Discount Chart

Here is a quick run down of the normal costs and the discounts currently being offered:

As you can see, some of the discounts are much better than others. The largest discount is found in the 2 minute update category, while the best overall deal is found in the 1 minute update category. However, depending on the needs of your fleet the 5 minute update definitely provides the cheapest, most cost effective alternative for most fleets. Chances are most small businesses are not going to need an every minute update, so having such a cheap option is a pretty good thing.

In fact, there might be some serious reasons to choose a cheaper option if your business does not need very frequent updates. The main one is this: insurance discounts.

Insurance Premium Discounts For Fleet Tracking Systems

While you will definitely want to check with your particular insurance carrier, many companies will offer a discount on insurance premiums for vehicles that have a real time GPS tracker installed in them. I know of one provider that offers a discount as large as 33%!

Let’s put it like this. Imagine that your insurance premium per vehicle is around $100 per vehicle. If you receive just an 18% discount on your insurance premium then you will essentially be using your tracking system for free. If your discount is even greater than that or your premium is greater then you can stand to make money on the device, which could help you offset the cost of purchasing the product itself.

Vehicle Trak GPS Fleet Traker

If you are going to be able to take advantage of this deal you will need to buy the VehicleTrak from GPS Technologies.  Here is a list of the features that they mention of their website about it:

• Open service plans – no contracts!
• Low Cost Monthly Plans (as we have already seen)
• Get 100 FREE Instant Locates with the device in addition to all your normal locates.
• View multiple vehicles at once using a Google Maps interface.
• Track important fleet metrics including mileage, stop times, and Locations.
• Generate reports daily, weekly, or monthly to see your fleets activity.
• See where your fleet is from any Internet enables PC.
• Fleet tracking software can run up to 14 different reports to give you a better understanding of your fleet.
• Intelligent Dispatch Capability – enabling dispatchers to find the closest vehicle with ease.
• Get alerted on your mobile phone or email when a vehicle is speeding or has left its geographic boundary.
• Low battery alerts let you know when the battery needs to be changed.
• Door unlock functionality – unlock the doors of a vehicle remotely at no extra charge.
• Starter disable  functionality – turn off a car remotely at no extra charge.
• Tamper-resistant
• Simple installation on all units! No wiring, no antenna on the VehicleTrak Plug; just plug the unit into your vehicle OBDII port or diagnostic harness.
• Highly mobile and easily moved from vehicle to vehicle.
• Coverage available in the United States, Canada, Mexico, Bermuda & Puerto Rico

This is a decent amount of features for a fleet tracking unit.  If you were already considering the VehicleTrak then now is certainly the time to buy.  The added discount to the service plan is plenty of incentive to make the purchase.

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Where to Find Consulting?

This is by and large the hardest question for those looking for GPS fleet consulting.  But in order for us to answer this question we first have to take a quick look at the different things that different people might be thinking about when they think about getting some help figuring out if fleet tracking with GPS is something that they want to do.  For example, some people might just want to know if GPS fleet management is even worth looking into.  These people might pose their question like this:

Where does one find out the advantages of using GPS tracking technology to keep track of their vehicles and employees in real time?

The answer to this question is obvious – the Internet.  While some people do not necessarily trust information that they discover on the Internet, believing it to be a place filled with charlatans and cheats, there is some extremely excellent information to be had out there.  While you might not trust an article about the benefits of GPS fleet tracking for small businesses you might trust the Aberdeen Group, a provider of fact-based research focused on the global technology-driven value chain that was founded in 1988.  They did some extensive research analysis the effect of using GPS for small businesses and provide some of their results, for free, on the Internet (Aberdeen Group).

While determining if GPS fleet tracking is viable is only going to useful to those that have only heard about this powerful technology, there is still a lot more that people may be thinking about when looking for GPS fleet consulting.

Another topic that might interest them is the actual implementation and application of this technology with their business.  These people already know that fleet tracking software and GPS vehicle tracking can be very good for a business in theory, but they want to know if their particular business is going to benefit.  They want to know if the thousands of dollars they are getting to ready to spend on purchasing the hardware and the continual service cost that they will have to pay is going to end up being worth if for their business.  This is especially true of small businesses that do not necessarily have the ability to absorb costs that do not directly affect their bottom line.  They need to operate efficiently and keep expenses tight.

