Distracted Driving Collisions: Is Your Fleet Doing Enough to Prevent Them?
As long as crashes happen, juries will want to know what a company has done to prevent them.
By Paul Atchley, PhD, eDriving’s Brain Scientist Advisor
In May 2019, a jury awarded a plaintiff $15 million in a case in which a truck driver, talking on his cell phone, failed to stop for stationary traffic, critically injuring a driver who had stopped. As an expert on the case who was asked to testify on the company’s lack of an effective cell phone policy, I can say that one reason the jury was compelled to find in favor of the stopped driver was that the delivery company was taking no significant actions to prevent the crash, other than telling drivers in their welcome packet to not use their phones.
I wrote “…there appears to be no evidence that (the delivery company) took adequate steps necessary to prevent (their driver’s) behavior despite knowledge of the risks of phone use of any kind by its drivers and clear evidence available to fleet safety professionals that fleets with strict cell phone policies have fewer crashes.”
Brendan P. Keegan Wins Silver in 9th Annual Best in Biz Awards
Nashua N.H. native and CEO of Merchants Fleet Brendan P. Keegan has been named a silver winner in the Executive of the Year – Medium Companies category in Best in Biz Awards.
Keegan was recognized for his innovative leadership, which has fueled Merchants Fleet’s strategic direction and been the driving force behind its industry-leading growth.
“With our strategic focus on innovation across the company and our move into our new building, it has been a remarkable year for Merchants,” said Gary Singer, Owner of Merchants Fleet and Chairman of the Corporate Board.
Read more at Merchants Fleet News.
Auto Driveaway Acquires a Majority Interest in Sparkle Mobile LLC
Partnering with mobile, eco-friendly, waterless car wash and detailing services
Auto Driveaway Systems, LLC, through its newly formed entity, Sparkl Mobile LLC, is pleased to announce the acquisition of a majority interest in Sparkle Mobile LLC, a leading provider of mobile, eco-friendly, waterless car wash and detailing services based in Chicago, Illinois.
“We’ve done extensive testing of the Sparkl service offerings and are very pleased with the results and the potential throughout our network,” says Rodney Ruth, President and CEO of Auto Driveaway.
Uber Releases Safety Report Disclosing 3,045 Sexual Assaults And Nine Murders
For the first time in its history, Uber has released a comprehensive safety report about its rides in the US spanning the full length of 2018 and part of 2017 and how it compares to national US averages.
The report discloses that 3,045 sexual assaults occurred during Uber trips last year. Additionally, Uber says nine people were murdered during Uber rides and 58 people died in auto-related crashes.
Uber says users took 3.1 million trips per day on the its platform during the period between 2017 and the end of 2018 in which it was gathering data, and there were also 1.3 billion trips in total in the US last year. Uber says there were 36,000 auto-related deaths in 2018 and 20,000 homicides in 2017, to put the company’s incident numbers in context.
Read the article at The Verge.
U.S. Fleets and Marijuana: Cutting Through the Confusion
By Mark Boada, Executive Editor
I've attended and tuned into several presentations about fleets and marijuana recently, and the overall impression I was left with was that U.S. fleets have been thrown into a confusing mess and dilemma when it comes to handling the issue with their drivers.
The big questions that the conversations have raised are: is it legal for fleet drivers to use marijuana in states where it's been legalized and can fleets legally test their drivers for marijuana use without violating their privacy?
But on further review, it looks, at least to me, a lot less confusing, if not pretty simple. Still, that's with the proviso that fleets need to be careful about their fleet driver policies and practices, and so should double-check with their legal and HR departments on some details.
But before clarifying the issues, first, let's look at reasons why fleet professionals may be confused. I count six:
