5-Year Analysis: Accident Management Trends
How have accident management statistics changed over the past five years? With increased attention on driver education and distracted driving, you may be surprised by what you see.
Accidents impact not only a company's bottom line, but the safety of fleet's greatest resource: its drivers and the vehicles they operate. The past five years have seen an increased focus on driver safety, accident management, and minimizing distracted driving.
Automotive Fleet has been analyzing fleet accident management trends for several years. The following pages review the past five years and are chock full of important trends and data.
Interesting trends that emerged include the age range of drivers involved in accidents and driver tenure, which continue to illustrate just how important continued driver education and training can be.
Between 2006 and 2010, drivers with less than one-year tenure in both the sales and service segments experienced the lowest percentage of accidents - with the exception of 2007 for sales drivers. These statistics help show the necessity of continued driver education, beyond initial training.
Over the past five years, the lowest percentage of accidents occurred on Sunday and Monday, with Friday and Saturday typically showing the highest percentage of accidents. The overall percentage of accidents by day of week has remained constant since 2006, with accidents on Sunday showing the highest percentage decrease.
Seatbelts save lives - and drivers are catching on. Seatbelt use has steadily increased over the past five years from a low of 95.24 percent utilizing a seatbelt during an accident in 2006 to a high of 97.38 percent in 2010.
Overall, the percentage of accidents in which a cell phone was in use has stayed steady over the past five years, dropping 0.02 percentage points, hitting a low point of less than 1 percent in 2009.
Overall, the percentage of drivers in accidents by age group has declined over the past five years, with drivers between 46 and 54 years old and those over the age of 55 experiencing the highest percentage of accidents. Accidents by drivers aged 18-25 have been decreasing year-over-year, while accidents by drivers aged 26-35 and 36-45 have been increasing.
More Operations
Fleet Meets: Eric Kilgore
This edition of the Fleet Meets series features one of the industry's best leaders driving multi-market and national operations.
Read More →
Why Reactive Fleet Management Is Becoming Too Expensive to Sustain
Research highlights a growing need for proactive management strategies to address rising costs in fleet operations effectively.
Read More →
What Your Fleet KPIs Aren’t Telling You
Tracking fleet metrics is only useful when the data leads to better decisions. This guide helps fleet leaders assess cost, utilization, and downtime more accurately, identify performance gaps, and prioritize the actions that can improve operational results.
Read More →
Hidden in Plain Sight: Fleet Compliance Risks
Fleet compliance isn't just about having policies — it's about consistently enforcing them. This practical guide reveals six hidden compliance risks common in public sector and shared fleet operations and outlines proven strategies to improve visibility, accountability, and audit readiness
Read More →
Turning Fleet Payment Data into Executive Insights
Does data alone drive results in operations?
Read More →
Automotive Fleet Opens 2026 Personal Use Survey for Commercial Fleet Managers
Commercial and corporate fleet managers are invited to share how their organizations handle company vehicle personal-use policies, charges, and driver eligibility.
Read More →
Gary Van Orden Retires After Nearly Four Decades in Commercial Fleet
From answering customer calls at Ford Motor Company to leading fleet sales across multiple OEMs and a fleet management company, Gary Van Orden's career reflects nearly four decades of leadership in commercial fleet.
Read More →
How Stellantis Plans to Get Ahead of Fleet Downtime
Vehicle acquisition may grab the headlines, but fleet uptime increasingly determines operating success. Darren Bradshaw of Mopar North America gives the details.
Read More →
Hyundai Releases 2027 Commercial Program Incentives
The 2027 Model Year "Fleet Street Incentives" are available to commercial and government fleets.
Read More →
It's All Downhill from Here! Fleet Industry Raises $22,000 for Skilled Trades Scholarships
Work Truck’s Lauren Fletcher and Automotive Fleet’s Chris Brown turned a friendly racing rivalry into $22,000 for automotive technology and skilled trades scholarships.
Read More →