Will fleet GPS really help MY business?

Unfortunately, it is going to be very hard to answer this question.  The main reason is that there are very few people that you can go to get independent information about this.  In fact, we know of no person or service that will help you analyze your business to see if fleet tracking will help you that does not also sell GPS tracking devices, software, and services.  To some potential buyers, this is going to be seen as a conflict of interest and potentially deter them from making a decision about whether or not they should employ some sort of technological solution to curb fleet costs and improve worker efficiency.

The truth of the matter it that most businesses are going to benefit from real time GPS tracking.  The ability to locate your vehicles in real time and route them efficiently and effectively to new service calls is very powerful for businesses of all sizes.  But there are going to be some companies that are not going to benefit that much from the implementation of this technological solution.  Your best bet is to talk to several different fleet tracking providers and see what they think about it.  Chances are that if you get several estimates about the benefit your company is going to achieve you will get a pretty accurate picture of the way things could really turn out.  Not everyone is a liar, so spreading out your quotes and estimates is going to help you get a better understanding of what could go on for you.

This is true whether or not you have trucks, cars, vans, or tractor trailers.  Automobile GPS tracking is the same as van tracking, truck tracking or tractor tracking.  The only question is if your business is going to benefit from it or not.

In the end, GPS fleet consulting may or may not be able to answer that question for you.  Honestly, the only way to find out for sure is to take the plunge and buy some GPS fleet tracking.  Then you will know for sure if your business is going to benefit.

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But once that position has been calculated, how does that information get sent to interested parties?  In other words, how does a plain old GPS fleet deceive, like those used for navigation, become a GPS fleet tracking device?  Where does the tracking in GPS fleet tracking come from?

The answer lies for most devices in something called GSM.  GSM stands for Global System for Mobile communications and it is the most widely used cellular network infrastructure in the world.  By some estimates, GSM is currently used by approximately 80% of mobile devices in the world for cellular communications, making it the most widely used standard for mobile communications in the world.  Used by 3 billion people across over 200 countries, this technology provides digital signals for both its voice and signaling channels and is considered to be a 2nd generation cell phone network.  In fact, low-cost SMS messaging (also know as text messaging) was pioneered on the GSM system and has improved the life of more people than could be counted by a single individual in their lifetime.

The importance for GSM in relation to GPS tracking devices designed for a fleet of vehicles is that it represents a ubiquitous method of data transmission.  When a fleet vehicle is out on the road it has to use some data transmission system in order to get its GPS location data back to the office so that bosses and dispatchers can use the tracking information to streamline business operations.  If they cannot get the data then having a fleet tracking  system installed is a waste of money.

For a large number of devices, the sequence of events is going to look something like this.  The GPS fleet tracking device gets a handful of singals from satellites which it then processes into position data.  The device kicks on its cell phone modem and it begins transmitting the data over a cell phone network to a computer where the data is then processed and made available through the internet to the computer of a business owner or vehicle dispatcher.  The following graphic may help us get a handle on exactly what happens:

Well start from the left and work our way across this image to the lower right with a few liberties with the graphic to talk about fleet tracking technology instead of cell phone technology.  So instead of seeing a computer on the far left imagine that you see a a van or truck or whatever vehicle you think you might want to track with some fleet management system.  Once the truck has established its position in the world due to GPS tracking technology it dials up its cell phone modem, represented in the picture above by the cell phone on the left.  This cell phone then “calls” a nearby tower and dumps its position information into a signal to be sent back to the office for routing purposes.  The tower then sends this information through its own series of servers until it hits the Internet represented by the world icon on the bottom right of the image.  Once on the Internet, this GPS tracking information is available to whomever has access to it, which in this case is going to be a very specific company or person – depending on who has set up your GPS fleet tracking software.

Potential Problems With GPS Fleet Tracking From GSM Technology

The one most important issue that companies who use GSM GPS fleet trackers is that they need to have access to a GSM network in order to work properly.  If they cannot access one of these cell phone networks then they are not going to be able to communicate their position information to the company by any means whatsoever.  If you are located in a city where cell phone coverage is everywhere then you should have no problems, but if your fleet is regularly traveling outside of cell phone coverage you really do not have much recourse other than to not purchase a GSM GPS fleet tracker.

