Fleet management, in layman’s terms, is the process of managing fleet and asset information. It begins with acquisition and ends with disposal. Fleet management allows companies to optimize their operations by bringing down costs, increasing efficiency, and ensuring there is compliance throughout the entire fleet’s operation.
Fleet Managers’ Challenges
Considering the rate at which companies expand, it can be incredibly challenging as a fleet manager, to keep things afloat. Here are a few challenges that fleet managers seem to face regularly.
Efficient Management of Fuel
With the number of trucks and soaring fuel prices, it is no surprise that effective fuel management is one of the biggest hurdles to overcome.
Ensuring Health and Safety of Fleet
One of the most critical responsibilities of a fleet manager is ensuring the fleet’s safety and health. If a driver happens to meet with an accident, the fleet manager needs to ensure that reporting procedures are implemented. Through these procedures, drivers should be able to follow up on their insurance and get their claims without issues.
Ensuring Drivers are Productive
The fleet manager must do everything possible to ensure the drivers are productive. Fortunately, technological advances have managed to streamline the process of reporting, routing, and refueling.
The Need for Fleet Management Software
Fleet management software enables fleet managers to retrieve and retain the fleet performance information seamlessly. It is a vast database that consists of numerous applications that allow you to record and report attributes that can help increase efficiency and minimize costs.
Features of Fleet Management Software
Here are some exciting features of fleet management software:
Labor and Time Management
This feature enables users to look at the numerous functions and duties of all the employees in the maintenance software. Examples of these functions are operator accidents, safety records, technician certifications, time and attendance reporting, and so forth.
You can use the following parameters to track labor activities:
- Shift
- Employee
- Supervisor
- Location
These parameters combined can help your company increase productivity and drastically reduce labor costs. The best way to ensure optimal utilization of your labor resources is to have a centralized labor management system.
Asset Management
The asset management feature allows you to control every aspect of your company’s assets. You can set up the hierarchy of units, systems, and components while developing the equipment database. The information you can find for each unit includes parameters like performance history, accounting, repair history, location assignments, unit allocations, maintenance schedules, operating information, usage of fuel and oil, warranty, technical specifications, and downtime.
Management of Work Orders
Fleet software offers work management features that help your staff create customized workflows for each business requirement. You can customize your work order formats to collect information relevant to the operation.
The additional benefits of the work order management feature include higher availability and enhanced performance of equipment, and reduction of paperwork and errors.
GPS Vehicle Tracker
A Global Positioning System (GPS) runs on the Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) network. This tracking system can yield both real-time and recorded navigation data of any journey. A GPS vehicle tracker can help business owners and fleet managers understand how to schedule maintenance processes effectively, improve driver safety and productivity, and minimize fuel costs. Here are some essential features you should look for:
Timely Updates
Given how you need time to make informed decisions, one of the GPS vehicle tracker’s best features is its 10-second updates. 10-second real-time updates make managing a fleet a breeze.
Automated Reporting
Gone are the days of manually monitoring your fleet using your computer. Now you can automatically deliver the reports you want at any time. Be sure to look for this feature in your GPS vehicle tracker.
Geo-Fencing
This feature allows you to make draw areas and place vehicles to a specific geo area. You can keep track of your fleet vehicles as they enter and leave this area through the use of alerts.
Summary of Dashboard
You can expect to have a concise summary of the dashboard, which will show you parameters like idle time, stop time, and mileage, among others.
This makes it a lot easier to rectify errors to make your operation cost-effective and more productive.
Driver ID and Messaging
The option to seamlessly assign individual drivers to different vehicles enables you to effectively manage your fleet, especially when drivers have access to shared vehicles.
Control over Access and User Management
This is one of the most vital features for a business owner. This feature makes it easy for you to add and modify every user’s profile along with their access privileges.
You will be able to assign one or more fixed roles to a user and also group users if needed. This way, you should have no problem tracking a group of vehicles and view the report for the whole group.
User-friendly Interface
This feature is often overlooked, but it is critical to have an interface you can navigate without hassle. An intuitive interface can offer you powerful features, including the option of group-access without having to create multiple accounts and a bird’s eye view of your whole fleet. In a nutshell, an easy-to-use yet sophisticated interface allows you to easily access the information you want and make informed decisions based on the same.
User-Defined Logins
The option to modify user access to decide which vehicles and the type of information the users are authorized to see is crucial.