Category:
Passenger Transport
Yellow Buses
Passenger Transport
- Customer Story
GreenRoad helped Yellow Buses cut its accidents by 27% in 2 years while continually reducing its fuel consumption.
GreenRoad’s Risk Scores are simple but motivating. It’s human nature: no one wants to see their name at the bottom of a list.
Phil Pannell, Service Delivery Director & Owner-Partner
THE CHALLENGE
Yellow Buses is a 120-year-old bus company serving south of England. When it first deployed the GreenRoad Driver Behavior System in 2016, its goal was to reduce accidents by 10%, a goal that it expected to be challenging to achieve. In practice, its results have far exceeded the target: a 14% reduction in accidents in year 1, followed by another 12% in the 2nd year – both accompanied by significant reductions in fuel consumption.
THE SOLUTION
Phil Pannell, Yellow Buses’ Owner-Partner and Service Delivery Director, explained,
When we began scoring our drivers, we found that a full third were ‘in the red’. At first, there was a lot of worry and skepticism – both from our drivers and their trade union – because they feared the programme would be used as a ‘stick’ rather than as a ‘carrot’. We overcame this by launching an intense communication effort led by our GreenRoad Champion. He explained the system’s potential to help drivers protect themselves and their customers while simultaneously improving their professionalism and skills. As drivers saw their scores beginning to improve, we started seeing a fleet-wide buy-in. Soon after, there was a material reduction in the accident rate.
In 2016, Yellow Buses rolled out the GreenRoad Driver Behaviour Solution across its fleet, including both Driver Engagement and Gamification aspects.
Mr. Pannell continued, “After the first year, about 10% of our drivers achieved GreenRoad Fleet Elite pins, and a healthy peer pressure dynamic set in. When we began rewarding our top scorers with ‘thank you’ perks – for example, a Shooting Day outing – the scores improved even further. Most of our red drivers moved steadily towards amber and green, and our accidents declined even further, both in number and severity.
“I don’t want to give the impression that GreenRoad is a ‘magic bullet’. It is a tool that must be complemented with ongoing management efforts. However, it is an extremely effective tool. The data and insights that it provides, coupled with its driver self-coaching and gamification aspects, make all the difference. The scores make it easy to identify drivers who need special support, and the data points us to the specific behaviors that need focus. Safety and motivation for the drivers – cost and risk reduction for management – it’s just an extremely positive outcome.”
Yellow Buses also takes advantage of the additional functionalities provided by the GreenRoad platform. For example, it uses GreenRoad’s tracking capabilities as a backup for its Ticketer Fleet Tracking system in areas where its signal is weak and GreenRoad’s Idling Monitoring capabilities to further reduce the fleet’s fuel consumption.
THE Result
The combination of ongoing Management effort and the GreenRoad Platform has generated impressive results:
- 27% reduction in accidents over a 2-year period
- 95% reduction of “red” drivers (from ~100 to 5)
- Over 10% of drivers earned GreenRoad Fleet Elite status in 2019: 42 drivers, including 4 with Master Elite status (Fleet Elite for 4 consecutive years)
- 5% reduction in fuel consumption (through a combination of GreenRoad tools and GreenRoad tools and Yellow Buses’ investment in special hardware and vehicle upgrades)
- Customer satisfaction awards: according to a national UK Passenger Perception survey, Yellow Buses is consistently among the top 10 of UK’s best independent operators. It was named #1 in 2018.
Mr. Pannell concluded, “We continuously look for new ways to use GreenRoad to improve our fleet management processes and results. We are now working to bring our last 5 ‘red’ drivers to amber and green, and we believe we can achieve further reductions in our accident rate. We are looking into new ways to reduce our fuel consumption and carbon footprint. We appreciate the role that GreenRoad has played in keeping us at the forefront of our industry and look forward to continued cooperation in the future.”
