Advanced GPS tracking systems are standard equipment on many commercial vehicles, and smart vehicles built today already include internet connectivity and often Wi-Fi capability. But what about telematics?
You can add many powerful telematics capabilities to your business by integrating it with other software systems, including fleet management, inventory management and customer service, as well as software packages for payroll and enterprise resource planning (ERP).
ERP, as opposed to being just another sophisticated online system, is akin to telematics, in that it can provide real-time feedback to you on various aspects of your working processes. It allows you to have a better understanding of performance, and in turn drive up your performance based on data, as opposed to instinct, alone.
This way, telematics not only allows modern business to process data to make management more efficient and gain market advantage, but also offers some other use-cases.
Benefits of telematics in business operations
Telematics from companies such as Radius, can provide real-time information on vehicle activity for fleet operators to be able to make adjustments.
Reduced Fuel and Operational Expenses
One of the major expenses on the balance sheet of a fleet-running business is fuel costs, and telematics can really help you work out your journeys most cost-efficiently. For example, the system can work out distances travelled and fuel costs for different vehicles and geographic locations.
Besides tracking fuel consumption, you can account for idle time of the engine and, accordingly, provide drivers’ training in rational use of fuel. Thus you could compare parameters among individuals and among the vehicles, and it would become quite obvious whom to teach.
Through the combination of GPS tracking and real-time traffic information, telematics can calculate the most cost-effective routes between points, saving unnecessary mileage, fuel and pollution.
You can weigh each mass, and perhaps reduce the load to reduce fuel consumption still further. If you’re following freight, you could even use gyroscopic information to register a tipping or rollover of a container, and adjust future loads or packaging to avoid damage to merchandise.
Better Customer Communication
Whatever you do in business, your customers want to know what is going on. Whether you’re telling them when their parcel is leaving the ecommerce warehouse or when their taxi arrives, telematics allows you to send regular, accurate updates at every step of the journey.
Since you’ll have satellite data about where each vehicle is at any given moment, it would be a snap to relay this to whatever customers care to know. If a delivery vehicle is on its way to the customer’s door during its critical final journey – that is, the last mile – the customer would get a link through which they can keep abreast of your highly accurate ETA.
So, if a customer calls in to ask about delivery times, your support team can turn to the real-time data, too. You can also use telematics to direct the driver to the exact address, increasing the likelihood that more deliveries will be made on-time.
Improved Dispatching Schedules and Tracking
The other advantage of telematics for business is that, because it’s so easy to see this data about vehicles and drivers, you can draw up accurate time scale charts and make scheduling decisions based on average speeds.
It will also allow you to track your vehicles in real-time so you can see where your drivers are and can make sure the nearest one is sent to a new job when it crops up.
You can change the route, perhaps if there has been a crash or if there is heavy traffic or a diversion. You can also warn drivers about hazards such as icy roads or flooding.
Having a telematics unit installed in any of your vehicles enables it to e-mail you if one of them is being driven outside a perimeter you have defined.
Actionable Insights on Fleet Condition and Maintenance
Apart from providing insights into your fleet’s activity, telematics will tell you what’s happening to your trucks along the way: from afar you’ll be able to perform basic engine diagnostics, detect low battery voltage or a fuel leak – or other problems before they become major hassles and costly issues.
Telematics for maintenance: You can use odometer readings and engine run-time from usage data to schedule vehicle check-ups and preventive maintenance activity to keep vehicles up and running longer and proactively avert safety violations.
Having them regularly serviced enables all your vehicles to function both more effectively and more safely.
Final Thoughts
There are also benefits that can be reaped by businesses from telematics. The location of your whole fleet can be seen at any time, along with their respective health and driving behavior. This data can then be used for routing, which along with fuel costs, are a fleet’s greatest expenses.
Automated systems increase productivity and reduce errors, and the data insights allow for enhanced driver safety and compliance – hence lower insurance premiums.