Engineers at Fords: thankful for vehicle tracking
False insurance claim successfully disputed
A HOME service business in the West Country is reaping the benefits of fitting vehicle tracking to its vans. And not in reduced delivery times as you might expect – but in a bogus insurance claim.
Fords of Sidmouth is a home service business. However, one of the firm’s heating engineers was accused of driving at an excessive speed and colliding with a driver on a country road near Exeter. The damaged included a smashed door mirror – but the Fords employee disputed the allegation.
“We invested in Navman Wireless vehicle tracking three years ago, and so were in a position to discover which engineer was allegedly responsible and generate a report detailing his precise speed and location at the time of the purported incident,” said managing director Tim Ford.
The system provides managers with real-time information on the exact position and speed of vehicles while generating data on journey times and driving speeds. It also enables two-way messaging and integrated routing via business-specific in-cab satellite navigation units.
Tim added: “Our employee maintained he had pulled over, giving way to the other driver and that it was therefore not correct that he was travelling at speed. This was proven by consulting Navman Wireless records and the member of the public, when faced with the evidence, backed down.
“All too often we find that easily identified liveried vehicles are blamed for road traffic collisions, as telephone numbers can be obtained and false claims made. We were delighted to have the evidence available, at the touch of a button, to disprove the false claim.”
Fords is using the integration of tracking, messaging and navigation technology on a day-to-day basis to send job instructions via text message to its workfore, while also providing satellite navigation directions to guide engineers to their destinations at the same time.
