Regardless of size, managing company fleets can be challenging due to the various assets and equipment that need to be maintained to enhance local and national infrastructure. Plus, it saves business owners from costly repairs or accidents—all while ensuring smooth operations.
That said, here are the best practices for optimal fleet management.
Vehicle Insurance
Vehicle insurance policies are insurance often bought for company fleets, covering both property risk, ranging from theft or damage to the car and the liability risk or legal claims made against operators from accidents. Most states require businesses and fleets to have car insurance before it gets legally registered by the Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV). Besides getting insurance, it’s best if you hire a car accident attorney to help you obtain monetary compensations your business deserves to cover losses resulting from vehicular collisions or accidents. These professionals can legally represent you in court while getting the compensation for repairs, lost wages, and medical expenses of your dispatchers.
GPS Software
Thanks to technology, operators now have access to more accurate forecasting by using GPS software. It gives dispatchers a clear idea of their routes and destinations, ensuring a smoother trip. Plus, it allows you to schedule driver breaks ahead of time while using driver ELD apps, ensuring they’re taking enough breaks, crucial in fleet management. Additionally, it lets you keep track of all operations and cargo loads.
Route Planning
Route planning or optimization can help operators and dispatchers plan better and efficient routes and schedules while being aware of their destination’s different restrictions or constraints, ensuring better last-mile delivery. Without planning for routes beforehand, dispatches and managers would spend too much time on menial tasks, making it challenging to scale your operations without improving the systems and processes.
Gas Cards
Gas stations often issue gas cards or gas credit cards. Using this can help operators pay for gas at the pump while taking advantage of several perks and discounts exclusive to a cardholder. Getting gas cards for your fleet can help you manage fuel costs better. After all, if having several vehicles on the road is a crucial part of your business, fuel will be one of your most significant expenses, and fuel prices are volatile, and it changes as you go.
Having a gas card can help you have consistent savings beyond what you can save at the regular pump, providing just the kind of advantage any business needs. Plus, these cards can help you control worker spending, identity fraud, avoid misuses, track purchases online, and give detailed reports. ;
Regular Checkup
Since fleets often get spread across different job sites, keeping up with each vehicle’s health and performance can be challenging. That’s why to help your management team spot issues fast and avoid unnecessary downtime—it’s crucial to conduct regular or routine vehicle checkups or inspections. You can have professionals do the assessments, but relying on them, in the long run, can lead to expensive costs, and though paper-based vehicle inspections is an option most public works choose, they can lead to issues down the line. ;
That’s why it’s best to go automated and provide your operators and management team with electronic vehicle inspection solutions to help them conduct quick, detailed, and accurate inspections. This method allows your team to complete ‘checkups’ in a mobile application to immediately upload the results, alerting fleet managers of any issues present. Since fleets work with various assets and equipment, you can tailor electronic inspections to fit your specific needs. Additionally, these methods provide further clarity by enabling operations to upload images and comments during their routine inspections—and they can do this anywhere in the field. ;
Shorter Oil Change Cycle
Depending on a vehicle’s age, type of oil used, and driving conditions, oil change intervals drastically vary. The standard oil change cycle that most companies followed is changing it every 3,000 miles. However, with more modern lubricants, most engines nowadays may need oil change intervals between 5,000 and 7,500 miles. While synthetic can hold up better and run for more miles, keep in mind that never extend oil changes beyond their time intervals, usually around the mileages mentioned or six months to a whole year.
You can help your fleet achieve shorter oil change cycles by instructing drivers to do routine checkups of their vehicles and mileage driven.
Fleet management includes several duties, ranging from routine checkups to ensuring drivers’ safety. Ensuring fleet operations go smoothly is crucial as it can be costly to a business. It may involve human injuries, mechanical repairs, and irreversible damages—and the management strategies mentioned can help you avoid all these with ease.
