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Asleep at the wheel. How NZI is helping fight driver fatigue
Commercial driving is well-known for its long, arduous and unsociable hours. Under New Zealand’s work-time rules, a driver can work a 14-hour shift (13 hours working plus two half-hour breaks), cumulating in a work period of 70 hours. This is followed by one 24-hour break before beginning the cycle again.
To help reduce the risks of potential driver fatigue, NZI has been working with Rachel Lehen, managing director at Fit for Duty which specialises in occupational fatigue management. NZI also works with a range of other partners to help improve driver performance and a big part of that is education on the risk of driver fatigue.
Rachel explains:
“It’s not unusual for us to see drivers getting four or five hours sleep. From the get-go they are compromised, and on the weekends they are not getting the recovery sleep we would want them to. Sleep is the most important thing you do in a day. It needs to be prioritised.”
In the recently published NZ Transport Report, NZI gives unique insights, accumulated from accident data, into when, where and how accidents occur, and the role driver fatigue may have played.
Michael Stirk from NZI’s Fleet Risk Management team explains:
“NZI’s analysis reveals incidents often happen within the first two hours of a driver’s shift. And almost half are happening within a very short distance of the depots. This could point to a lack of preparation for the driving task. Drivers are burning the candle at both ends and not getting enough sleep to do what is a very tough job.”
The challenge for the industry is how to accurately measure and assess individual driver fatigue levels. Working collaboratively with transport businesses, NZI has been trialling two technology-based approaches.
" NZI’s analysis reveals incidents often happen within the first two hours of a driver’s shift. And almost half are happening within a very short distance of the depots. This could point to a lack of preparation for the driving task. Drivers are burning the candle at both ends and not getting enough sleep to do what is a very tough job.
Michael Stirk - NZI, Fleet Risk Manager
A technological wake-up call
The first is ReadiBand – a wearable technology, not unlike a Fitbit, that records your sleep quality and quantity to provide a ‘readiness score’. This score allows a worker or supervisor to understand their fatigue levels throughout the day. The technology provides alerts for when the wearer is approaching fatigued levels and when they are fatigued, providing an opportunity for intervention if required. So, if someone has a particularly low score, they can be placed on light duties during fatigued periods.
ReadiBand can also highlight drivers who are continuously showing poor sleep patterns – enabling managers to have a crucial health and safety conversation with the employee. Or, more seriously, it can encourage drivers to seek help to potentially detect an undiagnosed medical condition.
Testing cognitive alertness
AlertMeter is the newest technology NZI has been trialling. AlertMeter is a cognitive test that measures a person’s alertness to ensure they are mentally fit to be on the road. You can complete the test through an app on a mobile device or through a website on your computer.
When a driver clocks in for the day, they complete their AlertMeter test to measure their current cognitive state against their own individual baseline, determining whether they are fit to go.
When they stop for a break, the driver takes another AlertMeter test before they start driving to revalidate that they are not impaired and are ready to resume driving. Any results below their baseline can be flagged with their operations manager, providing a great opportunity for coaching conversations.
Andrew Greatbatch, NZI’s Risk Advisory Manager knows the technology works.
“You can survey a group of drivers and they’ll tell you they’re sleeping well and have never felt better. But it’s likely that fatigue is having a real impact on some of these drivers. ReadiBand and AlertMeter are great analysis tools that can help fleet safety managers identify the problem and then work out a solution.”
Well-rested drivers make for safer roads for everyone, and fewer claims on insurance. That’s the outcome NZI is striving for, as Andrew sums up:
“Commercial drivers are such an important backbone of New Zealand’s economy and they’re already at breaking point, so anything NZI can do to support them and keep them ‘fleet fit’ helps everyone in the long run.”
Contact your Fleet Risk Manager or broker to see how NZI’s Fleet Fit Programme can benefit your business.
