The story about VOSA's attitude towards its enforcement policy features some comment from the agency itself. Here is VOSA's full, unedited response to the detailed questions which were posed by Commercial Motor deputy editor Louise Cole:
1. Some of the interviewees I have spoken to within VOSA feel that having performance gain targets encourage them towards prohibitions rather than education. Are you aware of this as an issue?
It is true that the system encourages examiners to find prohibitions. But this is just part of the process. Education and advice are also an important part of our work and attract performance gain points as well as the issue of prohibitions.
Performance gain is designed to encourage examiners to carry out both education and effective enforcement when targeting non-compliant vehicles.
The performance management system requires a balance between the two. Line Managers would not expect an examiner’s time and output to come solely from either education or enforcement activity. There are some examples when the balance has gone significantly toward education alone and we cannot allow excessive drift either way.
2. Some have suggested that a small proportion of examiners give unnecessary, or unnecessarily harsh prohibitions in order to gain points and that it is a pressure all are subject to. Are you aware of this as an issue?
Yes, we are aware of the issue. Our targets do encourage examiners to concentrate on non-compliant vehicles. For mechanical defects examiners have to follow the guidance contained in the categorisation of defects. This provides an objective guide.
We also carry out extensive quality assurance checks on our prohibitions. We do however recognise that there may be a small number of cases where examiners interpret the guidance wrongly. For this reason we are reviewing our quality assurance system in order to ensure greater consistency.
When this occurs, a pattern of complaints will occur and the line manager will notice. Nobody wants to have to deal with unhappy customers and complaints and this will normally be dealt with locally through personal development and guidance from line management. We do not encourage staff to improve performance by harsh treatment or number crunching, on the contrary, we have spelt out to examiners that we cherish our reputation and risk losing it if we and are not fair.
3. Does the e-mail I sent through reflect the attitude VOSA expects staff to have towards enforcing new legislation?
As mentioned before, VOSA will be applying an educational approach to speed limiter enforcement with operators of vehicles now falling into scope.
VOSA will adopt a 'light touch' approach to the enforcing of new legislation when appropriate. We will always take a lead from the Department for Transport as to how they expect new legislation to be enforced, in the particular instance of speed limiter enforcement our approach here is to educate and advise in the first instance.
Enforcement action will only be taken where it is clear that previous advice has not been taken or where there is clear evidence of abuse, for example, tampering with systems after they have been correctly installed and set.
It is anticipated that this approach will remain until January 2008 when the full requirements of the changes to Construction and Use come into effect.
4. Do you think this email demonstrates a managerial focus on achieving PG targets through prohibitions and not on education?
The managerial focus is to achieve a balance between Enforcement and Education (please see the answer to Question 2). The e-mail you possess should not be interpreted in any way as a departure from this Policy.
5. [Your press office] told me that you do not set numerical targets for pass or fail at annual test "and quite rightly so, as we expect our staff to test vehicles, applying the right procedures to the right standard. Our primary interest is recording the right result and not to set targets that could mean examiners passing vehicles that should fail." Do you not think that targets for roadside checks may have the same effect? That examiners may be encouraged to fail vehicles which should be cleared?
No. Examiners at the roadside are required to be objective. We do not set a points target for individual road checks. Any examiner who deliberately prohibited a vehicle which had no defects would be subject to disciplinary action.
However, we do have a target to increase the percentage of vehicles which we prohibit but this is solely through better targeting so that we look at more non-compliant vehicles and drivers whilst reducing the burden on the law-abiding.
6. Is there any way that examiners can gain performance gain points except by giving prohibitions (apart from the one point they get for seeing a clean vehicle)?
Yes, there are many ways that an examiner can gain credit from activity other than prohibitions. For example:
- Visits to all new operators to provide education and support when they are new to road transport. This is to try to avoid new operators falling into the regulatory system through ignorance rather than intent or negligence. This is a particularly important activity for "own account" operators who will not have a CPC holder. Examiners leave an educational DVD with the operator for reference.
- General visits to established operators to deliver targeted advice.
- Attendance at Industry seminars. We always support a range of events organised by VOSA and the industry associations, there is a long list events we have supported and these all attract reward in our performance management system.
How Performance Gain works:
VOSA enforcement activity falls into three broad categories:
- Deterrent – the deterrent effect of our presence at roadside checks, operator visits, etc;
- Education – improving operator and driver understanding of the rules and regulations; and
- Sanction – penalising the non-compliant vehicle/driver/operator through prohibitions, public inquiry or prosecution action and mitigating road safety risks by prohibiting offending vehicles.
