 “It’s about risk management. We accept that occasionally accidents do happen.” says Mick Tuffs, Fleet Administrator, at Guildford Borough Council. “Even our best drivers will occasionally clip a wall, gate post or a wing mirror – it is almost inevitable from time to time. However, we need every driver to understand that now they can be identified with Traka, and ensure that any accident which occurs is reported – it makes life so much easier.”
The Council has 44 HGV waste collection vehicles, providing kerb side recycling, domestic refuse collection, green waste collection and commercial refuse collection. These vehicles start their rounds on a phased basis from 5am each morning. “Typically some 75% of our drivers are full time employees,” says Mick. “About 25% are agency drivers and, whilst their use enables us to cope with reduced or increased waste collection at certain times of the year it can introduce other issues such as responsibility and accountability.” By adopting Traka it has enabled Guildford BC to solve many of these problems.
To comply with VOSA (The Vehicle and Operator Services Agency) it is necessary to maintain strict records on; maintenance records for each vehicle such as reported faults, repairs and details of routine service schedules; driver records, competency reports, licensing details, and their individual expiry dates and vehicle usage – Tachograph for commercial use or Log Book for domestic use.
Mick explains; “We needed to ensure that drivers without a 7.5 tonne licence couldn’t get access to keys for inappropriate vehicles – imagine the consequence if there was a serious accident as a result of someone picking up keys at 5am from a pegboard – now with Traka this can’t happen. Every key is locked in place – and only authorised drivers can get access.”
With Traka, the Fleet Administrator can control who gets access to keys and how many they can take. A driver can only take one key at a time, whilst an Inspector or a Yards-man can take up to 6 keys. Workshop mechanics can get access to vehicle keys and Traka offers the use of advanced key booking to stop a driver from taking a specific vehicle when it is reserved for service or repair.
“Since Traka was introduced we no longer have difficulty in identifying which driver was driving a particular vehicle on any day.” Mick Tuffs explains why this is important. “Records were patchy, Log Sheets were not always submitted by agency drivers and, if there was an accident, a speeding fine, or a report of inappropriate driving, we used to have problems identifying the driver. However, with Traka, we can trace the driver immediately, even if the incident happened weeks ago. The easy to use Traka software holds all the records. With ISO9002, we need to be able to both comply and demonstrate that we have procedures in place to manage and account for driver activity.”
Guildford BC uses an independent Fleet Management system and a separate Fuel Management system. “We keep the systems separate,” explains Mick Tuffs. “But deliberately so, they would integrate if we wanted them to. The way it is, it enables us to cross check the information easily.” |