Is Fleet Management the Right Fit for Your Business?

How do you know if fleet management is right for you? If your business has at least five or more vehicles on the road, it's time to think about fleet management telematics. 

Many businesses have operational challenges that require tremendous energy, time, and coordinated logistics. However, logistics and fleet management are more complex for some businesses than others. The bigger your business gets and the more vehicles you have in your fleet, the more you should consider a fleet management solution that can keep everything running smoothly. 

Companies that benefit from fleet management include transportation, freight, deliveries, field calls, repairs, landscaping, plumbing, HVAC, the gas and oil industry, construction, mining, and more. Not just big companies—even ones with as few as five vehicles- can see a benefit. If your business uses vehicles, whether lorries or cars, but is not using a fleet management system, take a look at these benefits to see if fleet management is right for your business. 

What Is a Fleet? 

As your business grows and expands, you've probably added one or more vehicles to service your customers. Eventually, you may realise you have more than five vehicles on the road. At what point can this be considered a fleet, and when do you need fleet management? While adding a vehicle here and there may not seem like much, whether you realise it or not, managing your vehicles will begin to take up more of your time as your business grows. 

As your fleet grows, you begin to look at things differently. Unexpected breakdowns mean vehicle downtime, less work getting done and less money coming in. A couple of extra litres of fuel used multiplied over five or more vehicles quickly adds up. It may be time to consider fleet management.

Why Use Fleet Management? 

When your business depends on keeping lorries on the road and getting to their destinations on time, fleet management can keep everything running on schedule. Additionally, fleet management can help control costs, improve productivity, manage fuel usage, and keep your fleet in compliance with regulations. If this seems like a big job, it is. 

That's why fleet managers often turn to technology and software solutions to keep things running. By adding fleet management telematics to the mix, you can more easily improve driver safety, reduce costs, minimise risk, and better schedule preventative maintenance to minimise downtime. 

Benefits of Fleet Management 

Fleet management encompasses many aspects. Fleet managers are tasked with optimising costs, efficiencies, and risks of fleet operations. Fleet management can enhance the quality of a company's service and develop efficiencies that make the service more effective. 

Improved Dispatching and Routing 

With GPS tracking, you will know where all the vehicles in your fleet are at all times. When you have this visibility, you can improve route planning and job scheduling. You'll save time and be able to schedule more jobs or routes for each driver. This means you can do more work in the same amount of time with your existing vehicles and drivers. With this increased efficiency, you can increase potential profit margins. 

Customised Fleet Reports 

Fleet management software can generate reports hourly, daily, or weekly, depending on how often you want to see specific data. You can customise reports to show your driver’s behaviour, time on the job, and more. You can use this information to make adjustments in routes, hours, and driver behaviour. 

Improve Fleet Fuel Efficiency 

Fuel is one of the highest and most unpredictable costs for your fleet. Whilst you can't control the price of fuel and may be at the mercy of any fluctuations, you can manage your drivers' behaviour.  

Fleet management software lets you analyse the behaviour of your drivers, see how much time they spend driving, and how often they speed, brake harshly, and other behaviours that can lead to excess fuel use. Having this information in front of you helps you make an informed decision rather than just guessing about what to do. 

Improve Safety for the Fleet 

Whilst driver behaviours such as speeding, harsh braking, and hard accelerating burn more fuel, they are also very risky. These aggressive and dangerous behaviours can cause big problems for your company. The majority of accidents are caused by unsafe driving, and too many of these incidents not only put people at risk but can damage your company's reputation. 

Your fleet management system can help improve your drivers' behaviour in several ways. You can set automatic alerts that let the driver know, in real-time, when they are speeding or otherwise driving in an unsafe way. This gives them the chance to correct their behaviour. 

You can also generate a report and sort it by driver, behaviour, and any other filters you choose to analyse your fleet's patterns, habits, and behaviours. Then, you can use this information to make your drivers aware of how often they drive dangerously and help them improve their driving. 

Enhance Driver Training 

As mentioned, a fleet management system will give you insight into your drivers' behaviours. But that's not all. It can also help you create training programmes that will get real results. You rank and score your drivers, then share this information so that they know how they are doing compared to other drivers and incentivise them to improve. 

Improved Insurance Premiums 

Insurance is another huge cost for fleets, so anything you can do to lower the premiums will help your business. A fleet management system is one of those things. Because insurance companies know that fleet management telematics systems can help improve driving behaviour and reduce accidents, they often provide incentives to companies who use a fleet management system.  

Check with your insurance company to see if they offer discounts for using a fleet management system, implementing a safety programme, or other initiatives. You may be able to pay a lower premium. 

Improves Customer Experience and Satisfaction 

Customer satisfaction is key in all businesses. Whether you deliver food or a service, customers don't like to wait. Often, they've taken time out of their busy days to be available during the window you've given them.  

That's why on-time delivery and reduced or no wait times are so important. All the benefits above will culminate in better customer experience and improved customer satisfaction. You'll be able to give your customers better, more efficient service, regardless of what type of business it is. When customers get better service, they are more likely to give you more business and recommend you to others. 

No matter what type of company you run, if you operate lorries or other vehicles, a fleet management system can help you improve your business. From reducing accidents to improving fuel efficiency to reducing wait time, a fleet management system is key to keeping your fleet competitive.