Each outcome is given a value related to its estimated contribution to road safety and environmental standards.
The points value ranges from 1 point for a sift check of a vehicle to 100 points for an immediate prohibition with a safety-critical steering, tyres or brakes defect.
This means that we can reduce the number of checks and reduce the burden that routine checks create for the compliant if, through improvements in the range and quality of intelligence and data, we can target our resources more effectively.
By giving appropriate value to our education and advice outcomes we can also encourage extra effort in this category. In this way we can help those who want to get it right but who need additional support and guidance.
While each PG outcome is assessed and scored separately, the points scores for the three categories are broadly as follows:
- Deterrent: 1–10 points;
- Education: 10–50 points; and
- Sanction: 50–100 points.
7. What percentage of prohibitions are challenged?
Some complaints will be dealt with on the spot and would not be recorded. However, those that are not resolved at a local level will be referred to the VOSA Customer Complaints Coordinator. In the financial year 2005- 2006, 69,282 prohibitions were issued. The amount of these that resulted in a formal complaint being sent to the Complaints Coordinator was only 59. Therefore only .085% of prohibitions issued, resulted in a complaint not being able to be resolved at local level and being sent to the VOSA Complaints Office.
8. Vehicle examiners have told me that ensuring that prohibitions are all fair and that all data is recorded including clean vehicles stopped takes a lot of management time and often involves comparing notebooks etc to even know that this is taking place. What procedures are there to ensure that over-zealous behaviour or a deliberate avoidance of sound trucks is caught?
It is true that quality control checks can be time consuming but they are essential. We have put in significantly more Senior Examiners over the years so that they are managing smaller teams and can concentrate on this type of activity. We also have a Quality assurance and Improvement team as a second tier of checks.
9. The OCRS system rates operators green, orange and red with red causing most concern for road safety and attracting most VOSA attention. If the red or orange operator is stopped and their truck is sound will this count towards their progression to green?
Yes, it does. It has a positive impact on their compliance score and they could progress to green. However, their progress to green is dependent on the compliance level of other UK operators. If all operators do better and are compliant when checked, the progress may be slower.
The bottom line is that the onus is on an operator to maintain suitable systems to ensure that vehicles are always maintained to a high standard, and that any relevant legislation in force is adhered to. You need to ensure that any failures at test and prohibitions issued are investigated.
VOSA is willing to assist you by providing advice and information that will help to identify potential problem areas. Knowledge is a key weapon in the drive to improve standards and if you know what you are being assessed on, then you will find it easier to improve your position. Below are some suggestions that you might find useful:
- Obtain your OCRS scores
- Track progress of your scores and obtain supporting reports
- Set performance improvement targets.
10. Vehicle examiners have told me that, having stopped a truck, they will nonetheless avoid examining vehicles they think look sound. Do you accept that this denies red and orange rated operators their chance to show improvement?
Operators with a red or orange status are more likely to be stopped, because of their status. Operators with a clear record from previous roadside inspections will be less likely to be stopped.
11. If examiners do not reach their performance gain point target is this seen by local managers as underperformance? What happens then?
Performance gain targets are set by each Enforcement Area rather than relating to individuals. The targets are achieved by a combined total of staff involved. If instances arise where targets are not being met, we will investigate the reasons of which there could be many, for instance the staffing level could be low through sickness or holidays. Having investigated, we will seek to resolve the problems, through training or recruitment of new staff for example.
12. And finally, I have been told that the location of the roadside check is crucial to effective targeting. What proportion of trucks therefore are then stopped using ANPR and OCRS as guides or will trucks be stopped more randomly once a good location has been found?
We are not aware of any records detailing proportions of vehicles stopped using ANPR & OCRS. However, both are targeting tools that will be used if available.
It must be remembered that these tools have been introduced to reduce the burden of enforcement for compliant operators.
Location of Spot Checks
Spot checks may be carried out:
(a) as part of organised road checks where vehicles are stopped by uniformed police or VOSA accredited stoppers and examined. Such checks frequently involve other agencies, e.g. Driver and Vehicle Licensing, Customs and Excise, Home Office.
(b) at operator's premises without prior notification.
(c) at any other location where stationary vehicles may be found, e.g. in vehicle parking areas and lay-bys etc.
(d) as part of a mobile check (with a VOSA accredited stopper or the police).
On safety grounds, it may be necessary to direct the vehicle to a location, such as a VOSA Testing Station or other area which is suitable for an examination.
