When you need drivers for your business, you want to ensure you’re picking the best of the best. If not, you could find yourself denied auto insurance coverage for drivers with a bad record or employees costing you when they end up causing accidents.
At Berry Insurance, we know that maintaining productivity and efficiency are crucial for any business owner, and hiring bad drivers will only slow you down.
That’s why we’ve compiled a list of some tips on how to find the best drivers for your business as well as what insurance carriers will be on the lookout for when approving coverage for drivers.
Table of contents:
- What insurance carriers will and will not accept for business drivers
- 6 tips for finding the best drivers for your business
What insurance carriers will and will not accept for business drivers
Just as a business owner will review a potential employee's resume and qualifications when applying to a job, an insurance carrier’s underwriter will play a large part in determining if your business and drivers are covered by commercial auto insurance.
When you add a new driver to your business’s auto insurance policy, an underwriter will review the driver’s records, accident history, and prior insurance claims to help determine the risk of insuring the driver. Whether a driver is transporting cargo, goods, or passengers, all business operations will come with some inherent risk, making the underwriter’s assessment a key factor in determining coverage as well as policy rates.
Underwriters in particular will be looking for the following red flags in a driver’s record:
- Driving under the influence
- Less than 6 years of driving experience
- Excessive speeding
- Reckless driving
- License suspension or revocation
- Cell phone use while driving
- Failure to obey traffic signs/laws
While some insurers may be more lenient on minor infractions that pop up in a driver’s record, repeated violations can indicate potential risk in the eyes of an insurance company, leading them to exclude drivers from coverage entirely.
6 tips for finding the best drivers for your business
When searching for your next new driver, follow these tips to ensure you pick the best driver for your business.
1. Be clear about what you’re looking for
When posting a job listing it’s better to give as much information as possible about what your expectations are for the role and the driver. This should include hours, job requirements, salary ranges, and any non-negotiables. Having more details in your job description can help potential bad-fit candidates self-eliminate themselves before applying, since they know exactly what you are and are not seeking. Plus being candidly upfront about what exactly your company is looking for can save you from issues down the road.
2. Prepare to interview
To narrow down your search for the best drivers, you should schedule interviews to get to know the candidates and see if they fit your needs. The more prepared you go into the interview as the interviewer, the more you will get out of it. Review each applicant's resume and experience and write-up a set of questions to ask in each interview.
3. Evaluate their driving history
Since a repeated history of bad driving will be a major factor in whether a driver will be excluded by insurance underwriters on your policy, your business should thoroughly evaluate each driver's record. To view a prospective employee’s driving record, employers would need to request an unattested Massachusetts driving record during the application process to properly judge the driver’s experience.
4. Call past employers or references
To make sure your new driver would be a good fit for your organization, reach out to references or past employers to help avoid making a hiring mistake. If the applicant has been a commercial driver before, ask past employers about their attendance, reliability, and how they viewed them as an employee.
5. Check they have the right documents
Before they can work, make sure an applicant has all of their credentials up to date. This includes proof of identity, motor vehicle history reports, proof of legal right to work, and any requirements for local licensing.
6. Hire quickly
When hiring drivers, it’s best not to delay. If there are quality candidates, be sure to move forward hiring them before they accept another position elsewhere. Being a competitive market, you don’t want to find your business with no good drivers available when the time comes.
Bonus tip!
Before officially hiring a new driver, check with your trusted insurance agent regarding any questionable driving records the applicant has. Being able to access records, they can provide more information regarding their record so you can make a fully informed decision!
Finding success when hiring drivers
Hiring the right drivers for your business can be a difficult task. Having a driver excluded from coverage after hiring them will cause even more headaches. Now that you have the tips on what to look for when hiring, as well as how carriers will be assessing your coverage, you can set your business up for success and narrow down the best drivers for you.
If you are issuing vehicles to employees, it is important to know how they will be covered. Read this guide to learn how employees are covered by commercial auto insurance, as well as if employees can use company vehicles for personal use: What You Need to Know When Supplying a Company-Owned Vehicle to an Employee.