Special delivery: These tips can help delivery drivers avoid painful injuries

Slippery porch steps. Cracked sidewalks. Aggressive animals. Rush hour traffic. These are just several examples of the many hazards delivery drivers could face on a single shift.

Our suite of online safety resources aims to help employers in this industry provide their employees with safety and health training and systems to help prevent injuries.

Brittany Johnston, senior safety management consultant at SAIF, says that growth in this industry has also come with a spike in injuries, sometimes immediately after a business opened their doors.

“This is such a unique industry, and we were finding that the existing resources didn’t work for these businesses,” Johnston says. “We needed to come up with solutions that were quick, specific, sparked conversation with employees, and had low barriers to implement.”

A growing industry with a high injury rate

SAIF insures over 3,000 companies that offer delivery services. This industry has experienced rapid growth of primarily start-up businesses with younger workers, long days and stressful work conditions, and high turnover. The annual wage growth in this industry has outpaced the average, with wages increasing by 10% per year.  

In 2021, total injury claims received by SAIF were 90% higher than expected for this industry and claims in which the worker was unable to return to regular work were even higher, at 275% of expected. The incurred claim losses, or the total dollars paid for a claim plus outstanding reserves, have grown to more than six times as high as they were a decade ago.

Safety and health tips for delivery drivers

Our resources focus on how to prevent injuries from 12 common hazards that delivery drivers experience, including:

• Safely entering and exiting a vehicle
• Avoid slips, trips, and falls
• Animal safety and preventing dog bites
• Ways to avoid device-distracted accidents
• Safe lifting tips

“Our hope is that anyone who leads a group of employees can use these resources to open conversation about a specific topic or hazard they encounter in their work,” says Johnston.

To see all our safety and health tips for delivery drivers, visit saif.com/deliverydrivers.