All posts by Andrew Kopecki

Optimizing your winter maintenance operations maximizes public transportation while minimizing collisions due to winter traveling conditions. With real-time reporting on salt usage and winter maintenance activity, for example, roads can be plowed and de-iced as soon as possible. And while winter may seem months away, not acting now may prevent you from being fully prepared once here.

Prevent Any Fleet Discontinuity This Coming Winter

There’s currently an unprecedented global shortage of semiconductor chips that’s affecting nearly every industry, from automotive to consumer tech, and many more in between. While this shortage has affected consumers, it’s also impacting various government fleets as they are unable to access new vehicles until supply bounces back.

Many fleet managers will need to extend the service life of their existing vehicles until the shortage has been resolved, and they should complete any necessary maintenance now to ensure the vehicles will be able to continue running safely, enabling first responders to have a presence without any interruption.

Today is the day to use your telematics data to accurately measure fleet performance to ensure usage continuity.

Winter operations fleets are taking full advantage of what Geotab has to offer:

• Automated reporting for regulatory compliance and billing

• Active tracking for winter maintenance vehicles

• Accident detection with real-time notifications

• Accurate measurement of winter equipment usage

• Route optimization for reduced mileageIdling and fuel consumption trend reports

• Preventive maintenanceReal-time reporting on salt usage

Complex fleets, like winter operations, often require sophisticated integrations to properly manage their programs. With so many different metrics to track, doing so without the aid of technology can be tough. However, by using a telematics solution, like Geotab’s Public Works solution, you can boost your winter operations and gain greater insight into your fleet’s performance.

Telematics is essential for managing winter maintenance programs because it:

• Drives down costsImproves operational efficiency

• Promotes operator safety

• Provides insight into vehicle location

• Monitors operational status and levels of service

To learn more about how telematics can help you effectively manage your winter operations and keep roads safe and clear, give us a call or email us at info@advtracking.net.

Fuel monitoring is a great way for fleet managers to find potential savings. Geotab’s GO devices are able to read a vehicle’s engine and fuel data to perform fuel use calculations.

Fuel data monitoring: How does it work?

When a Geotab GO vehicle tracking device tries to pull data — in this case, fuel data — from the engine, it does so by accessing a specific location on the vehicle’s computer. Standardization means that most vehicles will have the data required, but it won’t always be stored in the same location. When a Geotab GO device is plugged in, it will check possible sources for fuel data and begin verifying which is the correct measurement.

Verifying fuel data

There are three methods the GO device will use to verify that it is getting the correct information:

1. Fuel economy

2. Fuel confidence

3. Active methods

Fuel economy

The Geotab GO device calculates a vehicle’s fuel economy while the vehicle is driving. If the device is getting data from something other than fuel use, the resulting calculation will be incorrect. A device might register near-zero fuel use over a long route or calculate that a massive amount of fuel was consumed over a short trip. When this happens, the device has knowledge that the calculations do not match expected vehicle behavior and can safely discard the data source.

Fuel confidence

The next step used to verify a fuel data source is calculating confidence. This is done through a second-by-second breakdown while comparing how fuel use normally behaves with the help of the following questions:

• Is fuel use increasing during acceleration?

• Is the rate constant when the vehicle is cruising?

• Does the rate change when the vehicle is stopped?

The Geotab GO will compare how the data changes in response to engine activity to calculate fuel confidence. If a data source doesn’t get a passing grade, it’s discarded.

Active methods

Fuel economy and fuel confidence are great ways to eliminate bad fuel data, but both methods work best near the end of a trip. Active monitoring is what allows a GO device to validate fuel data mid-trip or earlier. Essentially, the device will notice and discard outliers early on to make the other calculations easier. The device will also filter data sources that don’t match up with the type of fuel used by the vehicle (gas, diesel, etc.)

Compatibility means reliability

The GO9 device is compatible with a wide range of vehicles. Part of this compatibility is making sure the device can effectively work with the different ways manufacturers store engine data. Geotab’s telematics device is able to sift through possible measurements and only return the most accurate and confident results to our customers. This in turn, lets those customers make the best decisions for their fleet. Learn more about our fuel savings program.

