Accident excess

E Palmer
Member - 16 posts

I believe charging an employee for accidents and scuffs etc is wrong. They were obviously using the vehicle to carry out their duties and it is obviously an essential tool of their employment. Scufs, chips,dents are all unavaoidable consequences of everyday driving. You can't avoid a stone if it is thrown up by another vehicle and hits your vehicle. Are you going to charge them if their computer breaks down. I believe it is also illegal for companies to make deductions from employees wages without consent.

David Price
Member - 84 posts

Sorry E Palmer, but I didn't read anything in Ruperts email that said his company was making deductions from employees wages without their consent?

But you are right about the driver being charged for everyday damage, this is not the drivers fault and is unaviodable, and if the compay are telling their staff that they need a car then they should pay for the damage through the insurance excess that they already charge, and not make staff pay twice.

Staff already pay tax on a company car, so additional charges should also be taken into account, staff should point out that they have to pay these excesses to the Inland revenue as they are not income but an expense that go along with having to use a company car, and Rupert fails to mention what they do with the £500 pounds that the get back from each driver?

Nina Powell
Member - 3 posts

I have to say I think that is disgusting! I have a company car and drive many miles a year, chips and scuffs are unavoidable, many a time I have come to get back in my car at a car park and found a scratch along the side, I wouldn't expect to have to pay for that, and I certainly wouldn't accept a job where I did. I pay enough in tax as it is without being penalised by my own company.

As Dave Price says I would love to know what your company are doing with the money they get back from the driver??

NEIL POMEROY
Member - 2 posts

Neil Pomeroy
I run a fleet of 300 vans and 30 cars.We do not currently recharge excesses except for drivers under 21 where oue excess is a extra £200 on top of our normal £350.
I believe that unreported damage should be treated differently but sympathasise and agree regarding cars and tax/scratches however with regard to operatives driving vans it would be sensible to recharge them for accident repetition particuarly when they have hit a parking post or bollard. Some companies operate a deposit system which would deter operatives leaving/awol without returning their vehicle. We do operate a fairly strict recharging policy for parking offences.

RUSSELL HILL
Member - 34 posts

All this talk of charging people for damage to cars /vans has made me think. I help companies write their policies and carry out driver training and this hasn't really come up before. I'm not sure if I agree with charging them or not. Certainly for repetiton accidents and definately fines etc. Interesting

thanks

Emma McAuley
Member - 16 posts

I operate a fleet of 60 vehicles and we have trained all drivers in safe driving practices, although we still have some more regular offenders than others with 'minor' buumps and scrapes. We do not currently have a policy for re-charging the cost of repair although I think this would be entirely reasonable.

A company vehicle is a benefit to most, rather than an essential and I expect drivers to take good care of the vehicle we provide for them. I know that many drivers have the attitude that 'it's not my car' so do not operate with the care and attention they would for a vehicle they financed themselves.

I agree with the comments about routine scuffs and chips as these often happen without the driver even knowing about it.

Finally for Neil, have you taken advice about your excess charging policy? I should imagine that this would be direct age discriination if only drivers under the age of 21 are expected to pay the excess. I would strongly doubt that the increased payment of £200 would be justifiable business reason for doing this. Just a comment to help you avoid any potential ligitation in the future!

derek agent
Member - 5 posts

Many years ago when I had a car as part of my job the company said that if you wrote a car off you did not get a new one for xxx number of years, or if you continually dented or scrapped it the same rule applied. I think the answer therefore is straight forward that all dents and bumps are monitored and the careless person gets a 'hand me down car' I have worked with people that continually had accidents, mainly through carelessness, i.e. parking in places where they may get damaged by other vehicles, or trying to squeeze through a gap when there is no room therefore losing a wing mirror. We all know someone that is always denting their car or vans, I don't believe that is bad luck but poor judgement, chance taking etc. So taking away the the 'new car' away which is something that we all want may help to resolve the issue, or even a down grade in the make of vehicle.

Noel George
Member - 14 posts

Accepted that there has always been a problem in getting a driver to respect a company vehicle as if it was their own but this is treading on eggs. Unless there is a signed agreement with the employee I believe there is a serious legal issue. It is my understanding that without such a signed agreement document it is illegal to make any deduction from wages without a court order. The driver needs a the least, to have signed at induction an acceptance and agreement to the company vehicle policy and procedure.

Rupert Dingley
Member - 3 posts

Hi, thanks for all the comments. Employees sign the Car Policy before they are given the keys to a company car and they are made aware of the charges they could be liable. All deductions are made with the employees approval and unless they are leaving the deduction is usually spread over several months. When cars are returned we get the local Chips Away chap to do the necessary repairs. The driver pays upto £250 for these repairs, anything over the company pays for.

Diarmuid Fahy
Member - 16 posts

Hi Rupert.

Do you lease your cars? The British Vehicle Rental and Leasing Association (BVRLA) issues a set of guidelines regarding "fair wear and tear". These guidelines state out what is and is not acceptable damage on the vehicle at the end of the lease. Anything outside these guidelines gets recharged to the client. Perhaps you should use the same guidelines when it comes to recharging drivers. Let me know if you'd like a copy and I'll send you one.

One word of warning, however. Every fleet I've worked with that imposed these driver penalties had a serious problem with under-reporting of incidents. People were prepared to put up with scratches and dings on their cars rather than pay the penalty. This led in turn to issues with Third Party drivers as well as increased end-of-lease costs. Also, who decides whether an incident is fault or non-fault?

My advice would be to forget about the penalty (except perhaps for nominated drivers) and focus instead on a programme of education to help prevent the accidents happening in the first place.

Les Lane
Member - 49 posts

We run a fleet of 73 leased vehicles and have adopted a policy where drivers are only recharged if damage is caused through a negligent act such as putting the wrong fuel in losing the keys by leaving them somewhere etc.

The circumastances of each incident are investigated by me as the Fleet Manager and finally decided by the Company Secretary. To date we have never had to invoke this since it introduction in 2006, where as previously drivers wouldjust go ahead and claim for any damge arising.

James Fairchild
Member - 292 posts

In the commercial vehicle sector (buses and trucks), the notion of recharging damage is laughable.

It is for a company to justify the business case for its own vehicles, and that means insurance/excess/cover type.

I assume this means, of course, that for each employee who uses their OWN car that Rupert's company reimburse for damage that occurs on company business ;-)

I think that in addition to a clause in the contract (allowing deductions) there needs to be an explicit consent to each proposed deduction.

NEIL POMEROY
Member - 2 posts

Emma
after consulting my Hr Manager she thanks you for bringing this to our attention and concurs that you are probably right and that we should change our procedures.i will try and opt for all employees under 1 yr service which hopefully will not be classed as discriminatory

Mark Shuttleworth
Member - 57 posts

Careful Neil, even something as seemingly innocent as under one years service could leave you open to age discrimination claims against younger drivers/employees. Ridiculous but could happen in theory. Just a thought as i keep coming up against this new legislation regarding parking allocation and who can/ cannot go on which of my sites etc!!

Chris Gradwell
Member - 3 posts

I have found that rewards for safer driving and non own fault crashes do help to raise standards. Also I have invested in in vehicle cameras which record wide angle view of road ahead and to front sides. Any impact or aggressive driving is picked up and stored in a memory which can be uploaded from an SD Card. The unit has GPS and can display location and speed. This encourages safer driving, clearly establishes blame in most cases where the video picks up the incident thus reducing knock for knock and the camera quickly pays for itself in reduced fuel and maintenance costs. Who would drive like a maniac knowing the boss could play back the video?