Section 1 – Introduction

Polypipe Civils, part of Polypipe PLC is based in Horncastle and is one of the leading suppliers of plastic pipes to the civil engineering industry. Kevin Donovan, Transport and Logistics Manager, explains how the company has achieved significant improvements through being FORS certified and how following the FORS standard has assisted the company in becoming more efficient, compliant and environmentally aware – “Polypipe has always been a company who is committed to being environmentally friendly and efficient, our pipes utilise recycled plastics to limit the effect of fossil fuel use and make a permanent use for plastics which have come to the end of their first life. FORS has assisted the business from a transport point of view, it has given the business a focus to work to, ensuring that the key point indicators such as fuel consumption and vehicle incidents rates are firstly being accurately tracked and secondly, that they are being managed in the right way to ensure that they are constantly being reduced.

Section 2 – How did you hear about FORS, what prompted the company to join and how long have you been a member?

The company became FORS registered back in 2015. This was a company driven initiative to drive transport compliance through the company and give Polypipe the best possible access to contracts and markets through membership of FORS.

Section 3 – What was your experience of the initial FORS Bronze audit?

Polypipe have always found the FORS audits to be beneficial as a secondary check on the company activities to ensure that they are effective in achieving the results. An audit is always an opportunity to improve and the civils and other Polypipe divisions will and have taken positive steps to improve from the feedback received at audits.

Section 4 – What was your main reason(s) for you progressing (either from Bronze to Silver and then Silver to Gold or straight from Bronze to Gold)?

The company has constantly been at Silver level for the last two years and the civils division wanted to be the leader within the group to move the FORS level up a stage and reach the gold level. The company did achieve silver level back in 2016 but due to internal reasons, the silver was not maintained.

In addition to this we have used the FORS fuel tracker and the CLOCS collision investigator tools in the past which again, have provided us with a good base for ensuring quality data is being logged and retained for future analysis and confirmation of problems solved and improvement made.

Stephen McDuff, Supply Chain Director says – Some of our largest clients now Operate FORS Gold and I see this as the way forward as a natural progression for Polypipe Civils & Green Urbanisation, it puts us out there at the top in terms of image and compliance and this can only be good in my opinion

 Lillian Baker Compliance Officer says – For Polypipe Civils to obtain FORS Gold would be justification for the hard work put in by the whole team, it also demonstrates our commitment to our clients and our dedication towards Health & safety, compliance and the environment

Section 6 – What improvements have you made?

These shall include:

• Performance data – Use data provided for FORS requirements S2 and G2. See example below for table (data can be presented in different table format if you prefer)

	MPG	Incidents per 100,000 Kms	CO2	NOx	PM10	Number of PCNs	Proportion of fleet that uses alternative fuels
Nov 2018 – Oct 2019	9.31	0.71	94.14	61.28	38.3	0	0%
Nov 2019 – Oct 2020	9.48	0.25	68.03	44.28	27.67	0	0%
Percentage improvement	1.83%	64.7%	1.83%	1.83%	1.83%	N/A	0%

• Driver health and fitness review – The company has increased the regularity of health screening of drivers to ensure that all drivers are fit for the road and that the company can actively work with persons who are suffering from health conditions which could affect both their driving and working ability. The company is and always has been pro-active in finding solutions for anyone who has problems to ensure that they are best accommodated and can remain in the employment of the company.
• Recruitment of drivers – The company has further increased its offering to the apprenticeship scheme to ensure that new talent is recruited into the business. The company also works well with the local educational authorities and job centres to recruit locally to assist with unemployment in the local area.
• Noise assessment – The company has implemented a fleet upgrade, ensuring that the quietest vehicles are being used and that the company actively plans routes to ensure that noise pollution is minimised as far as is practicable.
• Modal shift and alternative vehicles – The company has started to use electric vehicles across the Polypipe group and are considering the use of alternatively fuelled HGV’s.

Section 7 – What are your plans for the future?

In order to ensure that our operations remain clean and green we will be pushing the Polypipe environmental objectives and targets and upgrading our vehicle fleet accordingly when cleaner vehicles become available.

Section 8 – What evidence do you have of positively promoting FORS at requirement G7?

We positively promote FORS through our social media platforms and include FORS awareness as part of our internal and external communications plans.

Section 9 –What FORS Gold accredition means for your organisation/to you?

Conclude

FORS has helped us to improve our fleet operations and we believe it will continue do so. For this reason, FORS will continue to be high on our agenda to ensure our business is as environmentally efficient and safe as it possibly can be.

Section 11 – FORS members’ feedback questionnaire

Please could you take the time to complete a short questionnaire and provide feedback about FORS. Please note all answers you provide will be strictly confidential and will only be used by FORS to help us to improve the scheme. To access the survey, please click the link here: https://www.snapsurveys.com/wh/s.asp?k=153908006313

*Please note: All published FORS Gold case studies have been submitted by the accredited company named above and transcribed verbatim