Strategic route planning is one of the main challenges of a successful fleet management. It can be tricky to strike the right balance between excellent service to your customers and efficient cost management.
Fortunately, there are some effective strategies you can use to create a winning system that satisfies you and your customers. Have you incorporated any of these best practices in your fleet management?
- Plan The Best Routes
This may sound obvious, but route planning is no longer limited to plotting directions based on a map and hoping drivers don’t run into any obstacles. GPS tracking can alert you to road construction, traffic jams and other real-time situations that cost precious time.
Sophisticated GPS tracking offers additional benefits, including geo-landmarks, geo-fencing and on-demand location, to make your route planning flexible and responsive to changes on the go. Route alterations can be easily communicated to drivers via smart phones and tablets.
- Aggregate and Consolidate Shipments
Running empty or less than full trucks is a significant drain on your budget. Multiple orders from a customer that are processed separately create unnecessary less-than-truckload (LTL) shipments. Aggregating the orders into one shipment reduces costs and frees up trucks for better uses.
You can use a similar strategy by consolidating multiple LTL orders together or with a truckload-sized order at less than full capacity. Before using this method, be sure it doesn’t interfere with delivery and pick-up windows and stop-off charges are not prohibitive.
- Keep Trucks Moving
When trucks move between manufacturing plants, suppliers, distribution centers and customers, it can result in empty miles that needlessly increase fuel, equipment and time costs. Look for opportunities to convert individual trips to separate legs of one combined move.
- Review and Refine
A GPS-based fleet management system provides a wealth of data that can be stored indefinitely. Use it for an overall view, or drill down to a granular level for deeper analysis. Once you have determined what works and what doesn’t, make appropriate adjustments.
Our GPSTrackIt state-of-the-art fleet management system can pay for itself by route optimization alone, but you will also appreciate asset tracking, vehicle diagnostics and other valuable features. Speak to a Fleet Advisor today or schedule a free demonstration.
