THE ACCIDENTAL LIABILITY OF COMPANY CAR DRIVERS

A postal survey of company car drivers was carried out to compare the accident liability of these drivers with data from an earlier survey of 'ordinary' drivers; 4479 usable questionnaires were returned. On average, company drivers cover much more than twice as many miles as ordinary drivers, and their overall reported accident frequency was 0.19 accidents per driver per year. A multivariate model was used to relate accidents to mileage and other variables such as age and experience of the driver. Accident frequency increase with mileage, but not in direct proportion to mileage and falls with age and experience. The comparison with the earlier survey showed that company car drivers have about 50% more accidents than ordinary drivers after allowing for their higher mileages. When the company car driver data was examined on its own, those who drove more than one car during their work had significantly fewer accidents; in addition there was a strong indication that those drivers who had been offered a reward for not having an accident, also had fewer accidents. 11% of the company car drivers had taken car driver training since passing the L-test; the difference between the accident liability of drivers that had received training and those that had not (-8%) was not statistically significant. (A)