Road accidents: 1era cause of death at work
On average, every year in France, 20,000 accidents at work are road accidents. Road accidents remain the leading cause of death at work, accounting for around 20% of fatal accidents.
Yes, it's an appalling fact: 1 in 5 fatal work-related accidents take place on the road!
Another alarming and significant figure for companies: road-related accidents at work represent 5 million lost working days.
Faced with this sad fact, company managers are called upon to contribute to preventing road risks.
In fact, according to the Labour Code, the company manager is obliged to assess all the risks faced by employees and to implement prevention measures.
The prevention of road risk is an obligation for the company manager:
When a company manager provides a vehicle to an employee to enable him to carry out his employment contract, he is bound by a safety obligation and it is his responsibility to take all necessary measures to avoid endangering the safety of his employees.
If a lack of preventive measures in the field of road transport is the cause of a road accident at work, the employer may be personally liable, including under criminal law.
Indeed, criminal proceedings may be brought against the employer for manslaughter or involuntary injury (Articles 121-3, 221-6, 222-19, R.625-2, R. 622-1 of the Criminal Code) if, through his failings, he has created or allowed the creation of a dangerous situation that made it possible for the accident to occur.
Despite these potentially serious consequences, the company manager is often powerless to deal with the road risk. How can they have a clear vision of the road behaviour of each employee?
On-board telematics provides a clear answer to this thorny question.
By means of a GPS box installed on board each vehicle, it is possible to collect a large amount of information in real time on the vehicle, of course, but also on the driver (identity of the person behind the wheel, his or her driving behaviour, etc.). In terms of driving behaviour, on-board telematics makes it possible to constantly analyse 3 fundamental indicators illustrating the type of driving of each person:
- Braking
- Curves
- Acceleration.
The collection, processing and analysis of this data enables the profile of each driver to be defined in order to identify accident-prone behaviour.
At Optimum Automotive, a European specialist in connected vehicles, the profile of drivers is given in the form of a rating called "Eco-Index".
Initially, a score of 100 is given to each driver; then this score will gradually deteriorate according to the driving events mentioned above. The company manager thus has a Dahsboard on which he can visualise the driving behaviour of his employees and very quickly identify risky behaviour for which preventive action should be considered. It should also be noted that the Optimum Automotive platform, in addition to the Eco-Index score, provides an estimate of CO2 emissions and fuel consumption. In addition to the number of accidents, the driving behaviour of drivers has a major influence on these two indicators.
Training and consolidation are the other two pillars of road risk prevention
Once accident-prone behaviour has been identified, the company manager is obliged to "implement appropriate prevention measures". Driver awareness and training are effective measures to reduce the number of accidents in companies.
The training can take different forms: practical courses on the track with an approved trainer or e-learning courses.
Optimum Automotive has, for example, entered into a partnership with Code Rousseau to optimise drivers' road behaviour. The e-learning platform, EASY COACH, consists of 7 test modules, each with 20 MCQs. Featuring 30 multimedia courses on 10 themes, this programme covers driving rules, driving behaviour and road risk prevention. Each module is graded and corrected as you go along.
But training is not everything. As the saying goes, "if you don't want it, it will come back". Road behaviour cannot be changed overnight. So how can we avoid the return of bad habits?
By consolidating what has been learned! In order not to let the knowledge acquired during the training be forgotten over time, it is important to maintain awareness in the medium and long term. To do so, the Optimum Automotive platform allows you to create and run challenges on different criteria (Eco-Index rating, CO2 emissions, fuel savings?). These challenges allow to create an emulation and to preserve the acquired knowledge in the long term.
In conclusion, road risk is not a fatality. On-board telematics can provide a concrete response to road risk prevention and demonstrate the efforts of the company manager in his ability to assess and minimise the risks to which his employees are exposed.