Does this count as racing/pacemaking?

[FlabbyMidgets]

A friend of mine works for a large franchised fast food company. The company has a large number of delivery drivers, all insured with one of those basic cover notes giving tp insurance to employees on business usage.

One of the exclusions of the policy is the standard exclusion against racing, pace making and speed trials.

The drivers are timed on deliveries, and a league table made, with financial incentives and disincentives for being higher or lower (quicker or slower)

Do you think this would be excluded?

Edited by FlabbyMidgets on Thursday 26th September 11:05

[t400ble]

Errr, no

[vaud]

No, but it is not a healthy measure to encourage the right behaviour.

[anonymous-user]

vaud said:

No, but it is not a healthy measure to encourage the right behaviour.

Absolutely. I used to work home deliveries for tesco. You would do a week of safety on the vans and then it would go right out the window trying to stay on time for deliveries. 6 minutes per delivery no matter how many items, crates or if it was loose in the crates. And I've heard now they've gone completely bagless. One afternoon I had 14 deliveries to do and 7 of those were in flats with no lift.

[FlabbyMidgets]

Thanks for the replies. I was thinking if there was a serious accident involving one of the drivers, and this timing thing came to light, what the insurers/police view would be.

[TwigtheWonderkid]

vaud said:

No, but it is not a healthy measure to encourage the right behaviour.

Absolutely. It's not one of the 3 exclusions, but it's hardly encouraging responsible driving.

[vonhosen]

TwigtheWonderkid said:

vaud said:

No, but it is not a healthy measure to encourage the right behaviour.

Absolutely. It's not one of the 3 exclusions, but it's hardly encouraging responsible driving.

And as such the bosses of a company that's policies/practices create that could render themselves liable in a Corporate Manslaughter investigation where it results in death.

[donkmeister]

FlabbyMidgets said:

Thanks for the replies. I was thinking if there was a serious accident involving one of the drivers, and this timing thing came to light, what the insurers/police view would be.

Back in the 80s and 90s, pizza delivery companies often had "your pizza in 30 minutes or it's free!" type promotions. The rub was that the 16 year old on a moped was usually on the hook for some/all of the cost of this free pizza.
There was a fairly high-profile case of a kid getting killed whilst delivering pizza in these conditions (I seem to recall it was around Shepperton/Walton/Weybridge) and a stop was put to the practice of disincentivising the delivery riders... No idea if it is in law though.

[vonhosen]

donkmeister said:

FlabbyMidgets said:

Thanks for the replies. I was thinking if there was a serious accident involving one of the drivers, and this timing thing came to light, what the insurers/police view would be.

Back in the 80s and 90s, pizza delivery companies often had "your pizza in 30 minutes or it's free!" type promotions. The rub was that the 16 year old on a moped was usually on the hook for some/all of the cost of this free pizza.
There was a fairly high-profile case of a kid getting killed whilst delivering pizza in these conditions (I seem to recall it was around Shepperton/Walton/Weybridge) and a stop was put to the practice of disincentivising the delivery riders... No idea if it is in law though.

There is a heap of Health & Safety at work legislation including the Corporate Manslaughter and Corporate Homicide Act 2007 in relation to the organisation & individual directors could be charged with the common law offence of Gross negligence manslaughter.

[vaud]

FlabbyMidgets said:

The drivers are timed on deliveries, and a league table made, with financial incentives and disincentives for being higher or lower (quicker or slower)

It's called gamification and is a trend for performance management. Done right it can be a very useful tool.

It would be better to do it on "customer satisfaction" rather than absolute times. i.e. customer has probably ordered via an app; the app can ask them if they were satisfied with the delivery time based on what was promised.

It does sound it fundamentally encourages drivers to speed or not drive within the conditions...

[lyonspride]

flashbang said:

vaud said:

No, but it is not a healthy measure to encourage the right behaviour.

Absolutely. I used to work home deliveries for tesco. You would do a week of safety on the vans and then it would go right out the window trying to stay on time for deliveries. 6 minutes per delivery no matter how many items, crates or if it was loose in the crates. And I've heard now they've gone completely bagless. One afternoon I had 14 deliveries to do and 7 of those were in flats with no lift.

I don't think the people sat at desks setting the targets really care, if you don't do it on time you get sacked, if you have to drive like a lunatic and have a crash, then they didn't actually tell you to do that, so you get sacked.

This is unfortunately how a lot of businesses run these days, unrealistic targets, the staff have no choice but to take risks and cut corners, but if they get caught doing so they get sacked.

[TwigtheWonderkid]

vonhosen said:

TwigtheWonderkid said:

vaud said:

No, but it is not a healthy measure to encourage the right behaviour.

Absolutely. It's not one of the 3 exclusions, but it's hardly encouraging responsible driving.

