Keep your drivers safe and your fleet shining during Operation Safe Driver Week

Find out what to expect for Operation Safe Driver Week and how telematics can keep your drivers safe — and your fleet violation-free.

By Grady Meston

August 26, 2022

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2 minute read

July 10-16 is Operation Safe Driver Week in Canada, the U.S. and Mexico, so be prepared and educate your fleet!

Enforcement officers will be handing out warnings and fines to all vehicles for unsafe driving habits, like speeding, distracted driving, improper lane changes and other risky behavior on the roads.

Why is Operation Safe Driver so important?

While traffic collisions and injuries have declined over previous years, fatalities have increased. In fact, the fatality rate has gone up 21% from 2019 and is higher than it’s been since 2007.

Better training and education is needed across the industry as driver action and behavior is tied to 94% of all traffic accidents — something telematics can support and enhance.

What’s the focus of this year’s initiative?

With such a high volume of incidents, Operation Safe Driver week aims to reduce the unsafe behaviors that cause the most incidents.

Patrols will watch for all types of poor or illegal driving behavior, but this year they’ll focus heavily on speeding, with speed-related fatalities rising by 17%.

And going by the numbers from the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS), it’s obvious that speed is a big problem on our roads:

In 2019, over 9,000 deaths were speed-related
Speed-related crashes cost the U.S. about $52 billion each year

The U.S. Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg says, “the rising fatalities on our roadways are a national crisis; we cannot and must not accept these deaths as inevitable.”

So, what can you and your fleet do to ensure a successful, safe and speed-free operation? You can start with telematics.

Intelligent solutions for Safe Driver Week… and beyond

Telematics can be an effective tool for your fleet during Operation Safe Driver Week — and all year round as a key part of your business operations.

Tools like in-cab coaching, driver scorecards and fleet gamification can enhance your fleet’s bottom line, safety and reputation.

In-cab driver coaching

Telematics can help you track behaviors like speeding and harsh braking and cornering in real-time with notifications and alerts. You can provide immediate feedback to drivers with a buzzer alert or GO TALK spoken instructions.

Also, you can use trend reports to identify which fleet drivers need additional training for growth and development.

Driver scorecards

The Driver Safety Scorecard is a free Geotab Marketplace solution that focuses on three primary elements of unsafe driving:

Aggressive driving
Seat belt usage
Speeding

Driver scorecards provide a visual of your most at-risk drivers. Scorecards can be objectively tailored to your fleet for a fair rating of all drivers.

Fleet gamification

Gamification helps make repetitive tasks a more rewarding experience by tapping into our need to be rewarded for good behavior.

It encourages positive behaviors in the workplace and creates a fun learning environment.

You can inspire healthy competition, engage your workforce, improve processes and deliver learning experiences that leave participants with a sense of achievement.