Who should maintain a company vehicle

phingers

Evening all!

A colleague drives the company van for company business. The van is serviced annually and this is up to date. The van broke down. The reason the van broke down was because it had run out of oil. There were no warning lights in the van to say oil was low or had run out. The cost of a reconditioned engine is £2000. The employer says my colleague has been negligent in looking after the van and must pay half the repair bill.

Is this right? There is no written car policy at all.

Any help massively appreciated. TYIA

thefishdude

i dont know if its right but i know were i work i drive company vechiles maintained by the company how ever every time we drive we have defects sheet to fill in all pretty basic stuff and can report problems if we find any. one thing we have to do is check the oil level of the vechile before each usage if we did not and it broke down for that i would imagine we would be in deep trouble possible grose misconduct.

also you dont normally get anything that tells you you have low oil the oil lights in cars are for low oil pressure not low oil.

mcduff16

At our place it is the drivers responsibility to do basic daily defect checks if they are using a company vehicle. Checks includes tyres, working horn, lights, oil level, water level etcs.

Delivery_Driver

You can't rely on an annual service and warning lights to pick up low levels, you have to keep checking it.However, I don't see hwo the company can make him pay half of this bill unless its in his contract.Even then, its shaky ground.
They can discipline him though for not doing basic checks if thats classed as part of his job.It is for most van drivers.If the company don't use check sheets though or have a policy of making drivers do these checks then he may be in the clear.

photome

I drive a company car and it is in my contract to check oil/tyres etc daily/weekly.

If it isnt in your colleagues contract I guess there is little they can
do to make him pay up, But if he doesnt pay up will he still have a job next week?

oldhand

If I owned the firm he wouldnt have a job,most firms who supply vehicles to employees expect (and rightly so) they will take reasonable care of them.In some companies I worked for we had what was called a NIL defect sheet,which meant you put a tick at the appropriate box to say (after having checked the vehicle) there was NO fault at that time with that item.That person could also have been breaking the law each time he took that vehicle out as having not checked the vehicle for oil we can safely assume he would not check the lights,indicators,wipers handbrake etc all of which are the drivers responsibility before taking a vehicle onto the road.His firms well rid of him,I can only hope some other firm does not get lumbered with him too.

colino

It probably is in his contract to do the basic checks, but I've never heard of anyone being liable for unlimited contributions to repairs. That's not to say though that it wont be a disciplinary for failing to comply with the basics.

prowla

I once got (half) told off for having a puncture repaired on a company car, but I said it wasn't save to drive oherwise...

mchale

The driver of any vehicle should check fluid levels at least once a week, its called common sense

mustrum_ridcully

Correct me if I'm wrong but at the end of the day isn't it the legal duty of the driver to ensure that the vehicle is roadworthy?

So I'd say the company does the maintenance but the driver does the checks. If the van is damaged through failure of the company to service it properly it's their fault, if it's damaged because the driver couldn't be bothered to check fluid levels it's his fault.

Point your mate in the general direction of: http://www.direct.gov.uk/en/TravelAndTransport/Highwaycode/DG_069871

marlot

Of course he should be checking the oil; indeed he should be doing all the daily/weekly checks in the vehicle handbook.

As to whether the company can make him pay - he needs to head over to the employmen law sub forum.