[DID YOU KNOW?] Not Using GPS Fleet Tracking Software Can Cost You Rastrac Team | Dec 18, 2015 8:30:00 AM

In a few of the blogs that we’ve published recently, we discussed the benefits of using GPS fleet tracking software to manage your vehicle fleet. Many organizations and businesses can benefit greatly from the use of such software to manage their vehicle fleets.

Recently, RASTRAC was contacted by a reader from softwareadvice.com about a study they completed on how transportation professionals use fleet management software. One surprising finding of the study was that of the study’s sample, “two-thirds of respondents are using a formal fleet management system.” This means that the remaining one-third aren’t using such a system!

Not using any kind of software to manage a fleet of vehicles could have surprising costs. How could not using a vehicle fleet tracking solution end up costing you? One way is that it can increase your fuel costs.

Causes of Increased Fuel Costs

In their study, Software Advice found that “among survey respondents, more than half (53 percent) indicate that fuel costs exceed projections ‘somewhat’ or ‘very frequently.’” There are a number of reasons why fuel costs might exceed projections, such as:

• Faulty Projections. Sometimes, the figures that go into a fuel cost projection might be inaccurate or missing important information.
• Bad Route Planning. In some cases, the shortest distance between two points might not be the most fuel efficient. As noted in a Popular Mechanics article, “Going up a steep hill, a truck’s mileage might drop to about 2.9 mpg, while going down the same hill will raise it to more than 23 mpg.”
• Fuel Prices. Sometimes, the cost of a gallon of fuel fluctuates heavily. This can throw off projected costs.
• Sometimes, a truck will just hit a route with really bad traffic that causes it to burn gas just sitting idle in stop-and-go traffic.
• Theft/Fraud. Regrettably, theft of fuel or fraudulent charging of fuel expenses does occur. When it happens, it can be very difficult to prove without some kind of detailed vehicle use data.

Using GPS fleet tracking software for your vehicles can help to reduce or even avoid the impact of these factors on your fleet’s fuel costs.

How?

Improving Basic Fuel Cost Projections

With GPS fleet tracking, you can have accurate records of the routes that drivers take, how far they drive, and how long their vehicles stay idle on their routes. This gives you the information you need to create more accurate projections of how much fuel a given vehicle on a given route should need.

Reducing/Preventing Fuel Theft or Fraud

The detailed vehicle use data provided by GPS fleet tracking systems can even help to prevent fuel theft and fraud. As noted in Software Advice’s article, “fleet management software assists with preventing fuel theft because it is able to provide incredibly accurate estimates for how much fuel should be consumed in a given situation.”

For example, if you know that the average mpg of a given vehicle on a given route should have been roughly 8 mpg, and see that the vehicle traveled a total distance of 300 miles, then it should have used up about 2,400 gallons of fuel. If your driver reports 4,000 gallons of fuel usage, then you know that something’s not right, and can go to the GPS data for proof.

Merely knowing your company uses GPS tracking to monitor fuel use can do a lot to keep drivers honest.

Improving Route Planning

Using GPS systems to coordinate your route planning can be immensely helpful in controlling fuel costs. GPS software can help you find the most efficient routes for drivers to take on their delivery routes by:

• Avoiding Areas of Heavy Traffic. Semi trucks aren’t the most fuel-efficient vehicles to begin with. Sitting in a rolling parking lot on idle can waste a lot of fuel without gaining much ground. Using GPS route planning systems to find alternate routes when one is blocked by heavy traffic can save both time and fuel.
• Avoiding Steep Uphill Inclines. As mentioned earlier, semis aren’t very fuel-efficient, especially when dragging a heavy load uphill. Plotting a course to go around uphill inclines rather than over them (or to take advantage of downhill slopes) can help to improve fuel efficiency by a large margin.

By avoiding heavy traffic and steep inclines whenever possible, the fuel consumed by a semi truck to get from one point to another can be reduced.

So, How Much CAN Not Using GPS Fleet Tracking Software Cost?

The exact amount of money that is lost to inefficient routes, bad driving habits, and outright theft or fraud is impossible to say without knowing the number of vehicles that are in your fleet, how far they travel in a year, and what routes they follow.

To give you an idea of how much these factors can cost you, here are some examples:

1. If a driver takes a set of routes that should consume 2,400 gallons of fuel at an average price of $2.338 a gallon (as shown for 12/14/15 on the S. Energy Information Administration website), then your fuel costs should total $5,611.20. If a driver fraudulently reports an extra 500 gallons of fuel consumption, it would cost you an extra $1,169 for that one instance of fraud.
2. If a badly planned route totaling 2,000 miles of distance causes the mpg of a truck to go from 7 mpg to 4.5 mpg, your total fuel consumption would go from 285.7 gallons to 444.4 gallons. This would cost you an extra $371.05 for this one delivery. Rerouting to a path that adds 50 miles while maintaining fuel efficiency would save you $254.15.

Incidents such as the ones listed above happen all too often, yet they are easily prevented with GPS fleet tracking.

If you find that your projected fuel costs are frequently going well above and beyond your projections, now may be the time to start looking at a GPS fleet tracking software solution for your fleet management.

As noted by Software Advice’s fleet management researcher, Forrest Burnson:

"Small to midsize fleet operations and transportation companies have more options than ever when it comes to finding an appropriate fleet management solution. For first time buyers who are stuck using manual methods, spreadsheets and pen and paper to keep track of everything, we've found that often a light bulb goes off once they implement new software and realize how much time and money it will save them. Our research shows that fleet managers often struggle when it comes to projecting fuel costs and keeping track of records—thankfully they have many options to choose from when it comes to making the back office run more efficiently." –Forrest Burnson

Get started by contacting RASTRAC today!

Special thanks to Mark DiGiammarino of Software Advice, a company that helps buyers find fleet management software, for bringing their study to my attention.