ExamopotamiaWhy test delivery drivers before you hire?
Delivery driving combines road safety, customer service and time pressure, and drivers usually work alone. You cannot watch how they handle a brake warning light, a missed customer or a route that is running late. Those moments affect your insurance claims, your vehicle repair bills and your customers' trust. A short test, taken before the driving assessment, tells you who has safe habits and who sees the schedule as more important than everything else.
What this template covers
- Vehicle checks: the daily walk-around and what to do when a warning light appears.
- Safe driving: phones, following distance in rain, fatigue and aquaplaning.
- Loading and manoeuvring: securing the load and reversing safely in busy areas.
- Customer handover: failed deliveries, hard-to-find addresses and honest delivery records.
- Delays and incidents: communicating when late and what to do after a minor collision.
How to run it well
Use twelve questions with a ten minute timer; drivers often take tests on a phone, so keep it short. Set the pass mark at 75%, and treat the phone, fatigue and warning light questions as must-pass, because a wrong answer there is a safety risk however well the rest goes. Shuffle the answer options so that the safest-sounding choice is not always in the same position.
The template avoids country-specific road rules on purpose, so it works anywhere. Use it alongside a licence check and a practical drive with a supervisor. In the interview, ask about any question the candidate got wrong, and listen for whether they would put safety ahead of the delivery schedule.
Who this test is for
Use it for van and parcel delivery drivers, couriers, multi-drop and route drivers, food and grocery delivery drivers, and drivers' mates who help with handovers. Fleet managers can also use it as a yearly refresher for existing drivers, and the results show which topics to cover in toolbox talks.
Make it yours
Add questions on your own procedures: how drivers record proof of delivery, where they may leave parcels, how to report a vehicle defect, and what to do with returns or damaged goods. If you need knowledge of local road rules, write those questions yourself for your country. You can translate the test into the languages your drivers speak and edit every question.