London, UK: Temperature-controlled storage and distribution firm Calderhead says that its decision to retrofit its vehicles with a Centrad camera system has enabled it to reduce rising insurance premiums and streamline operations.
Calderhead runs 10 trucks, two vans and three cold store sites. The company wanted to reduce rising insurance premiums and ensure its vehicles complied with Transport for London’s Direct Vision Standard in 2019. Calderhead was running up to five trucks into Greater London a day so complying with the changes was imperative to maintaining operations in the capital.
Centrad has retrofitted a four camera ‘360’ camera system on each vehicle within Calderhead’s fleet, covering the front, side and rear, as well as the technology to ensure full compliance with the new Direct Vision Standard, including forward and nearside blind spot detection cameras onto the haulier’s trucks over 12 tonnes – which are now compliant until 2030.
Philip Johnson, commercial manager at Calderhead, said the camera systems have played a vital role in mitigating already heightened insurance premiums for the business by providing clear and irrefutable evidence in case disputes arise, while also helping to streamline its fleet management processes.
“In the last four years, our incident numbers have been relatively low, however the importance of having a comfort blanket in place is still imperative, especially with insurance costs remaining high,” said Johnson.
“As a business, if you can tangibly demonstrate that you’re not at fault as opposed to being at fault, the difference in cost is phenomenal. This is largely why we didn’t want to settle for just a forward-facing dashcam solution, as we felt that having 360 coverage on our vehicles was crucial in ensuring all angles were captured and clear evidence was readily available in the event an incident occurred.
