Friday is the most hazardous day of the week for fleet drivers, with the highest number of accidents, speeding events and incidences of aggressive driving taking place, according to the latest research from Lightfoot.

In the second of its Fleet Spotlight reports, Lightfoot analysed data from more than 5,000 commercial vehicles that took part in blind trials.

The data showed that Friday at 9am is the most common time for an accident to take place – based on the number of FNOL (first notification of loss) alerts sent from Lightfoot devices. Altogether, Friday is also the worst day of the week for aggressive driving, with more instances of harsh braking, sudden turns and sharp cornering.

This is likely due to tiredness at the end of the working week for many fleet drivers, as this can often lead to mistakes and inattentiveness.

Paul Hollick, Lightfoot’s Managing Director, commented:

“When we begin working with a business, or are piloting our system, we get data which shows the real-world situation on the road with their drivers. This data is then fed into a risk management strategy which pinpoints where they are most likely to experience poor driving. Over the course of these thousands of blind tests, we have consistently found that Friday is the time when things are most likely to go wrong on the roads. This points to stress-related reasons for the peak in bad driving on Friday – ‘weekenditis’ – as people are rushing to get home for the weekend and tired minds wander away from the business of driving.”

By contrast, Monday is the day when there are the lowest number of speeding incidents, harsh driving events and insurance claims within fleets. This may be due to many drivers returning to work on Monday feeling refreshed and rested from the weekend.

As well as monitoring vehicle efficiencies, Lightfoot’s telematics solution also detects issues with drivers, ranging from harsh braking and acceleration to excessive speed.

Paul Hollick suggests that companies learn from these data insights to reduce bad driving instances and save money.

He added:

“With such a high concentration of accidents and incidents taking place on Fridays, in the first instance businesses can make drivers aware that their standards may be slipping as the week wears on. Sometimes, raising awareness can really help. Drivers, on reflection, may then agree they need to concentrate more at certain times. But then fleets can take some more proactive steps, such as changing working routines, break times, and vehicle routing or by installing a telematics device and implementing coaching to mitigate the risk. The key is understanding the risk in the first place. Having the data means you can then deal with the issue.”

View the full Spotlight Report infographic here.