Until recently, the majority of EVs on the market were compact to mid-size passenger vehicles that did not have the carrying capacity or the electric range capabilities required for many fleet applications, presenting a hurdle for fleets considering electrification. The market has mostly caught up with the demand and this problem has largely been addressed, or will be in the near future.

There are numerous long-range EVs available that have an effective range over 300 miles on a single charge and this will only continue to improve as battery technology advances. This, in combination with an ever-improving network of charging stations, means that “range anxiety” should no longer be a concern.

As for vehicle offerings, a wide variety of Class 2 to 5 EVs are currently available with a number of additional delivery vans and pickup trucks on the horizon. With electric vans boasting payload capacities up to 6,000 lbs and trucks that are able to tow more than 11,000 lbs, there will soon be an EV that suits every fleet’s particular needs.

It is clear that many of the largest players in the last mile industry have moved past any hesitations when it comes to electrification. By committing millions of dollars, and purchasing thousands of vehicles, they are sending a strong message – it’s time to start transitioning to EVs.

Start planning your EV adoption strategy

Last mile delivery may have been one of the first industries to embrace EVs, but now we’re ready to start talking with other fleets to begin their fleet electrification journey. With regulations and sustainability goals fast approaching, it is critical that fleets begin to create strategies for incorporating EVs. The hard part is learning where to start right?

Finding suitable vehicles and building out charging infrastructure can be a time consuming task. Fortunately, Geotab has created a number of tools and assets that we can use to help fleet managers with this transition. More importantly once EVs have been incorporated into your fleet our team backed by Geotab continues to provide on-going insights and support. With official support of over 100 EV makes and models, Geotab is the strongest telematics provider in the EV space.

Download The Essential Guide to Fleet Electrification to start your journey.

Do you know which is the top expense for most fleets today? You guessed it, it’s your fuel cost. On average, fuel makes up around a third of a fleet’s running costs. Because this cost impacts the bottom line of so many of our customers, we compiled five easy ways to cut on a fleet’s fuel bill:

1. Thoroughly analyze your fleet needs

Take time to do a full all-round working knowledge of your entire fleet including vehicles, drivers, customers, processes, systems, spend and regulations. Ask yourself questions such as:

• Is your fuel purchased wholesale or at the pump?

• What kind of vehicles are best for your operations?

• Where and how are your fleet vehicles driven?

2. Your driver behavior makes a difference

How your drivers behave behind the wheel massively impacts how efficient your vehicles are. Speeding, irregular gear changes and hard braking can have a negative impact on fuel economy. Reducing speed is an easy way to cut costs.

3. Properly plan your routes

A vehicle can use a quarter of a gallon of fuel for every 15 minutes it idles so planning ahead can potentially lead to big savings. From assessing driver routes to analyzing the best places to refuel your vehicles, telematics can play an important part in effectively managing journeys and choosing the best routes. The ability to track and monitor vehicles helps avoid congestion where possible or prevent unnecessary journey overlap.

4. Regularly maintain your fleet

Keeping your vehicles in prime condition can help to reduce fuel costs. As an example, a car with under-inflated tyres can use 3% more fuel than one with the correct pressures. Ask your drivers to carry out daily walk-round checks of their vehicles to look out for issues such as under-inflated tires. Making sure that vehicles are fully serviced and maintained is also a big help in controlling fuel spend.

5. Keep track of any fuel irregularities

Fuel fraud is not as uncommon as you may think – discrepancies in mileage for vehicles or sudden increase in fuel spend needs investigating. A fleet fuel management system, such as Advantage Fuel Center, can play an important part in showing you of any irregularities in fuel costs, supporting a prompt and efficient investigation to quickly determine the cause.

As you turn your attention to your fuel costs, consider if the energy efficiency of your fleets is still working for you. A switch to alternative fuel choices such as electric or hybrid vehicles could deliver those essential cost savings without any loss in performance.

