Your fleet management software does a lot — probably more than you realize. If you’re not leveraging these seven features, or if your fleet management software doesn’t offer them, you may be missing out on easy ways to manage your fleet more efficiently and effectively.
1. Find Nearest
Need to send someone to take over another driver’s route, or retrieve an asset for service? Use the Find Nearest feature in CalAmp's application to locate the vehicle in your fleet that’s closest to the asset in question. In addition, if a water pipe has broken or a utility pole is down and you need to dispatch a worker ASAP, you can enter the location and find the closest fleet vehicle within a 20 miles radius (search distance is user definable). Toggle to the street view to get a sense of the location in advance.
2. Geofencing
Easy-to-create geofences have multiple applications. For example, create a geofence around the depot or a parking lot to automatically check in staff or contract crews, or around a customer site to track whether drivers show up on time and how long they stay. Geofence the local casino or an off-limits gas station to be alerted if a driver enters the property. Geofence authorized routes to know when drivers stray. Within CalAmp, these virtual fences can take any shape. Draw one with a simple circle, rectangle or polygon, or outline the perimeter of a property, depending on the level of precision you need.
3. Navigate To
Use the Navigate To feature in CalAmp's application to get directions to the exact location of a telematics-enabled vehicle or piece of equipment with one click. Eliminate time wasted locating a stranded vehicle or hunting for a specific asset on a lot or job site. This feature is particularly useful when using a tablet or smartphone in the field.
4. Maintenance scheduler
Regularly performing preventive maintenance on fleet vehicles is the key to reducing downtime and extending life cycles. Especially for smaller fleets that don’t require the sophistication of dedicated maintenance software, a basic tool within your fleet management software that leverages mileage and hours of use data to drive maintenance schedules can keep your maintenance efforts on track and help you avoid both under-maintenance and over-maintenance.
5. Weather map layer
A one-stop-shop fleet management solution offers weather map overlays with color-coded severity indicators. Within CalAmp, you can view the weather in relation to asset information including vehicle location and geofences. This enables fast decision-making when weather becomes a factor for specific assets, job sites or routes, even if you’re managing a fleet that’s several states away. Weather information also facilitates emergency response preparation.
6. Traffic map layer
Seeing the current traffic conditions on major roadways helps managers route drivers the fastest way from point A to point B. In addition, if a driver is delayed in getting to a site, the traffic layer provides visibility into what lies ahead so you can give the customer or warehouse a realistic estimated time of arrival (ETA).
7. Breadcrumb trails
Want a window into a driver’s day? Use the breadcrumb feature. Choose a date range to view the breadcrumb trail on a map, then dive into details of what happened at any point along the way. See, for example, where the driver sped or braked suddenly. Fleets using video telematics can go a step further and click on icons along the trail to view event-triggered video clips. These clips add context to incidents. Breadcrumb trails also facilitate route analysis, which can lead to more efficient route planning.
For a closer look at these features and others, demo our application’s new user interface now.