Until the drivers have “skin in the game” claims will not go down. And I’m not talking about so called safety incentives. A jacket, cap or dinner tickets mean nothing. Employers can implement personnel policies that put drivers at financial risk if they have an at-fault accident. A deductible on the bodily injury and property damage coverage can be used to reduce premium and debit experience mods. If a driver has an at fault accident, their pay could be docked for $500 or $1,000. Many years ago, I had a client that operated a large fleet of delivery trucks. Due to PD claims, they had a 42% debit mod. The drivers kept driving under canopies. We put in place a policy that if a driver hit a canopy (high truck, low canopy) they had to pay $500 of the $1,000 PD deductible. After the first driver got fined, those claims stopped. When the carrier recalculated the mod with the deductible in place, the mod went to a 10% credit mod. More than paid for the deductible. But since the claims had stopped, the premium savings went right to the bottom line. The agent had never heard of such an option.
“According to the Insurance Information Institute, the number of vehicle miles driven in the U.S. has more than doubled in the past decade.”
That seems dubious. According to the Fed, it’s gone up about 10%.
https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/M12MTVUSM227NFWA/
And that makes the collision/claims results even scarier.
Until the drivers have “skin in the game” claims will not go down. And I’m not talking about so called safety incentives. A jacket, cap or dinner tickets mean nothing. Employers can implement personnel policies that put drivers at financial risk if they have an at-fault accident. A deductible on the bodily injury and property damage coverage can be used to reduce premium and debit experience mods. If a driver has an at fault accident, their pay could be docked for $500 or $1,000. Many years ago, I had a client that operated a large fleet of delivery trucks. Due to PD claims, they had a 42% debit mod. The drivers kept driving under canopies. We put in place a policy that if a driver hit a canopy (high truck, low canopy) they had to pay $500 of the $1,000 PD deductible. After the first driver got fined, those claims stopped. When the carrier recalculated the mod with the deductible in place, the mod went to a 10% credit mod. More than paid for the deductible. But since the claims had stopped, the premium savings went right to the bottom line. The agent had never heard of such an option.