Drivers are on the frontlines, delivering essential goods. We understand that the road is their workplace on a daily basis, meaning they have an opportunity to make a real impact on road safety. Reaching your company’s goal for collision reduction or increased safety scores can only happen with their participation.

1. Telematics mythbusting

If your fleet is new to telematics, dedicating a safety talk to telematics and the importance of connected vehicles opens up space for drivers to ask questions they might have but were too scared to ask.

2. Vehicle inspections

Discuss why driver vehicle inspections are important to the company and how to conduct pre- and post-trip inspections efficiently.

3. Distracted driving

With the amount of technology in vehicles now, distracted driving has become even more of a concern. Help your drivers understand your company’s rules around drinking or eating while driving, texting, and other forms of distraction. This may a good time to get feedback on how they feel about video dash cameras as well.

4. Driving in bad weather

Pose the question: What are some ways that drivers can prepare for and manage bad weather on the road, in summer or winter? This will help increase interaction and access valuable insights from your team.

5. Backing up when leaving

Parking lots can be very dangerous places. Minimize the hazard by sharing a technique, Backing Up When Leaving is also a rule in MyGeotab. Read how it works in this Community answer.

6. Mental health

Professional truck drivers face particular challenges to their mental health, such as long shifts, disrupted sleep, isolation and the pressure to deliver on-time, according to Safe Harbour Consulting. As a potential driver safety meeting topic, consider covering how to handle stress and anxiety on the job, and what mental health and wellness resources are available to your employees.

7. Bicycle safety

Talk about best practices for sharing the road with cyclists. Share information on the regulations in your local area.

8. Introduction to dash cams

Fleet cameras, mounted inside or outside the vehicle are becoming more popular as a way to protect businesses in the case of collisions and reduce risky driving. Help drivers feel more comfortable with this technology by describing how they work and why they are used.

Conclusion

Your safety talk with your drivers could be the most important minutes or hours you spend during your day. Sharing road safety and driving safety best practices can help your employees get home to their family safely and protect someone else’s family members out there on the road.

Picking an ELD provider is not an easy decision. There are many options out there and quality varies. For example, a couple of years ago an ELD manufacturer that offered zero monthly fees closed down unexpectedly forcing customers to find another solution before the compliance deadline.

But which ELD vendor is best? We put together 8 tips on what to look for when choosing a provider or manufacturer of electronic logging devices.

Check first that the ELD is self-certified

Before you start, check that the ELDs you are considering are on the FMCSA’s list of registered ELDs. This is a critical step, as ELDs must be self-certified and registered according to the requirements of the ELD rule. What does ELD self-certification mean? Read this post for further explanation.

Don’t skip this step, as responsibility is on the carrier to verify registration.

Look at company details when weighing ELD options

When you choose an ELD, you’re also choosing a business partner. Therefore, evaluating the ELD manufacturer or provider is just as important as reading the technical specs.

Here are 8 things to look at when choosing an ELD provider:

1. Years in business

2. Company structure

3. Number of customers and customer references

4. Number of employees and engineers

5. Worldwide ranking

6. Commitment to research and development

7. Solution partners

8. Security policies

For advice on what features you should look for in an ELD, please read this white paper: Choosing an ELD solution: What to ask

If you already have an ELD, but are thinking of switching, read this advice.

Conclusion

Don’t just settle for any ELD provider. Look at vendor experience and reputation to make sure the ELD is the right fit for your fleet. For the past 13 years, Advantage Asset Tracking has supported over 50 cities, municipalities, universities, public utilities, public port entities and law enforcement agencies across North America with the Geotab system. Advantage Asset Tracking is recognized by Geotab as a top tiered Value-Added Reseller (VAR) and is one a small handful of Geotab resellers that are a part of the California, Missouri, and Connecticut Sole-Source Contract programs providing the company with unrivaled experience deploying and supporting large government telematics contracts. Picking a reliable and reputable brand means that your company will have support as it grows or your needs change over time.

