Looking for a telematics platform, or just installed one? Our General Manager in Australia, Ryan Harm, talks about the best practices to realise the full benefits of your telematics system.
Telematics systems are great at capturing large amounts of data. They can analyse and present information in visual dashboards, simple reports and detailed lists of data. It can be overwhelming when starting the process of choosing or implementing a new system. This article helps you focus on what’s important to quickly get the most out of your telematics system.
Analytics and Reporting
Dashboards Give You a Quick Snapshot of Your Fleet
Most telematics systems collect information from several sources and provide detailed reports in the form of tables of data and charts. It can be time consuming to generate and review separate reports for each aspect of the system, so a comprehensive and easy to understand dashboard, combining multiple data sources, ensures you can quickly get a snapshot of what’s happening across your fleet. A good telematics system will also allow you to drill down into more detailed reports directly from the dashboard.
Out of the box, your system’s default dashboard should have been designed by your telematics partner to provide you with relevant insights from day one.
Automated Reports Save Time
With companies embracing so many different digital and cloud technologies, it can be time consuming to log in regularly to check for notifications and generate reports. Choosing a telematics system that can automatically generate reports and notifications, based on parameters relevant to your business, can save time and reduce stress for your staff. Reports can be delivered directly to an email inbox and notifications to a mobile device.
Optimise Your Fleet with Detailed Utilisation Reporting
A forklift fitted with a telematics system can tell you much more than just who’s driving it. Integrating your telematics system with your forklift’s electronics can give utilisation data (seat, traction and hydraulics time), battery charge data, service hours from the forklift dash and more. This data can tell you what your optimum fleet size should be, if you have a problem with idle time (i.e. high key/seat hours but low traction/hydraulics time), if your batteries are being charged correctly, and other key insights.
It is key that you choose a telematics partner who has the team to support this integration so you get maximum ROI on your investment.
Safety
Only Licensed Drivers Should be Using Your Equipment
To meet your safety and compliance obligations, only properly trained and/or licensed drivers should operate your equipment. Your telematics system should enable you to manage your driver’s training/licenses (depending on what your local regulations are), automatically notify you when a driver needs retraining, and restrict access to equipment for drivers whose qualifications expire.
Minimise Impact Related Maintenance Costs
Outside of refuelling/charging and scheduled maintenance costs, repairing damage to your forklifts and other equipment (e.g. racking, doorways/gates etc) can be a major cost driver for your logistics operations. Your telematics system should be fitted with an impact sensor to notify a supervisor when a significant impact occurs and who was driving. The system may also be configured to ‘lock out’ the forklift until a supervisor can investigate and check it’s still safe to operate.
Once drivers know impacts are monitored and they are accountable for their own safe driving, you will see this creates a safe driving culture which translates into lower repair and maintenance costs. Impact reporting will also allow you to focus your training resources on those drivers who need it the most.
Some new users of telematics systems have recovered the full cost of their system in the first 12-24 months of implementation just through savings on their repair bills.
Electronic Safety Checklists Reduce Paper Handling
Manual paper-based processes are a thing of the past. A good telematics system should allow your drivers to complete their pre-operational safety checks electronically. Your telematics system should also prevent access to the forklift until a pre-op has been successfully completed. Supervisors can be notified by email or text of any failed safety questions and take appropriate action to ensure forklifts are safe to operate. This reduces the supervisor’s time spent reading through and filing away piles of pre-op check sheets at the end of each shift or reporting period.
Never Miss a Scheduled Service
Ensure the safety of your forklift fleet by choosing a telematics system tells you when a service is due. Your system should be flexible enough to allow you to choose a service schedule based on your business’s own procedures including operational key hour intervals or calendar intervals.
Some telematics systems may also take a forklift out of service when it requires maintenance. Using this setting will remove access for regular drivers, leaving only supervisors and technicians who can use the forklift. This ensures any unsafe equipment cannot be used.
Support
24/7 support
It is unlikely that your operating hours will match up with the local office hours of your telematics partner. If you can’t get support when you need it, it may mean significant downtime for your fleet. Ask your telematics provider what level of support they can provide you and if they offer a global 24 hour 7 day a week support service. The peace of mind knowing you can reach help when needed means you can focus on running and scaling your business.
Phone, email and training
Each business is different, and the way in which you interact with your telematics partner will also be different. Your provider should have multiple options for support (e.g. email for non-critical issues and phone support for problems that need a quick resolution).
To get the most out of your telematics system, your telematics partner should also have a range of training options available. This might include online, pdf and printed documentation, pre-recorded videos, live webinars and on-site training. Check what options are available to you to get your system up and running quickly, and that refresher training can be provided on an ongoing basis.
Get the Data You Want with Customised Reporting
Now that you’re getting the most out of your telematics, using the standard features and reports, you may find that you need to customise or extend your system. When that time comes, your telematics partner should have the resources available to support you, whether it’s creating a new report, or developing a new feature. Discuss this with them early on so you’re not locked into an inflexible product after investing so much to get to this point.
Now that you’re ready to transform your fleet and get the most out of your telematics system, it’s time to start talking with your potential telematics partners.
For more information about Collective Intelligence’s range of telematics systems, Fleet iQ 360 and Forklift iQ 360, head on over to thecollectiveintelligencegroup.com.