Satellite GPS Fleet Tracking: The Solution

The solution to this problem for companies who regularly travel outside of established cell phone networks is to get a tracking system for their fleet that utilizes commercial communication satellites rather than the GSM network.  While this can be extremely expensive due to the cost associated with launching satellites into space, it certainly can be a useful way to bypass the traditional problems associated with GSM devices.  Satellite GPS fleet tracking still is not a perfect solution because it does require being able to contact one of these commercial satellites, but it is an effective alternative.

GSM GPS Fleet Tracking

For the most part, however, companies seeking to find effective ways to cut costs, improve worker efficiencies, and better maintain their fleet are going to benefit from standard GSM fleet tracking devices.  They work in an extremely large number of contexts and provide powerful data for companies of all sizes.  You simply cannot go wrong in choosing a fleet management strategy that includes some sort of GPS tracking for fleets.  You just need a plan and some quality tracking devices and you are set.

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GPS, Fleet Tracking, and Satellites

One of the most important things to understand about the Global Positioning System is that it is a global system.  GPS is global because there are 20+ satellites currently in orbit around the earth that are broadcasting signals constantly.  These signals contain specialized bits of data that can be used by specialized receiving devices to determine the location of that device on the face of the earth.

To help us better understand why so many satellites are needed we should probably take a look at a mathematical principle that is key to understanding GPS fleet tracking technologies: trilateration.  Here is a picture that summarizes in graphical form what goes on when a GPS tracking devices goes through the process of trilateration:

A studied glance at this diagram will give anyone enough information about GPS tracking to give them a solid grasp of how it all works.  In this diagram point B is the location of the GPS receiver – let’s say the M3G-2 system from GPS Fleet Solutions, one of the leading names in the fleet tracking industry.  P1, P2, and P3 all represent satellites in orbit around the earth.  The colored spheres represent the distance that a signal from the satellite has traveled over a specified period of time.  The larger the circle, the longer a signal has traveled from the GPS satellite.  This distance traveled is represented by the r1, r2, and r3 in each corresponding sphere.

Now, at point B the M3G-2 fleet tracking system is able to figure out its exact location based upon the know positions of P1, P2, and p3.  Because P1 … are all satellites in orbit around the earth scientists have developed rather precise predictions about where these satellites will be at any given moment in time.  Using know constants, such as their altitude and velocity, they can tell where any satellite is at any moment.  This information is stored in the GPS device and used by it when it receives a signal from a specific satellite.

The distance of r1, r2, and r3 are calculated using the amount of time takes the signal to reach the M3G-2 GPS fleet tracking system.  Since the speed of the signals is known, all the receiver needs to know is when the signal was transmitted from the satellite.  This piece of information is actually contained within the signal sent by the satellite, so all the receiver has to do is read that data and multiply it by the know speed of the signal since:

Distance = Speed x Time

Now that the GPS tracking receiver knows the position of the satellites that have transmitted the signal as well as the relative distance of the receiver from all the satellites it is able to find out its position in the world.

To sum up, here is a bullet point summary:

• GPS stands for Global Positioning System
• There are 20+ satellites in orbit around the globe broadcasting signals all the time
• GPS receivers use a mathematical process called trilateration to find out where they are
  • Trilateration requires that you have information from at least 3 GPS satellites
  • Using the Distance equation (D=SxT), receivers are able to find out all the information they need to get a location for the receiver using the know location of the satellites in their orbit

From this list, we can see that there are some drawbacks to the GPS system.  We will know turn our attention to these drawbacks.

Potential Problems With GPS Fleet Tracking Receivers

Any owner of a fleet tracking system is going to want to know under what conditions their investment is not going to work.  Hopefully, our discussion of how GPS works will help us get a better understanding of what conditions will prevent proper function of the tracking system.  When your business is on the line, you need to have as much information about what it is you are working with as possible.

One problem is that you could have too few satellites in range of your GPS receiver.  If one of the circles surrounding P1, P2, or P3 were removed from our image to the right, we would not be able to get a firm location of where B is in the world around us.  For example, imagine for a second that P3 was not a part of our picture – all we have is P1 and P2.  As you look at the picture you will notice that Point A and Point B are both points where the two circles, P1 and P2, intersect.  You will also notice that these two points are very far away from each other!