Find more ELD resources at https://www.advtracking.net/eld

Thinking about replacing fuel cars with EVs? Find out which EVs are best suited to your fleet needs with our EVSA.

What is the EVSA?

Powered by the largest dataset for real-world EV performance, our EV Suitability Assessment offers data-driven EV recommendations to make your transition to electric as seamless as possible.

Analyze your fleet’s unique driving profiles and patterns to identify the vehicles in your fleet best suited for EV replacement. Receive personalized make and model recommendations that take into consideration: EV availability in the local market, EV performance in extreme weather conditions and financials related to procuring the EVs.

Receive a fleet electrification blueprint, which analyzes the total cost of ownership and reveals the potential cost-savings of switching to EVs in your fleet.

Financial analysis

Will going electric actually save you money? If so, how much? Discover the cost-savings potential and understand the total cost of ownership when switching to EVs.

Range assurance

Silence range anxiety for good. Receive accurate EV make and model recommendations that are up for the task. This in-depth analysis, based on real-world EV performance data, checks if the battery will still cover your required range in extreme weather conditions.

Environmental impact

Quantify the environmental benefits of switching to EVs. Find out how much your fleet’s carbon emissions will go down as well as the overall reduction in fuel compared to the fleet’s actual current stats.

Benefits of the Geotab EV Suitability Assessment

• Identify the best candidates for EV replacement based on actual driving profiles and real-world EV performance data

• Learn which EVs make the most financial sense with a lifetime cost savings analysis

• Understand how much your fleet can reduce CO2 emissions and fuel consumption

• Ensure EVs have the range performance you require even in extreme weather conditions

• Assess multiple electrification scenarios specific to your business quickly with the convenient do-it-yourself tool

VIEW THE BROCHURE

Ready to electrify your fleet?

Get your free EV suitability assessment and make the switch to EVs with confidence by contacting us at info@advtracking.net

No matter what type of data you work with — telematics or otherwise — data quality is important. Are you working with data to measure and optimize your fleet program?

Consider adding data cleaning to your regular routine. Here is a quick overview to get you started.

What is data cleaning?

Data cleaning is the process of ensuring data is correct, consistent and usable. You can clean data by identifying errors or corruptions, correcting or deleting them, or manually processing data as needed to prevent the same errors from occurring.

Most aspects of data cleaning can be done through the use of software tools, but a portion of it must be done manually. Although this can make data cleaning an overwhelming task, it is an essential part of managing company data.

What are the benefits of data cleaning?

There are many benefits to having clean data:

1. It removes major errors and inconsistencies that are inevitable when multiple sources of data are being pulled into one dataset.

2. Using tools to clean up data will make everyone on your team more efficient as you’ll be able to quickly get what you need from the data available to you.

3. Fewer errors means happier customers and fewer frustrated employees.

4. It allows you to map different data functions, and better understand what your data is intended to do, and learn where it is coming from.

See also: Do you have a big data graveyard?

Data cleaning in six steps

The first step before starting a data cleaning project is to first look at the big picture. Ask yourself: What are your goals and expectations? To achieve those goals you’ve set, next, you must plan a data cleanup strategy. A great guideline is to focus on your top metrics. Some questions to ask:

• What is your highest metric looking to achieve?

• What is your company’s overall goal and what is each member looking to achieve from it?

A good way to start is to get the key stakeholders together and brainstorm. Here are some best practices when it comes to create a data cleaning process:

1. Monitor errors

Keep a record of trends where most of your errors are coming from.This will make it a lot easier to identify and fix incorrect or corrupt data. Records are especially important if you are integrating other solutions with your fleet management software, so that your errors don’t clog up the work of other departments.

2. Standardize your process

Standardize the point of entry to help reduce the risk of duplication.

3. Validate data accuracy

Once you have cleaned your existing database, validate the accuracy of your data. Research and invest in data tools that allow you to clean your data in real-time. Some tools even use AI or machine learning to better test for accuracy.

