Maintaining standards

Monday, June 02, 2008

Neil Cumming, Roadworthiness Project Manager at VOSA, champions the OCRS system for keeping tabs on fleet maintenance.

In 2008, with the Corporate Manslaughter Act placing more emphasis on corporate safety issues, we are still seeing fleet managers risking serious penalties by not maintaining their fleet. Basic maintenance such as oil testing is not always being carried out regularly by drivers and operators. Instead, the completion of deliveries and profit margins are still taking precedence. Neil Cumming, Roadworthiness Project Manager for VOSA, discussed the importance of fleet maintenance with Public Service Review.

Can you tell us more about the Operator Compliance Risk Score (OCRS) system and how it regulates the operation of lorries in the UK?

The Operator Compliance Risk system has two main elements: traffic offence and roadworthiness. The roadworthiness element takes encounters from annual tests, roadside inspections and fleet inspections, and identifies the defects found within vehicles. The OCRS takes into account whether responsibility for poor maintenance should be placed with the driver or company. After looking at all aspects of the maintenance, we calculate, through a points system, the performance of operators relative to each other. Each operator is given a ranking based on his OCRS score – red, amber or green. And the OCRS score is assessed by such factors as experience in roadside encounters with VOSA, performance of vehicles at annual test, number of prohibitions, and overall record of compliance. If the operator’s score is good – in the green sector – then he is less likely to be the subject of attention at a roadside stop or a visit from VOSA. If he is in the red sector, however, then he can expect that VOSA will be monitoring his performance.

What penalties will freight operators and drivers incur if their vehicle is not up to standard?

For most operators, the heaviest penalty they can incur is the loss of their licence. This can come from a relatively small number of serious infringements or the cumulative effect of lesser infringements, which can portray a picture that the operator is not fulfilling their responsibilities that they stated they would when applying for their licence.

How often do inspections take place and are VOSA doing enough to ensure that vehicles are roadworthy?

This is where the OCRS system became such an advantage to VOSA. Even if we do not see operators at the roadside, we know that the vehicles are being subjected to annual tests through the OCRS system. VOSA does not aim to spread our effort equally across operators; we have a certain amount of resource and we want to use this to the greatest effect possible; OCRS allows us to do this. OCRS identifies the operators who are not meeting standards; this allows us to make visits and ensure their maintenance standards meet the specified requirements.

How can a fleet manager monitor the maintenance of their fleet?

If a fleet manager is contracting out their maintenance, then they can conduct audits to confirm that the service meets their requirements, or they could bring in independent auditors who will make thorough checks of all aspects of the vehicle, including oil testing. VOSA can share information on maintenance through our new system, which will allow operators to register and receive their own encounter, and test history reports and their OCRS system report. This will hopefully give them the incentive to act immediately to rectify their roadworthiness problems. The Customer Information Services Portal will allow the operator to register and, on a self-service basis, download the reports they require.