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Tech Trends to Follow for Fleet Managers in 2022 Trends in vehicle telematics for fleet managers to drive their business in 2022 and beyond.

By Ekim Saribardak

Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.

It was never easy for any idea to succeed as a business, but considering the rapid growth in start-ups all over the world, the success of a company will rely even more on the use of software systems and tools to improve their product, lower costs and optimize business operations into the future. The fleet business is no different.

GPS Tracking and vehicle telematics systems have become a "must have' in the success of any business with a vehicle fleet that depends on fuel optimization and efficiency of fleet operations. Fleet management involves overseeing, routing, time management, organizational planning, fuel management and driver education, but fleet owners are buried in exhausting tasks and paperwork instead of spending time actually managing and optimizing their fleet.

Obtaining actionable information

Route management, unpredictable schedules, driving conditions, fluctuations in fuel prices, on-time delivery, maintenance service routines, breakdowns, and other operational issues are significant challenges fleet owners face on a daily basis, and many small and medium-sized businesses that rely on the use of vehicles are infuriated with vehicle management and fuel and driver costs, not to mention the rising costs of vehicles themselves.

For enterprise organizations managing a fleet of thousands of vehicles, route planning is one of the biggest challenges. Planning routes that ensure both driver safety and vehicle availability while meeting customers' high expectations is challenging, to say the least. Considering climate conditions, roadwork, traffic, and accidents, it requires quite an effort to locate and dispatch the closest driver to a task using the best route available, and if you do all of this manually, mistakes, inefficiencies, and hiccups in deliveries can result in chaos.

Using the latest GPS and vehicle telematics systems, however, data from vehicles is continually presented to fleet managers in the form of actionable information. Apart from location tracking, it can help fleet owners streamline operations, set up service maintenance reminders, view fuel usage and lower emissions, and monitor and educate risky drivers, regardless of the size of the fleet.

Related: How To Keep The Wheels Turning For Your Transport Business

Improvements in driver behavior

One of the most significant roles of fleet managers is hiring skilled and responsible drivers whom they can entrust the keys of a vehicle to. Business owners and managers have to ensure that drivers don't repeat any bad driving habits and risky behavior. Vehicle telematics systems provide real-time information about harsh speeding, sharp turns, and hard braking. A vehicle's speed is continually compared with speed limits to provide an unparalleled view of drivers' habits and eliminate lousy behavior before they turn into problems or accidents.

Fuel is a major, ongoing cost for any business that operates vehicles. Unnecessary engine idling and harsh driving behavior can increase fuel costs and damage the vehicle's engine. Telematics systems provide businesses with the tools to monitor fuel usage and idling to save on fuel costs and lower consumption. Fleet management systems also provide fuel use analytics to enable fleet managers to make decisions on how they can improve the overall performance of fleets and improve business profitability.

Decreased maintenance costs and improved productivity

After fuel expenses, vehicle service and maintenance costs account for the most sizable chunk of operating expenses, as breakdowns cause significantly expensive losses. To prevent such unnecessary expenses, fleet managers can adopt a proactive maintenance approach as telematics systems provide real-time information on vehicle mileage, pinging alerts for maintenance scheduling. In this way, fleet managers can proactively avoid the accumulation of issues, and it's always cheaper to run well-maintained vehicles than to deal with costly repairs later on.

As GPS tracking and vehicle telematics acquire real-time, valuable information from vehicles, fleet managers can have more visibility. Managers can analyze the data to allocate resources better, address any vehicle issue faster, optimize routes, and schedule maintenance accurately. This helps to reduce fuel and labor costs, increase productivity and improve fleet efficiency. With exceptional fleet efficiency, managers can deliver an unprecedented standard of customer service.

Using the latest GPS and vehicle telematics solutions helps fleet managers to effectively deal with fleet management challenges, and provides them with great peace of mind by giving them a bird's eye view of their fleet at all times.

Related: 5 of the Biggest Productivity Challenges Fleet Managers Face in ...

Ekim Saribardak

Entrepreneur Leadership Network® Contributor

CTO of Rewire Security

Ekim Saribardak is the CTO of Rewire Security. He started computer programming in 1998 and has over 15 years of experience in developing web-based services and products.

Want to be an Entrepreneur Leadership Network contributor? Apply now to join.

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