Fleet Management – Getting The Most From Your Fleet

Fleet Management – Getting The Most From Your Commercial Fleet

 

Scheduling Fleet Vehicle Deployment and Drivers –

Probably the most important part of all fleet management is how you actually put your commercial vehicles out on the road and use them as part of your business every day.

It doesn’t matter if you only have a small number of vehicles, or a large fleet, across multiple bases. With rising costs, tighter margins and ever higher customer expectation, you need get your vehicles to the right place at the right time.

Good fleet management is all about how you plan and schedule the deployment of vehicles and resources, including your drivers. It’s about coordinating your fleet so you can maximise efficiency and minimise waste.

Having unnecessary downtime for your fleet vehicles costs you money, even if they’re not on the road. Good route planning is about understanding the most efficient ways to reach a destination, onward and return journeys.

With the growth of satellite navigation we now no longer rely upon maps but rather live, digital information that can also advise us of traffic pressures, road closures and temporary detours.

Just as careful vehicle management is crucial, you also need to effectively plan how you deploy your drivers. A number of factors have to be taken into account, including driver’s hours and the laws relating to this. Again, now we have Digital Tachograph management tools for this, which help you to get the most use from your human resources, whilst staying compliant with the law.

 

Fleet Vehicle Fuel Management –

One of the largest costs of operating fleet vehicles, be they HGV, LCV (vans), company cars, or other, is that of fuel usage.

Fleet Managers can now use powerful management tools and solutions to control fuel usage. This is not just about good route planning and fleet scheduling though. These are also able to directly monitor fuel usage of each vehicle.

Given the number of miles a commercial vehicle travels in a week, month or year, a small decrease in fuel consumption every day can add up to significant savings across your whole fleet.

Current and developing technology is able to even look at the driving style and performance of your drivers, helping you to monitor things like speed and gearing, accelerating and harsh breaking, idling, etc.

In this situation we’re looking more at the performance of the operator, your drivers, rather than just the fuel efficiency of the vehicle itself. Armed with this information Fleet Managers can develop and train their drivers, helping them to adopt better, fuel-saving ways of using your fleet vehicles on the road.

As an aside, these solutions provide additional benefits too. Better, smoother driving is not only one way to save fuel but can also reduce the risk of accidents and even improve the health and well being of your drivers.

 

Fleet Vehicle Communication –

One aspect of fleet management that has improved significantly over recent years is that of communications. Being able to know where your vehicles are, send instructions to your drivers and get live tracking data back are all vital tools for the fleet manager.

Drivers need to concentrate on the job in hand. So having ways of keeping track of your vehicles needs to happen autonomously. This is where vehicle tracking and telematics comes in to play.

These systems comprise hardware fitted to your vehicles, with software controls and dashboard functions back at base. Some even feed data to mobile devices so you can keep track of things when away from your desk.

Busy Fleet Managers will know that one of the most important aspects of their job is to be flexible and able to adapt as situations change. This is why good communications are vital.

Routes or driver schedules can easily change throughout the day. You need to be able to update drivers, with the least possible distraction, keeping them on time and minimising disruption.

With smart technology not only can you see where your vehicles are by the use of tracking, with modern vehicle cameras and CCTV systems you can actually see what’s happening, in real-time. This can be really beneficial in helping drivers to complete their tasks.

 

Your Next Step –

If you’d like to know how the latest Fleet Management technology could help take the strain, let’s talk about your business and how we can help.

As independent specialists we work closely with our carefully selected partners and long-standing Certified Partners of Webfleet Solutions.

Call us now on 0345 459 4998, or email info@fleetsense.co.uk

 

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