North Tyneside protects crews & fights anti-social behaviour with Fleetclear

The North Tyneside Plan (2021-2025) highlights the prevention of antisocial behaviour and a commitment to increasing recycling rates as well as the introduction of food waste collections in the borough.

The challenge

The council’s Environmental Services team was having issues with existing vehicle camera systems, installed to waste and recycling collection vehicles to protect crew members and mitigate false insurance claims made against the council.

Steve Whitworth, Operations Manager, Operations and Logistics, Local Environmental Services, North Tyneside Council explains:

“We had a crew member assaulted and needed to put some safeguards in place to protect staff.  We also need the video footage as evidence to invalidate the increasing number of false insurance claims made against the service.

“The vehicle CCTV system we were using required software to be installed onto PCs, which was very difficult given the security restrictions of the council’s network. We also found it took too much time to search for relevant video footage and we needed a more efficient back-up service from our technology provider.”

The council also wanted to install camera systems to vehicles used by its Community Protection team, who work closely with the police to address anti-social behaviour issues. However, the current systems weren’t suitable.

The solution

Steve Whitworth: “We contacted Fleetclear because they have a very good reputation in the industry. We were impressed with their products and the after sales support.  

Their live camera system is web-based, which means we didn’t need to install any software and we can access information about the vehicles from any online device.

The system also provides real-time vehicle tracking, so we can see where any vehicle is at any time and gather data about different rounds. The live video streaming is great, not just for the collection service but also for our Community Protection teams who often need to respond quickly to situations and provide immediate footage to the police.”

Fleetclear’s RXLite Live camera recording system offers 100% reliability for recording files and provides excellent image quality for drivers and fleet operators. The system can be used to monitor the deployment of other safety equipment and there is a Managed Service option for proactive third-party remote monitoring of the system, whereby any faults are immediately identified and actioned by the Fleetclear team.

The geofencing feature enables the search for any vehicle, at a specific day or time, at a pre-defined location or area. It takes seconds to find the correct video clip.

Gavin Thoday, CEO, Fleetclear: “Vehicle accidents, health and safety best practice monitoring and false insurance claims are just some of the challenges that our local authority customers face every day. Proving the circumstances is often the most difficult and time-consuming task. That is why we developed a highly reliable, user friendly, and feature-rich system that always captures essential information and can deliver the relevant footage in seconds.

We are pleased to be able to provide North Tyneside Council with a Live camera recording and vehicle tracking system that helps to improve crew safety and enhance fleet efficiency as well as contribute to the fight against anti-social behaviour.”

Data protection

Fleetclear belongs to a government-backed Cyber Security scheme, Cyber Essentials, which verifies that it has introduced proven cyber security controls to protect against a range of the most common internet based cyber threats. Fleetclear staff follow strict measures and policies as IT users when handling sensitive data.

Chris Waller, Technical Director, Fleetclear said: “Many of our products and services involve the monitoring, collection and recording of information and data to help our customers’ run their fleets more effectively. Protecting this data is our highest priority. Gaining Cyber Essentials certification reassures our customers that we have put every measure in place to keep their data secure and safeguard our systems from the threat of cyber-attack.”

Support

Steve added: “Back-up support is key for us and Fleetclear are very proactive. Any issues are dealt with speedily and the mobile engineering team are quick to respond. However, the quality of the equipment is such that we rarely incur problems and reliability is extremely good.”

Any new collection vehicles on the North Tyneside fleet are now automatically fitted with RXLite as standard, along with the Fleetclear Reverse Radar, which is the most flexible, accurate and powerful blind spot monitoring solution available in the marketplace. It can detect up to 16 stationary and moving targets simultaneously, and is deployed in over 80,000 vehicles, over 37 countries.