Octo Telematics Offers Insurers Distracted Driving Scoring Feature

April 27, 2017

Octo Telematics is making available a distracted driving scoring and analysis feature within its suite of telematics products used by its more than 60 auto insurer customers.

The scoring feature is available for both in-vehicle and mobile solutions that include Octo Glimpse, Octo Vantage, Octo Fleet, and Octo Surround.

Octo is making its distracted driving feature automatically available to any Octo insurance partner at no additional cost.

Smart phones and connected car features continue to take drivers’ attention off the road. According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, fatalities from “distraction-affected” crashes increased 8.8 percent to 3,477 from 3,197 in 2015, and 391,000 people were injured in motor vehicle crashes involving distracted drivers that year.

Octo’s distracted driving feature monitors how the phone is being used during a trip, detects and analyses several risky behaviors with different severity levels and communicates the final details and score to the insurance carrier and their usage-based insurance (UBI) policyholder. Unlike other penalty-focused distracted driving apps that may shut off a smartphone altogether, Octo’s service takes an educational approach, monitoring and communicating feedback to drivers so they better understand the risks, and working with insurance carriers to incentivize drivers to stay off their phones while driving.

“Our flexible platform allows us to work directly with insurance partners to build a customized distracted driving solution or one that fits into their existing UBI programs,” said Nino Tarantino, CEO of Octo North America. “Whether it’s increased discounts, rewards programs or other incentives, our approach is reward-based, not penalty-based, which is more effective in policyholder adoption of any type of telematics.”

The product feature aligns with Octo’s membership in Together for Safer Roads (TSR), a global coalition of private sector companies focused on improving road safety and reducing deaths and injuries from road traffic collisions. Other corporate members include AB InBev, AIG, AT&T, Chevron, Ericsson, Facebook, IBM, iHeartMedia, PepsiCo, Republic Services, Ryder, UPS and Walmart.

One of the largest global providers of telematics and data analytics for the auto insurance industry, Octo has more than 4.9 million connected users and one of the largest global databases of telematics data, with over 155 billion miles of driving data collected and 397,000 crashes and insurance events analyzed as of March 31, 2017.

Topics Carriers Auto Personal Auto

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