I think the so-called 'gig economy' has a lot to answer for in terms of road safety. A lot of businesses don't want to employ delivery drivers and buy and maintain a fleet of vans. They want to off load all of that risk onto individuals. Why pay someone a monthly salary and incur all the expenses of owning and maintaining a delivery vehicle fleet, when you can contract people on zero hours contracts or per-parcel contracts, and make them pay for, acquire, insure, and maintain their own delivery vehicle? They also don't want the risk of paying someone when there might not be enough work/deliveries.
I don't want to get too political with this, but I think that ultimately, this is what happens when the number of workers exceeds the number of jobs. When it's an employer's market, they can name their terms and conditions, and if people don't like it, there's an almost endless supply of desperate people who will step up. Occasionally there are stories of delivery drivers caught on camera peeing or dumping somewhere they shouldn't. Of course it's horrible when delivery drivers do that, but what are they supposed to do when they have a mountain of parcels to deliver on an almost impossible schedule?
A week or so back a small car aggressively overtook me while I was driving, then sped through a red light. I thought they just weren't paying attention until I saw them squeeze past another car that was waiting at the next red light, and go through that traffic light at red too. I was close to home at that point, so imagine my surprise when I pulled into my road a minute or so later, and saw the same car completing the drop off of a takeaway meal!
Here's one of many articles on what's going on (click the text to read the full article).
Patrick Wilson’s* heavy eyelids drop momentarily as he parks on a steep terraced street on the suburban edges of north Bristol. He raises a fist to cover a deep, primal yawn that makes his whole body shudder with exhaustion. He has been on the go since 7.30am, when he filled every bit of free space in his battered VW people carrier with packages and bags from the likes of Amazon, M&S and Next. He hasn’t had time to take a break or go to the toilet and it’s now nearly 3pm.
https://www.theguardian.com/busines...as-parcel-delivery-drivers-driven-to-the-edge
“I picked up 220 parcels in the morning,” he says, examining the chunky GPS device that records and dictates his every move. “I’ve done 77 but I’ve got 143 left. That’s a lot.”
Sounds interesting. If you have time, could you give some examples? Are they people who simply drive far too fast? Have you ever managed to work out which people are most likely to drive like lunatics beforehand? Do the loons tend to want to test drive powerful cars?
To be honest it’s usually the elderly which are the issue. I do feel sorry that it’s their independence but on the other hand some should have stopped a long time ago. A few years ago I had a guy buying a Fiesta for his 100th birthday.
In 18 years I think I’ve only once told a driver to pull over for driving like a nob.
Typically it’s quite easy to work out who will be a issue. The ones who want to drive a mustang or RS. We don’t normally do test drives in these cars as several have been written off at other dealers in the past. It’s simply not worth the hassle.