What should be covered in a company’s driver policy?
When you set up criteria for a vehicle operation policy, you want to make sure all your drivers are evaluated and that you discuss if the policy will affect only employees. If you’re going to allow personal use, will you allow other members of the family to drive? If you allow other members to drive, how are you going to do due diligence to make sure they are safe and tracked? Are you going to put a restriction on how far they can drive? Are you going to stick to within 50 miles of their home, or will you allow them to take it to Florida for the family vacation? I’ve seen kids take company cars on spring break, and the company ends up bearing the burden of that claim for what never should have happened.
Another risk factor that should be addressed is the use of vehicle restraints like seat belts. You also need to deal with potential driver distractions, whether that is the use of cell phones, text messaging or other drivers on the road.
All these issues can be written into policies, then communicated to your employees. Provide training to keep your drivers safe while they are operating motor vehicles under the scope of their employment.
Your employees have to realize the risks to which the company opens itself by allowing these things to happen. Maybe the executives are comfortable with that, maybe they’re not. Maybe your insurance company is comfortable with it, maybe it’s not.
The involved parties need to have these discussions ahead of time rather than get into a situation and wish they had addressed it (proactive versus reactive).
How can your company’s driver policy affect the amount you spend on insurance?
These decisions certainly have an effect on exposures and rates from an insurance company — especially if you have incidents.
When you are working with underwriters who are pricing the risk, you need to realize that they only know what they have been told. You can draw a better picture for them if you can say, ‘This is the policy we have in place. We don’t allow personal use of the company vehicles.’
Whenever you draw a clearer picture, it makes them feel more comfortable, which gives them a reason to lower rates.
Jonathan Theders, CPIA, is president and COO of Clark Theders Insurance Agency Inc. Reach him at (513) 779-2800 or [email protected].