Are you passionate about your coach business? Would your heart be broken if risk-related scenarios brought it to its knees?
This Valentine’s Day, take a long look at what could prevent your affair with your livelihood continuing in the long term.
One could be compliance. Have you checked your drivers’ permissions to drive, and ensured they secured their Driver Qualification Cards, if these were up for renewal, as so many coach sector cards were, in September 2023? Unless full CPC training was undergone, it’s possible some drivers did not receive their DQC, but do you know, for sure? Have you asked for temporary access to their driving records, to check?
How regularly, in general, do you review your drivers’ licences? Are you keeping on top of their eyesight tests and monitoring their general fitness to drive – physical and mental?
How much are you protecting drivers? Do you invest in driver training, to help them stay safer but also make your business a better insurance risk?
Do you have a strategy in place, in case drivers are interviewed under police caution, for a driving offence, including the relatively new one of Causing Serious Injury by Careless or Inconsiderate Driving’? This is such a risk for those driving for their livelihoods, that McCarron Coates has launched a RTC Crisis Line service, ensuring all clients have immediate access to legal professionals, offering advice over the phone but also at any police station at which a driver is interviewed, following a road incident.
The new offence results in no fines, just prison sentences. It also defines serious injury broadly including a broken bone. RTC Crisis Line keep both drivers and business owners better protected. It’s very much about business continuity.
The driver is one half of the business-love equation but what about your vehicles? How much TLC do you give to those? Do you, without fail, carry out your daily walkaround checks? Is your vehicle maintenance programme bullet-proof? Are your tyres all legal and have you checked the treads? Are your seat belts all functioning correctly?
Do you devote yourself to careful route planning and do you have a procedure to follow, if your regular route is closed? How aware are drivers of low or narrow bridges on nearby roads, or any bridges that have weight limits?
And what about the cyber threat and that of internal crime? How much do you cocoon your computer systems by restricting password access? How regularly do you change passwords? Have you trained staff in cyber criminals’ techniques? Do drivers use a VPN when accessing the Internet whilst out and about? Could their phone, tablet or computer be hacked, because they don’t? Could that allow a heartless criminal to gain access to your wider system?
Having considered all of this, how much do you really love your coach operation? If you now think it needs a good injection of risk-focused love, McCarron Coates is on 0113 298 3489 and ready to make a date to talk.