A GPS tracking receiver would not be able to tell where it was on the surface of the earth and this could have disastrous effects for your business.  Imagine trying to route a vehicle in your fleet from their current location to the next service call when they could be in two different places.  What types of difficulties would you encounter when trying to notify a customer about the arrival of their products or service personnel if the vehicle containing the good could be in two different locations?  These issues and more would be your fate if you were only working with two signals.  The problem is compounded even more if you only had a signal from one satellite.  Needless to say, making sure that a GPS receiver has access to at least 3 signals is pretty important.

There a few different things that could prevent your receiver from receiving the proper number of signals to make it an effective GPS fleet tracking device.  The first is that there are physical obstructions preventing your fleet vehicle from hearing what the satellite has to say.  Things like concrete walls, driving in a tunnel, and even being in the urban canyon created by towering skyscrapers all have been shown to inhibit the working of GPS tracking devices.  These obstructions pose a big problem for mainly urban service and delivery fleets who operate exclusively in city centers.

Another thing that can sometimes prevent a receiver from receiving the proper number of signals is being is a remote area.  While the military tried to create a system that could cover the whole globe, there are some physical feature of the earth that create environments where using the Global Positioning System difficult.  Mountainous areas, deep canyons, heavy forests, and caves all inhibit a receiver’s ability to get a lock on a satellite signal.  Other natural phenomena also can effect this process including heavy rain or snow, heavy fog, or simply heavy cloud cover.  Pretty much any obstruction of a satellite’s signal is going to affect a fleet tracking receiver’s ability to get a fix on its location.

A-GPS Fleet Tracking: As A Solution

In order to help prevent some of these problems from occurring, the GPS fleet tracking industry has made some efforts to improve receiver performance in all sorts of circumstances.  The outcome has been the development of A-GPS fleet tracking.  The A in A-GPS stands for ‘Assisted’ and helps receivers overcome the difficulty that weak satellite signals create for vehicle tracking and fleet management.

What A-GPS is able to do is leverage existing cell phone towers and other wireless communication arrays to make up for the loss of one or more signals from a satellite.  For example, let us assume that our example from above is still true – that P1 and P2 represent satellite signals where both A and B are possible locations for a GPS receiver like the M3G-2 GPS fleet tracking system.  Because both A and B are possible outcomes of the trilateration process, the receiver doesn’t know exactly where it is on the face of the earth.

However, the M3G-2 is using A-GPS.  Because of this is is able to tap into some cell phone towers in the area which will give it a point of reference from which to create the circle represented by P3.  Therefore, the A-GPS fleet tracking device is able to perform where a normal tracking device would fail.  A-GPS is certainly superior and has been a major improvement to fleet tracking technology .

Position Finding and Position Communication

In talking about GPS we have discussed the first major part of GPS fleet tracking – position finding.  If you want to be able to track a vehicle in your fleet then you obviously need the vehicle to know where it is in the world.  This is first and most important part of this process and the Global Positioning System provide the technology for this to occur.  Next, we are going to discuss GSM which serves as the position communication technology in most fleet tracking devices.  For once the device knows where it is, it has to find a way to communicate that information to you, the fleet owner or fleet dispatcher.  GSM is where this capability comes from and is an integral part of GPS fleet tracking technologies.

Find out more about GMS and how it affects GPS fleet tracking here: GPS Fleet Tracking Technologies: GSM

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You might expect that a tool like this has practically 0 features – but you’d be dead wrong.  OpenGTS is a full featured GPS tracking solution for your business or fleet.  Its features include:

