Section 1 – Introduction

I am the Operations Manager (Martin Francis) at Kingman Services based at our head office at Walton on the hill in Surrey and oversee the daily operation on the fleet and office staff.

Kingman Services currently run two large fleets of vehicles, one which consists of 37 HGV Cement Mixers and the other is our fleet of 28 HGV aggregate tipper vehicles.

The majority of our Cement Mixer fleet is franchised with Hanson Heidelberg (including 20 Mercedes Econic Mixers) and operates across there London and South East concrete plants. We do also have a smaller fleet of Mixer vehicles that go out to the concrete market on a Hire basis.

The fleets we operate are based at our Greenhithe Depot, with the tipper fleet being aggregates based only. We work with and on behalf of a number of companies within the industry including CEMEX, Tarmac, Hanson, Conway, Gallagher Days, as well as others.

We operate within Greater London area but also have vehicles working throughout the South East of the UK on both of our fleets.

Section 2 – How did you hear about FORS, what prompted the company to join and how long have you been a member?

We have been involved with FORS from the beginning of its inception back in 2009, after following several various publications within our industry subscriptions Terry Francis (General Manager) decided that the FORS aims and goals for better safety standards within the industry and to the general public was in-line with our own goals and beliefs here at Kingman Services. Terry attended numerous seminars and was included in the first group of FORS Practitioners to be trained, an accreditation he still holds to this today.

Section 3 – What was your experience of the initial FORS Bronze audit?

We booked our initial audit which was both helpful and positive in terms of advice given and help to achieve our own targets moving forward (This included all the workshop tools that we were introduced to). After the audit we was operating initially at the Bronze standard. We decided to send another of our staff members (Michael Hudson) on to the FORS practitioner workshops of which he passed all modules and then become our in house FORS practitioner. Add his newly found knowledge of the FORS expectations going forward, and the help of the FORS tools including the fleet management system and the drivers Licence checking service, we were then able to quickly qualify for the silver standard.

Section 4 – What was your main reason(s) for you progressing (either from Bronze to Silver and then Silver to Gold or straight from Bronze to Gold)?

FORS has become immersed within our company’s DNA and went hand in hand with how we operate daily. This was driven into all areas within the company including, the workshop fitters, the office / shipping staff, the senior management, and all of our drivers. These positive signs of progress only encouraged us to complete our FORS induction journey and finally choosing to operate at the FORS Gold standard, which I am proud to say has now been for 6yrs and personally I believe it to be our proudest achievement. I have listed below just some of the positive benefits a company gets in choosing to operate at any of the FORS standards and are happy to encourage others to do so. When choosing to work with or on behalf of external companies it is important to us that they are linked to FORS in some way. We are happy to support companies who we are associated with in gaining accreditations and we aim to have all known contacts FORS Registered by the end of 2022.

Section 5 – Explain how you have made use of the benefits FORS provides?

We are continually using the FORS system, all of our drivers must complete online courses to a FORS Gold standard, we believe this makes our drivers more aware of vulnerable road users as well as their understanding of their responsibilities to these road users upon the courses completions.

Highly skilled drivers – thanks to FORS “drivers E-Leaning Modules” which we believe has contributed to reductions year after year in our accident claims. Insurance costs have been reduced for the previous 5yrs as a result of less driver fault accident claims and we believe this is from the extensive FORS driver training.

Our in-house practitioner Michael Hudson has been on all workshop courses and completed all online courses which has expended his and the company knowledge of FORS, we used the benefits of FORS discounts when taking on our web fleet system which gave us a discount on the subscription and units for our fleet.

Section 6 – What improvements have you made?

Our CO2, NOx, and Particulate matter emissions have been vastly reduced, once again we attribute this to educating drivers via FORS E- Learning Modules, and the monthly use of TBTs regarding greener methods of operating. Add these to our vehicle investment programme of operating EURO 6 engine vehicles where possible (Most fuel-efficient engine), plus our future plans to use more energy efficient / alternative energy vehicles once they become available to us in our industry. To assist the noise levels reductions across our fleet we take regular readings with a DB app when they are in use to ensure they are within tolerances. We also encourage drivers via TBTs and training to switch off engines where and when possible.

