After implementing a video telematics system into its fleet, Loram Maintenance of Way has seen an improvement in driving habits, a reduction in accidents, and in the accidents that do occur, they’ve less often been found at fault.

Loram is a railroad maintenance service provider based out of Minnesota whose fleet of roughly 300 vehicles in North America is mainly comprise of light-duty pickups.

Safety has long been a consistent focus of Loram, but in 2019 the company decided that it wanted to do more to improve safety within its fleet.

Distracted driving is something that is becoming increasingly widespread in the U.S. and people such as  Kevin Burton, vice president fleet operations for Loram and Graham Rose, vehicle fleet manager for Loram wanted to make sure they implemented something within their fleet that would tackle it.

“What really started the conversation for us was the global risk of distracted driving and we’re seeing it not just with our people, but across the country,” said Burton. “We had a good safety record with our fleet, but we wanted a better one. We wanted to tackle a real problem, which is distracted driving.”

Since integrating a video telematics service into its fleet, Burton and Rose noted that they have seen an improvement in driver awareness and in their driving behavior.

However, one of the biggest benefits that Burton and Rose have seen has been a reduction in at-fault accidents.

Burton noted that his fleet was receiving judgements every year from insurance underwriters that were putting his drivers partially or completely at fault in accidents where they knew that they were not at fault.

Because the video telematics system provides video and audio recording of the inside and outside of the vehicle, they had video evidence that could clear them of liability in those type of accidents.

Since implementing the video telematics system in 2019, Loram has already been cleared of several events where they were 100% not at fault, according to Burton.