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Fleet management systems have been around a while and have become so complex that it has evolved into Field Resource Management. This article explores 5 reasons why all fleets need at least a basic Field Resource Management system.
Drivers will probably pay record-high gas prices during the upcoming Thanksgiving holiday week.
The current national retail average price for a gallon of self-serve regular gasoline is $3.40. Today’s price 51 cents more expensive than one year ago.
Despite a lagging US economy and Europe on the verge of collapsing, oil prices surged past $100 a barrel yesterday. Experts are predicting this may drive gas prices higher in coming months. The last time crude oil settled at more than $100 per barrel was June 9.
According to data released last week by the Oil Price Information Service and the AAA Fuel Gauge Report, American households have year-to-date spent 8.4 percent of their income on gasoline. This is up from 6.7 percent of household income in 2010 and is on pace to surpass the 7.9 percent number in 2008.
The average household is spending $50 more per month on gasoline in 2011 than they did last year. Also, motorists are paying significantly more at the pump than ever before for this time of year.
After a businessman found a flashing device under the hood of his car, (which turned out to be a secret GPS tracking system installed by the man’s jealous wife) he immediately drove to the police station. Police decided to call in the bomb squad
When Interwest Construction Inc. realized one of their trucks had been stolen, they immediately activated the company’s in-vehicle fleet GPS tracking system. Next thing you know, the chase was on.
According to Fleet Manager Kristal Wagner, “We had a truck stolen on Monday during the night. Tuesday morning, when the foreman was panicking & calling the sheriff, I used the the real-time GPS tracking device to pull up the vehicle’s exact location and gave the Sheriff the information. We recovered the truck within a couple of hours. Some small items that weren’t valuable were stolen from the truck, but the vehicle was not harmed at all!”
A car is stolen every 26 seconds in America, according to The National Insurance Crime Bureau (NICB). Nearly half of these stolen vehicles are never recovered, and are commonly scrapped for parts or smuggled to another country.
Geotagging is when a device such as an iPhone, Android smartphone or digital camera stores your location or geographical information, such as your GPS coordinates, within a photo or movie file (such as .jpg or .mov files).
Nearly all smartphone cameras geotag the photos they take. So it is important that you check the settings on all of your cameras, cel phones and other image-recording devices, because you could be disclosing details of your life and you might not even be aware of it.
How to Protect Your Privacy and Disable Geotagging
There are several ways, and some of them are better than others.
When Jake Ackerman purchased Central Jersey Equipment, a John Deere dealership, the company had been in business for over 30 years and included several seasoned employees that were “too set in their ways.” At the time, Mr. Ackerman said managing his mobile employees and equipment was a daunting task and he “needed more control” so he decided to purchase FieldLogix’s GPS fleet tracking system.
Mr. Ackerman said, “You can’t manage what you don’t measure. FieldLogix’s tracking system has helped me to see which employees are the most effective and which ones are not. Now payroll is based on hours spent working, not just hours clocked in, so there’s real accountability. Not only are we saving money, but we can reward the drivers who are delivering the best results.”
Take a look at some of the key discussion points:
Key acquisitions and investment in the fleet telematics market
The vital role of telematics in the future of commercial insurance
Harnessing the power of fuel management solutions
Get an inside view on the EV (electric vehicle) business case
How FMCSA rules are set to shape the industry
Leveraging vehicle generated data to develop next-gen commercial telematics services
“We are at the highest fuel prices ever for this time of year, even though they have dropped a bit in recent weeks,” said Tom Kloza, chief oil analyst for the Oil Price Information Service. “I think we will see prices in 2012 that will break … records.”
A combination of growing global demand and rising U.S. fuel exports could send gasoline prices to record highs in 2012, according to industry analysts. Those factors have been pushing pump prices to historically high levels since the beginning of September, and the approaching holiday weekend is expected to present a painful roadside example by breaking the old record for late November — set in 2007 — by 10% or more nationally and in California.
Upon installing the FieldLogix fleet tracking system, Carlos’ suspicions were immediately confirmed. By using the tracking system’s activity reports, he found that his “honor system” was being abused by his employees. By having an accurate way to measure daily work hours, his overtime costs dropped immediately.
In fact, his overtime costs dropped by more than 2 hours per man per day with no change in the workload. Based on Carlos’ calculations, he paid for the entire first year of the system within the first 18 days.