And as such the bosses of a company that's policies/practices create that could render themselves liable in a Corporate Manslaughter investigation where it results in death.

Indeed, and it would serve them right.

[lyonspride]

TwigtheWonderkid said:

vonhosen said:

TwigtheWonderkid said:

vaud said:

No, but it is not a healthy measure to encourage the right behaviour.

Absolutely. It's not one of the 3 exclusions, but it's hardly encouraging responsible driving.

And as such the bosses of a company that's policies/practices create that could render themselves liable in a Corporate Manslaughter investigation where it results in death.

Indeed, and it would serve them right.

They'd be too clever for that, their policy, employment contract and/or handbook would include something like "the driver is responsible for their own actions at all times, they must obey all speed limits and road laws".

[vaud]

lyonspride said:

They'd be too clever for that, their policy, employment contract and/or handbook would include something like "the driver is responsible for their own actions at all times, they must obey all speed limits and road laws".

Putting things in the contract, etc does not prevent them being prosecuted, especially if they had put in performance metrics that counter that expectation.

IANAL.

[bad company]

lyonspride said:

TwigtheWonderkid said:

vonhosen said:

TwigtheWonderkid said:

vaud said:

No, but it is not a healthy measure to encourage the right behaviour.

Absolutely. It's not one of the 3 exclusions, but it's hardly encouraging responsible driving.

And as such the bosses of a company that's policies/practices create that could render themselves liable in a Corporate Manslaughter investigation where it results in death.

Indeed, and it would serve them right.

They'd be too clever for that, their policy, employment contract and/or handbook would include something like "the driver is responsible for their own actions at all times, they must obey all speed limits and road laws".

Not clever at all. They'd really struggle to hide behind that policy given the targets set for the drivers.

[Tannedbaldhead]

I met two contractors on one of our sites who were charged with speeding and racing on the public highway.
They were travelling together, in traffic with cars in front and behind travelling at the same speed, and keeping safe distance apart at a speed measured by a following Police vehicle as 71mph on a dual carriageway.
Both drivers were in company liveried Citroen Nemo vans and in spite of the drivers pointing out the tiny dimensions and low gross vehicle weight the Police considered them to be full sized vans and subject to a 60mph limit.
Police went on to say that as they were driving at "excessive speed" whilst in convoy they added "racing" to the speeding offences and were told they would be summoned to appear in court rather than just be issued with fixed penalties.

[donkmeister]

Tannedbaldhead said:

Both drivers were in company liveried Citroen Nemo vans and in spite of the drivers pointing out the tiny dimensions and low gross vehicle weight the Police considered them to be full sized vans and subject to a 60mph limit.

Notwithstanding the claims of racing, the Citroen Nemo is a van with a car version rather than a car with a van version, dimensions and gross weight are not the deciding factor for speed limits under 3.5 tonnes. This is down to the DVLA not the police who are there on the day.
Companies should at least inform their van drivers simply because the speed limits of vans can be such a daft area of the law.

[InitialDave]

donkmeister said:

Back in the 80s and 90s, pizza delivery companies often had "your pizza in 30 minutes or it's free!" type promotions. The rub was that the 16 year old on a moped was usually on the hook for some/all of the cost of this free pizza.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KVeZYCjnkSc

[Rasta Pickles]

flashbang said:

Absolutely. I used to work home deliveries for tesco. You would do a week of safety on the vans and then it would go right out the window trying to stay on time for deliveries. 6 minutes per delivery no matter how many items, crates or if it was loose in the crates. And I've heard now they've gone completely bagless. One afternoon I had 14 deliveries to do and 7 of those were in flats with no lift.

A mate of mine retired but wanted to keep active during the week (his wife was a bit younger than him and so was still working).

He lasted a week as a driver with Tesco Home Shopping; computer says it takes nine minutes from your first drop to your second drop......well, yes it does on a Sunday afternoon but not at 4.30p.m on a Wednesday evening during peak rush hour.

And you then had to explain to your supervisor why you were late when the punters complained!

[anonymous-user]

Rasta Pickles said:

A mate of mine retired but wanted to keep active during the week (his wife was a bit younger than him and so was still working).

He lasted a week as a driver with Tesco Home Shopping; computer says it takes nine minutes from your first drop to your second drop......well, yes it does on a Sunday afternoon but not at 4.30p.m on a Wednesday evening during peak rush hour.

And you then had to explain to your supervisor why you were late when the punters complained!

Poor sod. Most people have the misconception that you're out in the road care free and your own boss. Nothing could be further from the truth. The best thing is when a customer puts a delivery time slot in say 17.00-18.00 and the computer works out the delivery should arrive at 17.58.... Brilliant! Then as you say the customers moan as they all think the delivery will arrive no later than 17.01. And there was a few times I had gone to leave the store dead on time for the evening shift and found the van hadn't been loaded.