Top 5 tips for fleet and safety teams this National Safe Work Month

Zetifi, an Australian technology company providing connectivity between vehicles, workers, assets, and the systems fleet and safety teams use, has issued a list of five key tips for fleet and safety teams to make the most of National Safe Work Month, run by Safe Work Australia, throughout October.

Vehicle incidents were the leading cause of work-related deaths in Australia in 2024, accounting for 42% of the 188 workers killed, according to Safe Work Australia.¹ For organisations with people on the road or working alone, making sure both managers and frontline workers understand work health and safety issues is critical.

However, while staff safety is a priority and non-negotiable, many organisations still rely on disconnected tools such as email, spreadsheets or standalone management systems to handle safety events. These fragmented workflows slow response times and weaken accountability. At the same time, serious incidents can occur when workers transition into field environments where connectivity is limited and traditional telematics systems lose visibility. Indeed, some industries such as mining, utilities, agriculture and transport face elevated risk due to remote operations, fatigue exposure and communication gaps.

With this in mind, Zetifi has developed a list of five tips to help fleet and safety managers take stock of their current safety strategies and provide for a safer workplace.

Tip #1: Check workers can call for help beyond mobile coverage

Review the routes and locations where workers regularly lose mobile coverage, whether that’s a long stretch of regional highway, the back of a large property or a sub-basement in the city. Once those areas are identified, organisations can check whether the communication equipment available to workers actually works there and gives them a reliable way to raise the alarm. Where it doesn’t, that gap needs to be closed. Equally important is making sure workers understand the limitations of the equipment they carry and know exactly what to do when a connection is unavailable, so they aren’t left to work it out on the spot.

“We’re certainly not saying that organisations have to triple their spending on work safety measures,” said Zetifi CEO Dan Winson. “In most cases the tools already exist, and the first job is finding out where your people drop out of contact. For someone working alone, knowing they can make that call if something goes wrong takes a real weight off. Without it, the stress of being out of reach can build over time and turn into a mental health concern in its own right, on top of the physical risk.”

Tip #2: Make sure someone is responsible for every safety alert

A duress alert or missed check-in notification is only useful if it reaches someone who knows they are expected to act on it. Organisations should define who receives each type of alert, what that person needs to do and who takes over if they are unable to respond. Shift changes and after-hours work deserve particular attention, as this is when responsibility can easily become unclear and alerts risk going unanswered. Walking through the process with workers, supervisors and safety teams helps ensure everyone understands their role well before a real incident puts it to the test.

Tip #3: Know who is driving each vehicle

In fleets where vehicles are shared across teams or shifts, the person behind the wheel is not always the person listed against the vehicle. A driver app, identification fob or driver identification camera allows each vehicle to be linked to the person driving it, and that assignment should be updated whenever drivers swap vehicles. This means safety alerts and incident records are tied to the right person. When an incident does occur, the team responding can quickly establish who is involved and contact them, instead of losing valuable time working out who was driving.

Tip #4: Agree what happens when a lone worker misses a check-in

Check-in arrangements should reflect the worker’s task, location and level of risk, as a technician visiting sites in town faces very different conditions to someone working alone on a remote property for most of the day. For each arrangement, organisations should specify who is monitoring the worker, how quickly a missed check-in prompts follow-up and at what point further help should be called. Confirming that both the worker and the person monitoring them understand these arrangements before work begins removes the guesswork if a check-in is ever missed.

Tip #5: Test the full response to a worker calling for help

A response plan that has never been tested is still an assumption. Running a planned exercise that follows an alert from activation through to someone responding shows organisations how their process performs in practice, including whether the responder receives enough information to locate the worker and arrange help. The exercise should include situations where mobile coverage is limited or the first contact is unavailable, as these are often the conditions in which real incidents unfold. Any gaps identified can then be fixed before they matter.

“Most organisations have a safety process written down somewhere,” Winson said. “Far fewer have tested it from start to finish. Running an exercise where the call doesn’t connect, or the first person on the list doesn’t pick up, is the fastest way to find out whether your people would actually get help.

“Every one of these steps is within an organisation’s control. None of them needs a big budget. They need someone to ask the hard questions now, and National Safe Work Month is a good time to start.”

_{1. Safe Work Australia’s Key WHS Statistics 2025 (2024 data)}

Image credit: iStock.com/kali9