We have also had reductions in transport related fines due to the drivers undergoing E-learning training and regular reminders on the TBTs of parking restrictions within London and driving time tachograph management. Educating our shipping staff and the use of the most up to date Tom Tom Telematics system has also attributed to these advancements in fine reductions and more greener efficiencies. 

	MPG	Incidents per 100,000 Kms	CO2	NOx	PM10	Number of PCNs	Proportion of fleet that uses alternative fuels
Year 18-19	5.05	0.967	4494.28	5032.76	77.80	55	0%
Year 19-20	5.10	0.381	4090.65	4574.11	71.19	38	0%
Year 20-21	5.13	0.444	3216.17	3477.33	54.54	26	0%
Percentage improvement	0.6%	54%	28.4%	30.9%	29.9%	52.7%	0%

(% is over Total 3 Year Period Improvement)

After such a difficult year (Due to COVID19) we have had time to reflect and readdress our fleet size our staffing levels as well as our current work levels. The industry has been slow up to present, but there are signs of recovery across the fleets. We have been offered renewed works both via the Concrete Mixers as well as the aggregate Tippers, this is on large projects going forward this year such as, HS2 and Thames tideway. Therefore, we will be retraining some existing staff in to new roles as well as recruiting new staff, via online advertisements as well as promoting the “recommend a friend” scheme within our current work force.

We will look to try and keep focused on the fast-changing safety issues due to Covid within the industry this year. We currently carry out 6 monthly eyesight checks on all staff, as well as promote health and fitness for drivers and staff within our monthly TBTs where encouragement is given for a healthier and greener lifestyles.

We will also look in to using alternative fuelled vehicles for the future as we may want to use a van for internal works, this will be our first purchase of newer alternative fuelled vehicles.

We will continue to carry out our site and vehicle noise assessments using the decibel X app as feel this is a good way to compare data from previous months and if any improvement can be made will enforce this to the standards required.

This will help lower the carbon footprint we produce even further and reduce running costs helping the environment and staff health.

Section 7 – What are your plans for the future?

Our future will include investment into our on-line presence using our newly designed website (with FORS logos and company statements promoting FORS) we aim to be more prominent on our chosen web-based media outlets. We will be updating our sign on glass tablets in line with some of our customers bringing forward their paperless apps due to the current COVID19 Pandemic such as CEMEX Go, TARMAC pod-father, and HANSON one, while also looking to re-design our own currently bespoke systems to make them more modern and more efficient, we will be further looking into alternative fuel vehicles as feel this is coming to a stage within current development where this may now be possible within our industry.

Section 8 – What evidence do you have of positively promoting FORS at requirement G7?

Kingman Services continually promotes. FORS via our newly designed website, on headed letters and any document of us within the company we have been speaking with out supplier base this year, we have manged to encourage other companies in their silver accreditation with offering any advice they may require. Going forward this year we will be doing a toolbox talk with the driver in co-operation with the met police “on dangerous driving and Vulnerable road users”. Michael Hudson our FORS practitioner will be re-taking his refresher course as a FORS practitioner in the coming year as well as further new courses, being made available for the new FORS requirements for the future that will need to be undertaken by himself and all staff members.

We have done workshops with Thames’s tideway in regard to Direct Vison and going forward we will always make ourselves and our vehicles available for any other road initiatives that will be introduced.

Section 9 –What FORS Gold accreditation means for your organisation/to you?

As much as investment into new vehicles, safety equipment and staff training are important to us, it is not as important as being sure that we are operating as a company to a high safety standard across the board and that it is practical and able to be maintained going forward. That is what the FORS Gold accreditation means to us and it is an achievement that we are proud of and proud to be associated with. From both a personal and professional perspective, in the future, I would like to see all the companies with which we do business with adhere to the same standards as ourselves and any additional areas highlighted by FORS, as well as continue to lead the way with safety working practises within London.

Section 10 – (Optional) Please provide your social media contact details so we can follow your organisation.

Kingman Services Social Media Contacts are as Follows:

Twitter: @Kingmanservices

Facebook: @Kingmanservices

LinkedIn: @Kingmanservices

Website: www.kingmanservices.co.uk

E-Mail: [email protected]

*Please note: All published FORS Gold case studies have been submitted by the accredited company named above and transcribed verbatim