It will cover many areas of your fleet management, starting with listing everyone who drives for the business and then checking their licences.

Many audits will then ask the drivers to complete a written or online driving assessment to establish their competency with a driver profile by looking at their driving history, accident record, attitude, previous driving convictions, attention span, aggression, anticipation, stress and hazard perception.

It is a useful tool to help reduce vehicle down-time, to reinforce good driving habits with existing employees and work as a recruitment benefit for new employees.

This assessment can also help to offer advice about eco-driving to help a company save money spent on fuel and vehicle maintenance.

The point of the written or online assessment is to identify which drivers may benefit from more focused driver training.

Stuart Gemmell, fleet risk consultant at QBE, who holds an MSc in Driving Behaviour and Education from Cranfield School of Engineering, comments: “Driver training has its place and should be done before handing over the keys to a vehicle, but competency is important: does the company recognise good behaviour? Is there a process to measure a driver’s competence?”

An audit will also help establish who is responsible within a company for ongoing risk assessment and development, which is especially important in companies without a dedicated fleet manager.

The audit will identify this person and what they are responsible for and make sure they have the correct training and support to oversee a risk management system.

It is important that driver assessment is not seen as singling out any driver for poor standards. Assessment is about offering help and support to aid drivers to be better at their job and safe in the working environment.

A good starting point is to tell them that, when they are driving, they are drivers first and employees second, so their responsibility is primarily to themselves and other road users.

The audit will also look at typical journeys, routes and timings to work out any particularly high-risk areas.

Other points covered in most fleet audits will be the company’s policy on the use of mobile phones and hands-free kits, drink and drug use, maximum driving times, safe loading, correct documentation and handling hazardous materials. It will also recommend measures to improve risk management and a timetable for their implementation.

Auditors approach risk assessment in a variety of ways, some preferring face-to-face interaction and others an online offering.

The length of time an audit takes is dependent on the size of the company and whether it has multiple sites, the scale of the fleet, and what a company wants included in an audit.