According to the Insurance Corporation of British Columbia, new drivers in BC are 3.5 times more at risk of getting into an accident than experienced drivers. That’s why ICBC is recruiting as many as 7,000 drivers with less than 4 years’ experience behind the wheel for a one-year pilot project to gauge driver behavior.

Each participant gets a tag, provided by the global telematics company Octo, that is affixed to their windshield that will measure speed, braking, cornering, accelerating, and other metrics and communicate the data via a phone app. It also tracks phone use and provides a visible, overall safe driving score that will update after every trip. ICBC hopes to use the pilot results to help determine how the crown corporation can use telematics in the future to reduce unsafe driving, reduce claims, and ultimately, reduce insurance premiums.

“Essentially, what we want to do is provide drivers with feedback to see if that improves driving behaviours and makes them less likely to crash,” says Mark Milner, a road safety program manager for ICBC. “We’re looking to reward people for good behaviour.”

In return, participants will receive rewards in the form of gift cards and the peace of the mind that their driving data collected during the pilot will not impact their insurance premiums. The pilot is slated to start in November 2019.

Read more about the ICBC telematics pilot project here.