee drives too close to another car or if they speed excessively.

Fleet Safety Tips

Now that you know more about how to monitor harsh driving behaviors, it is time to put that information to work. It is best to keep track of all incidents your vehicles are involved in, no matter how small or minor the incident is.

Maintaining these records help you identify patterns of bad or good driving behavior. You can then use this data to reward drivers with few or no incidents and focus on retraining those who need it.

Protect Your Fleet Today

Protecting your drivers from slamming accidents with fleet vehicles is not only crucial for your bottom line, but it also keeps your drivers safe. Many criminals out there prey on commercial fleet drivers, and they conduct staged accidents. To help exonerate your drivers or improve your fleet’s overall health, contact us now!