Your business depends on the performance of your fleets and their drivers. But, maintaining the best performance all day and every day is easier said than done.
Fleet costs are increasing every year. You might be able to afford a high-performing fleet now, but how much longer is that possible in this case?
The good news is that, with a few tweaks in your fleet management practices, you can see measurably enhanced performance, lesser downtime, and more cost-effective operations. Regardless of whether you manage a few trucks or run a nationwide fleet, we’ve got you covered with these 5 tips to improve fleet management:
1. Hire Potential Fleet Managers
One of the most important steps in ensuring proper fleet management is hiring a dedicated fleet manager for your business. Fleet managers play an important role in the proper running of your fleet as they oversee every aspect of fleet operations.
Some of the basic responsibilities of a fleet manager include ensuring drive safety, optimizing fleet costs, and managing regulatory compliance. Moreover, fleet managers also oversee fuel consumption, where a huge amount of productivity cost can be saved with efficient management.
2. Make Use of Fleet Management Software
There is a lot of attention required to operate a large number of vehicles for commercial purposes. For large-scale businesses, it is not possible for a single person to manage the whole fleet. Therefore, it is best for organizations to invest in a fleet management software.
Fleet management software helps managers assess factors that impact costs and come up with strategies to reduce them. Other than this, fleet management software also helps simplify compliance, schedule for engine repair, locate specific vehicles, and much more.
3. Perform Vehicle Maintenance
It is not possible to run a fleet for a long time without proper maintenance. Hence, vehicle maintenance should be considered a top priority to ensure vehicle safety and longevity. Maintenance checks usually involve oil changes, tyre pressure check, and replacement of motor oil, brake fluid and radiator coolant.
Neglecting maintenance could result in the vehicles breaking down on the road, which will require fleet truck roadside assistance.
4. Ensure Procurement Maintenance
Procurement maintenance is just as important as vehicle maintenance. Fleet procurement maintenance involves the scheduling and updating of documents related to buying, maintaining, and managing the vehicles within a fleet.
Fleet procurement maintenance not only ensures that the business operations run smoothly but also ensures that the vehicles in the fleet are safe to operate. When it comes to drivers running the fleet, it is important to take details of their driver’s license and fitness certificate.
5.    Optimize Fleet Usage
The larger your fleet gets, the more likely it is for inefficiencies to creep in simply because of how much more activity occurs. Employees may try to sneak personal travel into the trip. Drivers may make trips that are unnecessary.
To avoid this issue, perform regular audits of your logs to dish out any unnecessary travel. If you have any concerns, make sure to communicate them with the drivers so they are aware that their performance is being monitored.