Incentivize Safe Driving: 4 Ideas for parents of young drivers
As written for The Safe Driver.
It’s every parent’s fear that a son or daughter learning to drive won’t take safety seriously. Particularly these days when distracted driving is a bigger problem than ever before, it’s natural to worry that unsafe habits will develop. Fortunately, there are some solutions developing for this sort of problem that work even if drivers have unsafe tendencies. For instance, a product called the Smart Wheel that many people saw on the television show Shark Tank uses various sensors to effectively monitor teen drivers and sound alerts upon noticing dangerous behavior. This and other products like it can go a long way toward making the road safer for young drivers. However, personal attitude and execution still matters most.
Because of that, we’re presenting a few ideas for how to incentivize safe driving for your kids.
1 – Set Up A Reward Catalog
This is an idea that actually comes from a very extensive list of ways to get truckers and fleet drivers to stay safe. This is a serious concern given their long hours on the road, but even so some of the same tips can apply to young drivers. The concept of a reward catalogue was the first tip offered, and makes a great deal of sense. Basically by preparing a reward catalogue you can set up a situation in which the young driver at hand earns a given reward for certain achievements or milestones: every month without an infraction of any kind, proven time driving without texts or calls, etc. The rewards could be set to mount up over time, teaching the young driver to practice safe habits regularly.
2 – Use An App
This more or less goes with the idea of the Smart Wheel mentioned above, in that it fits into the category of tech designed to assist with safe driving. Basically there are now a lot of apps that help people stay safe. They can read texts as audio, alert you if you’re too close to another car, and even track habits and manage their own reward systems such as the ones outlined in the first point here.
3 – Set Up A Bet
This is more or less the same as a reward system, but some young drivers might respond more to a more competitive setup. For instance, instead of just offering an incentive, you can have your young driver put something on the line – allowance, a given privilege, a vacation, etc. The deal will be that if he or she breaks any established rules for safe driving by a certain time, he or she loses that thing. Otherwise, there’s a reward. If betting isn’t your usual cup of tea you can look into different types of wagering formats at betting sites online to get an idea for how it all works. It can actually be sort of a fun way to incentivize safe habits.
4 – Split Up Phone Payments
Most parents are paying phone bills, at least to some extent. But if you split these up and make a teenager take responsibility for his or her use of data, calls, and texts, he or she will be less likely to overdo it with these aspects of phone usage. It’s a roundabout way of making it less likely that the phone is in use while driving, because this will inevitably lead to data usage – which the young driver won’t want to pay for. It’s a small step, but one worth considering as a start.