4. Scrub for duplicate data

Identify duplicates to help save time when analyzing data. Repeated data can be avoided by researching and investing in different data cleaning tools that can analyze raw data in bulk and automate the process for you.

5. Analyze your data

After your data has been standardized, validated and scrubbed for duplicates, use third-party sources to append it. Reliable third-party sources can capture information directly from first-party sites, then clean and compile the data to provide more complete information for business intelligence and analytics.

6. Communicate with your team

Share the new standardized cleaning process with your team to promote adoption of the new protocol. Now that you’ve scrubbed down your data, it’s important to keep it clean. Keeping your team in the loop will help you develop and strengthen customer segmentation and send more targeted information to customers and prospects.

Do you know which is the top expense for most fleets today? You guessed it, it’s your fuel cost. On average, fuel makes up around a third of a fleet’s running costs. Because this cost impacts the bottom line of so many of our customers, we compiled five easy ways to cut on a fleet’s fuel bill:

1. Thoroughly analyze your fleet needs

Take time to do a full all-round working knowledge of your entire fleet including vehicles, drivers, customers, processes, systems, spend and regulations. Ask yourself questions such as:

• Is your fuel purchased wholesale or at the pump?

• What kind of vehicles are best for your operations?

• Where and how are your fleet vehicles driven?

2. Your driver behavior makes a difference

How your drivers behave behind the wheel massively impacts how efficient your vehicles are. Speeding, irregular gear changes and hard braking can have a negative impact on fuel economy. Reducing speed is an easy way to cut costs.

3. Properly plan your routes

A vehicle can use a quarter of a gallon of fuel for every 15 minutes it idles so planning ahead can potentially lead to big savings. From assessing driver routes to analyzing the best places to refuel your vehicles, telematics can play an important part in effectively managing journeys and choosing the best routes. The ability to track and monitor vehicles helps avoid congestion where possible or prevent unnecessary journey overlap.

4. Regularly maintain your fleet

Keeping your vehicles in prime condition can help to reduce fuel costs. As an example, a car with under-inflated tyres can use 3% more fuel than one with the correct pressures. Ask your drivers to carry out daily walk-round checks of their vehicles to look out for issues such as under-inflated tires. Making sure that vehicles are fully serviced and maintained is also a big help in controlling fuel spend.

5. Keep track of any fuel irregularities

Fuel fraud is not as uncommon as you may think – discrepancies in mileage for vehicles or sudden increase in fuel spend needs investigating. A fleet fuel management system, such as Advantage Fuel Center, can play an important part in showing you of any irregularities in fuel costs, supporting a prompt and efficient investigation to quickly determine the cause.

As you turn your attention to your fuel costs, consider if the energy efficiency of your fleets is still working for you. A switch to alternative fuel choices such as electric or hybrid vehicles could deliver those essential cost savings without any loss in performance.

Over the course of the last 92 years, Phillips Connect has built strong partnerships with a wide variety of companies including truck and trailer manufacturers, component makers, manufacturers of auxiliary equipment, and many others. There are many advantages to knowing the location of an asset: time saved, reduced unpaid miles (empty miles), increased driver productivity, and decreased operating costs. Which is why we are excited to share this information and special offer.

Phillips Connect EZTrac™ is an asset tracking system for trailers and chassis that’s super easy to install (as seen on the video below), has a user friendly dashboard and highly customizable reporting. A lot of the sensors are going to amplify each other from a management standpoint and anytime you can amplify data you are also amplifying your return on investment. When you have all the data in one place you can monitor the systems to see if they are healthy in ways that are not possible when the sensor was a standalone.

Looking ahead into the future, analytics are going to become more and more a larger part of the heavy duty trucking industry and other verticals alike as the demand to drive change and improve the bottom line for fleets around the world increases.

SPECIAL OFFER

We are offering EZTrac™ now until the end of the year (2021) with a no contract offer of $95 hardware and $9.95 a month subscription cost. If you’re ready to make a bigger commitment – a 36 month contract will get you free hardware with a $14 a month subscription cost. Contact our team today to learn more or to sign up for this special offer.