Workers attend to a mock truck rollover. 80174 Picture: JOE MASTROIANNI
By VANESSA CHIRCOP
TO celebrate the 10th anniversary of the Accident Assist the National Transport Insurance (NTI) team headed out to Laverton North last week to demonstrate a live truck rollover.
The organisation, which was established in 2002 after research showed that earlier involvement of insurance and recovery specialists at accident scenes would benefit drivers and owners, and minimise costs, went out to five locations across Australia to perform the demonstrations, including Laverton North.
NTI Chief Executive Officer Tony Clark said before the advent of NTI Accident Assist, insurance company’s would often be the last to know about an accident and had no control over keeping the intermediary and policyholder informed, how a truck was recovered or how potentially significant site damage was managed.
“This meant a truck might not have repairs authorised for a week,” he said.
“We realised that if we were involved right from the time an accident occurred, we could make the recovery process – for the driver, the vehicle and the environment – as efficient as possible.”
NTI’s branded Heavy Recovery trucks and Accredited Recovery Operators are trained to recover vehicles so further damage is minimised, reducing repair costs and times through its network of repairers.
“While the priority of other parties – such as police and road authorities – may be getting the road cleared, our approach is holistic, we work with them to do it safely and efficiently without causing more damage,” Mr Clark said.
