If you are a fleet manager for a corporation or a small business that that has delivery or service vehicles on the road each day then GPS Auto tracker technology applied correctly will save you money every day. Ever wonder why one vehicle has almost twice the miles and maintenance costs of the average vehicle in your fleet? How about a particular delivery route whose driver takes longer and has more employee overtime than then it probably should. In each case these situations are costing you money in terms of fuel efficiency, overtime and maintenance costs. So how can I better manage my transportation costs?

The answer to your questions may come from using GPS auto tracker technology. Basically there are two types of GPS tracking technology on the market today. One is commonly known as passive or logger and it has been around the longest. Passive tracking units are placed in or on a vehicle and as the vehicle travels on its route the information is logged on the unit. It basically works just like the GPS navigation systems that are so popular with the public these days. However unlike your cars navigation system GPS tracking units, Logger GPS devices record the information on to a data base. To access the information the unit must be retrieved from the vehicle and downloaded to a computer for viewing. Logging units are relatively inexpensive and are available in very small sizes that are easy to hide. They do a very good job of telling you exactly where your vehicles have been, their speed and stopped time. The problems is that the information is not in real time and you have to assign someone to collect the units and download the data then return the units to their assigned vehicles. On the positive side you have total control and access to your tracking information.

Real time GPS tracker technology is a great alternative to logging systems. Just as the name implies the information provided is relative” live” and can be view as the vehicles travel on their routes. If you are a fleet manager this has far reaching advantages. Real time GPS units use existing cell phone technology to upload the data from the vehicles tracking device to a GPS auto tracking service provider. The provider then sends the current information to your office to be viewed on a computer. Depending on the plan you have subscribed to uploaded data is updated at different time intervals. Basically the more frequent the information the more costly the service. Businesses with delivery services that also do pickups frequently ask for tracking information to be updated every 5 minutes while fleet managers that manage cross country transport only need tracking information every 30 minutes.

As a business owner or fleet manager you can quickly see the advantages to the system. Remember the vehicle that had high costs and maintenance, well the driver was using the truck for his own after hours business. The route driver that was taking so much time to complete his route and was accumulating lots of over time was spending his afternoons parked at his house. These types of problems although rare can cost business lots of money over a year. Additional advantages come in the form of dispatch efficiency. The dispatcher has a map on his or her laptop with the location of every company vehicle. If a pickup of a part or customer return pickup needs to be made, a quick look at the map will tell you what vehicle can best make the stop. It will not take long for the data to tell you how to better set up your daily delivery routes so as to save fuel and time.

On the down side the service provider has control of your fleet information including where your customers are located. A good GPS tracking service company will do a very good job of safe guarding your information but just like anything else kept in computer data bases there is a real risk to your business. It is very important to carefully select your service company and get to know them in detail. In addition if your service provider does not provide tracking devices you will find that real time GPS auto tracker devices cost more than the older logger units.

GPS auto tracker technology is a great tool for business transportation managers. Over time you will save fuel, maintenance and employee costs that will more than pay for the cost of the GPS auto tracking devices and service fees as well increase your company’s bottom line.

By: Jim Kesel