A company should always have up-to-date and detailed information on its fleet. It is crucial for making decisions that impact the productivity, efficiency, and profitability of the fleet. Fleet analytics is an excellent tool for obtaining necessary data on different aspects of fleets, from safety to efficacy. Azuga’s fleet management software provides fleet analytics on all sorts of aspects of fleet management. What are the benefits of these analytics, and how can they help fleet businesses?
Safety
A fleet’s top priority should always be safety. Safety is important because it keeps drivers from getting injured, and it’s crucial for productivity as well. When vehicles are involved in accidents, they are taken off the road and may be out of service for some time until they can be repaired or replaced. The same goes for driver injuries. Drivers may have to be out of work until they heal from any injuries they sustain in an accident. Their removal can cause significant delays in productivity that fleets should avoid at any cost. It may be surprising, but fleet analytics can help significantly with safety issues.
Systems such as Azuga Fleet track risky driving behaviors such as hard braking, speeding, rapid acceleration, and cell phone distractions. The system can then create a report that shows patterns in these behaviors among individual drivers or unique areas of a business’s fleet, allowing managers to pinpoint the source of the issue. This knowledge can result in coaching for a specific driver or changes to a particular route. Whatever the action may be, gathering data is essential so that businesses can ensure their drivers are engaging in safe driving behaviors.
Maintenance
Vehicle wear and tear is an everyday concern when running a fleet. Staying on top of vehicle maintenance is crucial to ensuring vehicles’ longevity and avoiding breakdowns. Breakdowns can cost thousands of dollars in lost time and repair expenses, so naturally, it is best to do whatever you can to prevent them. Telematics sends data to systems like Azuga Fleet to help track the status of vehicles. From the software, fleet managers can view at any time what vehicles are up for their scheduled maintenance, what vehicles are having engine trouble, and what vehicles have red flags on their pre- and post-trip inspections. They can also set up scheduled maintenance right from their screens, such as oil changes, air filter replacements, and other routine maintenance tasks. Preventative maintenance is vital to ensuring that vehicles are safe to drive and remain effective fleet members overall.
Track Vehicles and Equipment
The most significant aspect of any fleet management software is its fleet tracking system. Tracking fleet vehicles, jobs, and routes is a necessity for any fleet manager. It is crucial to ensure that vehicles and equipment are where they are supposed to be. If they are not, they can be losing money by the thousands. Features like geofencing ensure that vehicles and equipment do not go out of bounds of an approved area, alerting the fleet manager if they do. This process prevents theft and unauthorized use of assets.
Another way that tracking vehicles and equipment is optimal for productivity is that it prevents waste. Assets that would usually simply sit in a warehouse not being utilized can be sold and replaced with something that will benefit the fleet. Similarly, tracking assets will prevent fleet managers from accidentally purchasing duplicate assets because they are not aware of what they have.
Cutting Costs
There are plenty of ways to cut costs by tracking fleet data. One way is by increasing fuel efficiency. A significant drain on a fleet business’s budget is fuel costs. Engine idling can be a considerable cause of wasted fuel that fleet managers can track with telematics. If a fleet manager sees that a vehicle is idling excessively, they can reach out to that driver and take action to reduce that cost.
Another cost is insurance premiums. Many of the ways businesses gather data (GPS tracking, safety features, maintenance alerts) are leverage for discounts towards insurance premiums with many companies. Insurers want to see that fleet companies are taking action to make themselves less of a risk, and these measures show precisely that. It is highly beneficial to see if the features a company already has installed can lead to insurance discounts.
Conclusion
If you are not already accumulating this data, you miss out on many of these advantages in your business’s productivity and efficiency. Azuga offers many solutions for gathering data on your fleet. If you don’t know where to start, we are here to help. Reach out to one of our experts today or check out our extensive blog for more information.
