When choosing a car transporting company to use for transporting your vehicle, there are various factors that the client considers. Among these factors is the safety of the car or vehicle during car transport. For this, most clients will seek previous customer reviews.
During car transport, there can be various factors that pose risks to the cars in transit. The risk factors are either natural or man-made. Examples of natural factors are rain, hailstorms, etc. and man-made factors are, for example, drunk driving.
Of course, you would want your car transporting service to get clients and retain them. To do this, you should put up various controls to ensure the safety of vehicles on transit.
This article discusses various controls to alleviate the risk of moving vehicles.
1. Maintenance of Car Hauling Trucks
Mechanical failures are among the leading causes of road accidents. To ensure that car transport happens safely without any hitch, the car haulers should be regularly inspected for any mechanical defaults.
Integral components such as the braking system should be checked before every trip.
To ensure that you get to transport your vehicle with peace of mind, you should choose well-established car transporters. These companies only hire professional and legal carriers to ensure a safe car hauling process. You can be reassured of the quality of their service because they have standard procedures to handle your car.
This step is when the trailer is inspected to ensure that it is ready for car loading. Inspect the trailer for any signs of bending or looseness, tie down the rings, and the track system for the carrier.
Damaged rings and tracks pose a significant risk to the trailer as they can break off during hauling. This allows the car in transit to move about, hence affecting the load balancing. This can lead to an accident.
2. Loading of Cars
The first step when hauling a car is the loading of the vehicle onto the hauling truck. Any professional car transport service knows that the integrity of the ratchet straps is highly dependent on the loading of the car. The first step when loading the vehicle is to lower down the rear stabilizers of the hauling truck. Rear stabilizers help balance the truck, therefore, preventing it from being lifted by the weight of cars being loaded.
After that, you should drive the cars up the ramp slowly while being guided to avoid accidents and make sure the car placement is perfect. After loading cars, they should all be in neutral and the parking brake engaged. The car should be tied down with the appropriate chains and tensioning cables. The best car shipping companies should always have the appropriate chains for this procedure.
A key factor to note while loading cars onto the truck is that 60% of the total load on the car transport truck should be in the front half. This is to ensure safe load weight distribution.
Another safety factor to consider during loading is the height of the truck with the cars loaded onto it. The truck height should comply with state rules to ensure the truck’s center of gravity is at a safe position. This guarantees the truck’s stability.
3. Strategic Choosing of Routes
Before starting a trip, the car transport company should strategically choose a safe route. There are various factors to consider when choosing the route to use. The factors are:
- Road condition i.e., is it well serviced or is it full of potholes?
- Road lighting at night.
- Road systems. For example, one-way or two-way. Generally, one-way roads are the safest option.
- Route surface material and drainage. Some roads use weaker structures and materials that cannot handle the weight of hauling trucks.
- Traffic density.
When you consider all these factors, you are assured of getting a route that will ensure safety during car transport.
4. Hiring Smart
Driver negligence is a factor that causes many accidents. Driver negligence involves cases such as:
- Texting while driving.
- Ignoring speed limits.
- Following cars too closely.
- Running traffic lights.
- Fast driving at dangerous spots e.g., road corners.
- Driving under drug influence.
Before hiring drivers for your car transport company, you should conduct thorough and detailed background checks. Consider factors such as accident history of the drivers (if any), drug history (if any), medical history, etc.
After the interviews, you should take all prospects who have passed the interview for vigorous road testing. The aim is to see how the various drivers perform on the road and note their driving styles.
Statistics show that car transport companies that conduct two-hour road tests on drivers as part of the interview have fewer accidents. They also have fewer safety concerns related to the drivers.
5. Safety Training
Car accidents are not preventable. However, most situations that lead to car accidents are avoidable. You should develop a car transport safety program that outlines the various rules to observe during car hauling. The drivers of car haulers at your company should be well aware of this safety program.
You can also take the drivers through a defensive driving course. This will improve their awareness when driving and increase the driver’s aptitude. Defensive driving teaches drivers to always be on the lookout for possible risks or hazards while driving.
6. Driver Schedules
According to the Virginia Tech Transportation Institute, 20% of road accidents are caused by driver fatigue. Driver fatigue also accounts for 16% of the near-misses in road accidents. Based on such statistics, you should therefore ensure that your drivers do not suffer from fatigue.
You should ensure that your drivers are not overworked. To do this, you should ensure that a driver has adequate resting time before making a trip. Drivers should also take short breaks after every 2-hour drive or after covering 200 km. These breaks are necessary for the driver to freshen up and stretch. Breaks will improve the driver’s concentration while driving.
Conclusion
To maximize possible clients in the car transport business, you should ensure that your services are safe and will not result in any damages. Observing the tips discussed above will reduce the risk involved in the process of moving vehicles.
Another added tip is to take up commercial car hauler insurance coverage from a reliable insurance partner. A commercial car hauler insurance covers damages incurred in the event of an accident.
There are added options like cargo insurance that covers any damages incurred on products in transit. Good commercial car hauling insurance will increase your business revenues since clients will find it safe to put their cars in your hands.
