Effective occupational road safety programs : case study of Wolseley, United Kingdom

Despite an increasing interest in the potential of occupational road safety (often called fleet safety) to help governments to improve road safety, and organisations to reduce human and asset damage, generate business efficiencies, ensure legal compliance and cut costs, there are few published case studies of organisations that have effectively managed this risk. The aim of the paper is to address this gap, by developing and evaluating an effective process for improving occupational road safety through a case study of Wolseley, which has invested in a detailed fleet program over the last four years based on research and experience from around the world. A chronological case study approach describes Wolseley, the processes applied to review, benchmark and manage its occupational road safety, project implementation, project outcomes evaluation and ongoing steps. It also sets out the lessons learned for researchers, policy makers and other organisations. Over four years Wolseley has improved its process audit scores, halved its third party collision rate, and gained a number of wider benefits by adopting a holistic approach. Despite several barriers, the ongoing program continues to show measureable successes on all its key performance indicators.