Building a fleet of vehicles and a talented team of drivers are just the first two steps to Fleet utilization.
You need to improve fleet utilization to get the most out of your investment. What is fleet utilization? It means maximizing the effectiveness of the trips your vehicles make during their active periods. To do it, you need help from a good fleet management platform and follow these four guidelines:
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Monitor your Fleet in real time
GPS-based fleet management platforms like GPS Trackit give you the power to track the location, speed, and status of your vehicles. With better information, you can make quicker, more efficient decisions. Want to see which routes take the most time, require the most attention from your crews, or might be too far away to be profitable? Data from a fleet management platform helps make adjustments to your fleet’s schedule, routes, and operations to get the most out of your assets.
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Optimize Routes
Optimal routing can increase the number of jobs each truck handles per shift. It can also help your drivers avoid traffic, road closures, and construction delays. Route optimization software can help improve productivity and substantially reduce fuel consumption by selecting the shortest and most efficient routes for your drivers. How much can it save you? One GPS Trackit client used the data to increase the number of accounts he could serve per week by 20 percent, all while using the same number of trucks and drivers.
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Manage Driver Behavior
By monitoring and managing driver behavior, you can reduce the negative impact that poor driving has on the fleet—like unnecessary fuel consumption, extra vehicle wear and tear, and accidents. Monitoring helps you create incentives for your drivers that align with your company-wide ones. Drivers who perform the most safely and efficiently get rewarded, and those who struggle with those metrics can get the training they need to improve.
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Fleet Right-sizing
Right-sizing your fleet means adjusting your vehicle fleet to meet your business needs—either temporarily or permanently. For example, if you run trucks with less than 50% utilization, you can take one off the road and use it as a rotating replacement for other ones that might need service. Long term, you have better data to determine if you need to get rid of a vehicle, and detailed maintenance records and vehicle performance data help you both extend service life and select vehicles to replace.
By utilizing real-time monitoring, optimizing routes, managing driver behavior, and right-sizing your fleet, you can improve fleet utilization and increase your profits. GPS Trackit’s team of experienced Fleet Advisors can help build the custom solution you need. Get a free, no-obligation demo today.
