As an employer you have a duty of care under the Health and Safety at Work Act 1974 to look after the wellbeing of your staff and this includes when they are out on the road for business purposes.
According to a report by Road Safety Analysis someone who drives at work is more likely to be involved in an accident or engage in poor driving practices than someone who doesn’t due to a number of factors:
- They are driving more, more driving means an increased exposure to the risk of an accident while driving
- More distractions, thinking about the meeting that they are on their way to or from, driving too fast in order to get to a meeting or taking a call about work whilst driving
- A lack of familiarity with the work vehicle or using a number of different work vehicles also increases risk
If your employees use a company vehicle, then having a driver handbook is a really useful tool to set out expectations for both the employee and the employer.
So what should you include in a driver handbook?
There should be information that may relate to any legal obligations or prohibitions such as:
- Driving licence checks
- The use of alcohol and drugs (including prescribed medication)
- Consequences of driving offences
- Eye sight requirements
- Vehicle checks
- Use of mobile phones
And then there needs to be further information regarding:
- Accident, emergency and damage reporting procedures
- Smoking expectations
- Good driving practice
- Vehicle tracking
- Cleanliness of the vehicle
- Personal safety
- Journey planning
- Driving risk management
By issuing this information to any employee using a company vehicle or their own vehicle for business use, you will ensure you have made them aware of some of the risks and how to manage them to keep them safe and avoid harm. You can also back this up with additional training and spot checks as required.
Do you have questions about driver handbooks?
Give us a call at CUBE HR on 01282 678321, we’ll be happy to advise you and we have policies and templates available to meet every HR need.
Why not check out our blog on a similar topic Driver Checks on Company Vehicles – Cube HR
We also have a YouTube channel with loads of handy videos
