As a fleet manager there are many things that keep you awake at night. So what you need is the best, or most effective, fleet vehicle tracking solution.
If you have that, then you are more than half-way there. How? Because worries such as how you can track your vehicles, if a vehicle is being neglected, professionalism and driver behavior are a thing of the past. Or if they aren’t, you will know about them.
And with such knowledge, which can only come from a good fleet vehicle tracking system that suits your individual needs, you have the power to change things. More than that, you have the power to be the best fleet manager you can be and get the maximum efficiency out of your fleet.
Your worries and how fleet vehicle tracking helps
OK, so let’s face it, your biggest worry when wondering about tracking your vehicles is driver behavior. And when we talk about bad driving behavior we mean things like fast accelerations, sudden stops, hard turns or any other type of behavior that is not safe driving.
If you have a fleet vehicle tracking solution, such as Veturilo, you will have a log of all these harsh driving actions. And you can also get alerts when something extremely unexpected happens, such as a collision. These are things you want to avoid obviously. Because when your drivers act properly on the road you can rest assured that your business will flourish.
Apart from the above behaviors that are shall we say, “lighter” ones, there are also other types. Your drivers may also act inappropriately in a more severe way. For example they may violate speed limits. And if this happens frequently it means driving license revocation or other penalties. With a good fleet vehicle tracking solution, you can keep track of data in relation to all of the above so you can be proactive (versus reactive). Or call it taking a diagnostic approach if you like.
What are the other consequences?
That’s not all obviously. There are a plethora of other consequences to take into consideration which should direct you to getting a fleet vehicle tracking solution.
Risking Safety
Safety on the road is paramount. So you need to make sure that your drivers behave lawfully firstly and also accordingly so your customers are satisfied. And let’s not forget the other drivers on the road out there. This goes for all drivers, irrespective of the industry (i.e. from taxis and limousines to transportation services). Having a fleet vehicle tracking solution in place and informing your customers and partners of this already puts you in a good position as a professional, and has you on full safety alert from day one.
Increased costs
What kind of costs can incur because of bad driving behavior?
Repair costs
Bad driving means that it’s highly likely that you will visit repair shops more frequently than you would usually. Your vehicles can end up breaking down because of continuous poor driving behavior over time. Or even worse, if there is a serious damage as a result of an accident.
Additional costs
It could be the case that you’re forced to pull one of your vehicles “off duty” due to maintenance issues. This means you have one less vehicle and you may need to change your schedules. You might even stress your drivers who will have to handle difficult situations like this. Your drivers may also need to go the extra mile in terms of covering longer distances.
Damages
If your vehicles are carrying expensive or fragile objects and an accident happens, then you may suffer damages to the equipment or products that you’re ferrying around.
The data you can gather from a fleet vehicle tracking system will help you offset all of the above. You can evaluate and appraise your drivers for example, and also reward them for good driving behavior.
Customer dissatisfaction
Apart from the additional costs that you may be forced to pay for the above reasons, there’s more. Something that cannot be balanced with money. What’s that? You’re customers’ satisfaction of course! There’s nothing worse than letting your customers down. When one of your driver’s behavior ruins in some way the flow of your business’ routine then this will definitely affect your customers. Cases where this might happen?
Well, when there are delays on deliveries of products, when there are postponements, or changes on schedules, there’s a problem. Especially when your business provides a service. And the solution? You can use alerts and “balance” in some way those unexpected situations, when you get notifications or share locations with your drivers so you can send or replace a vehicle.
Reputation is everything
As well as customer satisfaction, you don’t want to jeopardize your business’ reputation. This will effect your recruitment of new customers.
Your goal is to keep all of your customers satisfied. When you manage to dissatisfy one or just a few of your customers, well that’s of course unwanted but quite tolerable. What’s really bad news is if something really bad happens such as an accident. Of course you can’t control everything, and accidents happen. One accident may be forgiven, but if they start happening frequently then you will be in trouble.
That’s why you need to be aware of all these situations in order to act proactively. And fleet vehicle tracking allows you to do just that. When your vehicles leave your business and are out there you can know in real time what’s happening. You need this knowledge in order to make decisions and enhance your services.
And of course when your drivers are also aware that they are being monitored in this way, they know that their actions have consequences. As a result, they should act more responsible and definitely improve their driving behavior.
Next stop, no sleepless nights
There you go. As we can see there are many consequences of bad driving behavior. It’s something that should not be overstated as it can have many knock-on effects on your business performance. Not just that, but also your reputation and professionalism. If you ask us, getting a solid fleet vehicle tracking solution puts you on a one-way street to success as a top fleet manager.