The importance of incident reporting

Dave Wood, DVSA’s Enforcement Policy Manager, is a vehicle engineer and policy manager with over 35 years of experience across industry, enforcement, and regulatory policy roles. Together, these experiences have offered valuable perspectives which now provide DVSA with a comprehensive insight and deep understanding on vehicle safety. Dave explains the importance of reporting serious coach and bus incidents, and why this needs to be done in a timely manner

In April 2021, DVSA (the Driver & Vehicle Standards Agency) updated the system that coach and bus operators must use to report serious incidents involving one of their vehicles. This is through PSV112 and ER112 forms. I want to update you on how the new system is working, and DVSA’s results for 2021-22.

[wlm_nonmember][…][/wlm_nonmember][wlm_ismember] By law, incidents where any failure or damage may affect the safety of passengers or other road users must be reported as soon as practically possible so that DVSA can work to prevent further occurrences. As a coach or bus operator you need to report any incidents that involve:

• serious injuries or fatalities,
• a vehicle fire;
• a significant body damage, including
• bridge strike;
• safety critical system failure;
• issues relating to age of the vehicle;
• a suspected serious safety defect.

These are known as ‘Reportable incidents.’ Below shows the number in one year.

• Fatalities 35
• Serious injury 230
• A vehicle fire (including arson) 103
• Significant body damage (including bridge strikes) 104
• A safety critical system failure 26
• Other reported incidents 452
• Total 950

Until the new system was introduced, operators reported incidents locally to DVSA enforcement offices. However, the data showing the national picture was not readily available. Reporting methods were inconsistent and it would be difficult to track from incident to conclusion.

We have now updated the reporting system. This means once a report is submitted DVSA aims to contact the operator within two working days to confirm whether the vehicle requires an inspection. Often, we will ask for additional information before deciding whether the vehicle needs to be inspected. The vehicle should not be used again or be repaired before DVSA responds.

Fatality or serious injury

If you are unfortunate enough to be involved with a fatality or serious injury, you must immediately report the incident to the police on 999 as they will need to investigate. They will also need to preserve any evidence. The vehicle must not be moved, altered or repaired until instructed to by them. This type of incident must be immediately reported to the police and as soon a practically possible to DVSA using the appropriate electronic 112 form.

Fire or thermal incident

Once a fire incident has been dealt with and reported to DVSA, we will usually ask for some extra information and may need to inspect the vehicle to try and establish the cause. DVSA is also working with the Confederation of Passenger Transport (CPT), carrying out a study of engine bay temperatures – which may be a cause of some fire incidents.

Bridge strike

In this case of a bridge strike incident, once the situation has been dealt with at the roadside the incident must be reported as soon as practically possible to DVSA, where further information will usually be requested. Many of these incidents are caused by driver error and may result in a driver conduct hearing and possibly an operator follow-up investigation. The investigating officer will let the operator know when the vehicle can be repaired.

 

Safety critical system failure

Assuming these are not being dealt with as part of a police investigation, DVSA will need to know what caused the failure. If it is suspected that a manufacturing fault has caused the failure, DVSA will investigate the incident – and if found to be the case, this could help inform the need for a recall.

Other incidents

It is interesting that about half of incidents happening with coaches and buses (452) are not recorded under one of the five main reporting criteria. Many of these appear to be near misses or no/minor injury incidents. DVSA doesn’t need reports on these. While we encourage incident reporting, we will feed back on obvious over reporting. This helps reduce the number of non-essential reports we receive.

I am pleased to report that the new incident reporting system is a vast improvement to the previous local area reporting procedure. Incidents are being reported and handled much more quickly and data is instantly available.

DVSA is working with stakeholders looking at what action can be taken, together with trends and any lessons that can be learned. This should help reduce the number of serious incidents involving public service vehicles in the future.

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