Introduction:
Insurance is past the point of utility. It’s a valuable business asset.
So, when Blue Sky Logistics Ltd - a delivery service partner for Amazon - joined our Risk Management Academy, we approached our collaboration with a specific goal to help optimise their business and take control of their fleet.
Identifying the challenge:
For a courier like Blue Sky, providing a timely service is crucial to their success, so keeping vehicles on the road and moving is key.
The issue is: drivers would often equate delivering jobs on time with taking more risks to arrive as quickly as possible. That fuels high-risk driving behaviours which put the drivers, the vehicles and the company reputation at risk. Rushing to complete the jobs led to more frequent accidents and, as a result, continuous damages to the vehicles.
In partnership with Blue Sky and their insurance broker, Hubb, we set ourselves on the goal to tackle these challenges through multiple touch points, using the behavioural data our telematics had generated on the fleet’s performance.
Our approach to the challenge
Our Risk Management Academy provides fleet managers with insights on fleet performance, giving key action points to inform driver training, improve behaviours and make safer trips.
So, when Blue Sky joined our Risk Management Academy - the focus was on finding some powerful insights to drive change in the drivers’ behaviour.
Insights that drive change
By presenting Blue Sky with data on their fleet performance, for the first time, we’ve enabled their business to get an in-depth look into their fleet’s mobility and their drivers’ behaviour areas of improvement.
Our telematics data enabled them to analyse their performance at both a driver and vehicle level, which sparked meaningful behavioural conversation between the business and the drivers overall: good drivers gained more recognition, whereas more high-risk drivers were given additional training to improve their performance.
“The actual risk management part has been brilliant because it’s pure information that you can react to that’s given on a week by week basis.
That’s enabled us to get consistent figures as to how those drivers are driving and which drivers are going around corners too quickly.
It’s a one-off snapshot which you can use to give back to your drivers and always at the back of your mind”
- Leigh Cotterill, Managing Director at Blue Sky commented.
Individual and overall driver score
Our telematics technology enabled Blue Sky to see both the individual performance of their drivers, but also get an overall picture of how their fleet’s performance is changing. The ability to see incremental changes gave the business power to make more informed operational decisions.
“The overall score gives you a very rounded overview of the performance of the driver – some telematics data only tells you about one specific moment whereas Zego’s data is continuous. That is the power of this management system. It’s more complete and provides an overview of everything”.
The big breakthrough for Blue Sky was when, through the data we’ve collected over time, they found a direct link between their individual fleet vehicle maintenance cost and the individual drivers’ performance score.
“It saves me and the company a great deal of time as the figures are there. We can be proactive with that, train off the back of it and see how we’re doing on a week by week basis”.
What Blue Sky achieved:
Outcome #1: “Good driver” redefined
Blue Sky successfully aligned with their drivers on what a “good driver” is and what kind of behaviour was encouraged. With help of our insights-driven education, Blue Sky shifted the “good driver” perception from being “rush the get the job done” to “drive smoothly - it’s beneficial for us all”. It sparked meaningful and encouraging conversations:
“We say that smooth driving is what we’re after; we gave them feedback and shared a rough outline of how they were performing. So they then wanted to drive themselves forward and become the best.
It was treated in a positive waywhere the top-scoring drivers were rewarded, and the drivers who needed to improve started feeling eager to become better”.
Outcome #2: Best drivers incentivised
Blue Sky started incentivising their top-scoring drivers to keep them motivated and aligned on the “good driver” vision at all times:
“The good drivers were rewarded with vouchers, which were massively well received, we made a big song and dance of that and said a big well done. They then all understand what it takes to be a good driver”.
Outcome #3: New processes established
Blue Sky ensured that the fleet’s drivers have access to the training needed to improve their driving score.
"Every week, we have a meeting with our drivers and we always have a training spot. It’s allowed us to have a system in place where we’re monitoring our drivers. It’s so so valuable”.
The ultimate operational results:
Blue Sky is a great example of how engaging with risk management data to drive effective behaviour changes can directly translate into business results.
1. Claims Number*
Reduced by 75%. Meaning that the number of accidents and vehicle damages significantly dropped resulting in reduced claim numbers.
2. Claims Frequency*
Reduced by 21.1%. Meaning that the number of claim-reporting vehicles dropped by one fifth.
3. Claims Costs*
Reduced by 57.6%, which will positively impact Blue Sky Logistics’ insurance price at renewal.
*The results are valid for the month of June 2022
Wrapping it up
The Blue Sky’s biggest challenges of ongoing van damages and rushing the jobs by drivers are very much behaviour-based. However, without the evidence to support their theory, it was very difficult to make the case for better driving practices to their drivers.
So, once we equipped them with our tech and brought clear, actionable data around their fleet’s performance to the table - the operational solution emerged in no time and so did the results.
We helped Blue Sky effectively tackle their biggest pain points and set them on a path for growth and continuous improvement. But most importantly, the fleet company took a proactive role in harnessing the power of the data-driven insights and driving positive change for their business. Cooperation was key in this case.
“We’ve been given the right motivation and boost to get us on the path of getting better and better. We can use telematics data to make sure that we’re always driving to be better than we are today with health and safety”.
Learn more about our behaviour based insurance and risk management here.