• Web-based authentication: This means that you will be able to support multiple users in your account, each having their own unique password and username as well as access to specified features.  If you have a manager in charge of the tractors on left at the work site but don’t want him having to deal with all the information gathered from your mobile team you can set his account to only have access to the tractor tracking information.  This makes the product scalable for all fleet sizes and business needs.
• Customizable web-page decorations: If you care how your interface looks you are able to change it with OpenGTS.  The look and feel can become of your specific company, increasing brand awareness among your employees.
• Customizable mapping service: As of v1.8.3, OpenGTS comes with support for Mapstraction in addition to the original support for Google Maps and Microsoft Virtual Earth. With the addition of Mapstraction OpenGTS can now display maps from OpenLayers, MultiMap, Map24, MapQuest, and more. Within the OpenGTS framework, other mapping service providers can also easily be integrated with minimal effort.
• Customizable reports: Sometime in can be a big pain to sift through all the data for your fleet at the end of the day.  With customizable reports you can find historical data on problem employees or special projects that makes your life as a manager much easier.  Tracking can be done over the entire fleet or a single car or truck.
• Customizable geofenced areas: Geofencing, as known as creating geozones, is the ability to mark up a map into territories.  These territories can be given custom names (suck at “Roger’s Turf,” or “Fueling Up”), making tracking service calls easy and effective.  You can even set up arrival and departure notifications so you know when a vehicle enters a certain area.
• GPS tracking device independent: OpenGTS comes with support for OpenDMTP capable devices, but it is is not limited to these.  It can be made to work with nearly any available remote GPS tracking device. This compatability enables business to track a variety of devices with one single platform.
• Operating system independent: OpenGTS is written in Java, uses Apache Tomcat for web service deployment, and MySQL for the datastore.  This means that it can run on pretty much any operating system found on a computer – from Windows Vista all the way to Linux.
• i18n Compliant: OpenGTS is i18n compliant and supports easy localization (L10N) to languages other than English. Languages supported currently include English, Spanish, Italian, German, and Turkish.

That is a lot of features for free GPS fleet tracking software.  Here are a few screen shots fo the software to help you get a feel for how the interface looks:

This software is kept relatively recent and has been updated in the past 6 months, meaning that you will not be left out in the cold if you decide to use this free software to track your company’s assets as they go about making you money.

The dowload is only 1.7 Mb so what do you have to lose in checking out this free GPS fleet tracking software?

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When you think about it, once a company has developed the technology to track and asset – a truck, a car, a cell phone, a package – it is really not that great of a jump to figuring out a way to use that same technology to track something else.

The Global Positioning System was developed by the US military to help it identify the location of huge ships out at sea and expensive planes in the air.  That was decades ago.  Now they use it to track single soldiers and direct precise missile strikes.  The technology has come a long way.

The same type of progress has occurred in the private sector as well.  At first GPS devices were simply used to tell you where you were on a map.  As computer and imaging technology became more advanced the maps became more and more detailed and the GPS became more and more accurate.  Turn by turn navigation units hit the markets and became the rave.  Many people now find it hard to imagine life without their friendly Garmin, TomTom, or Magellan.

Private GPS tracking has also seen an interesting genesis over the past couple of years.  Companies have long been using this technology to increase their fleets efficiency and to direct traffic.  As part of a fleet management solution, GPS tracking has reduced fuel costs, improved worker productivity, and improved maintenance operations for both large and small fleets.

This type of technology has been improved upon, become smaller and more powerful.  With these improvements many GPS providers have realized that the desire to have precise location information is not something that only businesses need.  This revelation has brought the technology of GPS fleet tracking to the general public.

What Is GPS Fleet Tracking?

To understand how simple it was for idea behind GPS fleet tracking to trickle down to the general public we first should look at what this stype of GPS tracking really does.  Basically, companies decided that they needed to improve efficiency, reduce their fuel costs, and improve the overall performance of their fleet.  One way to do this is to train your drivers extensively.  However, there is one major problem with this: businesses have no way of ensuring that their drivers stick to company policies and their training.

Now enter a magical black box that listens to the sky and can tell you exactly where one of the vehicles in your fleet is positioned at any given moment in time.  You as a business owner are empowered with this type of information. You can see the exact routes your drivers take.  Are they making unnecessary stops?  Do they site at one location for extended periods of time when they should be out making more service calls and the business more money?  Are they speeding in company property or in other ways riding recklessly?  If a vehicle gets stolen, are you going to want it back?

All the questions and more can be answered through the magical black box that listens to the sky.  In its simplest form, GPS fleet tracking empowers owners to run their business better.

GPS Tracking, Parents and Teens

Above I alluded to a boss worker relationship where the boss wanted to ensure that their worker performed well, drove safely, and made good decisions.  Does that sound like any other relationships that happen in human families?  Yes, as a matter of fact, it does.  It reminds me a lot of the relationship between a teenager and their parents.

Parents spend a lot of time training their child to see them grow up to be a productive member of society.  Parents want to see that their children are successful, happy, and safe.  However, modern society often sets up barriers between parents and children and these barriers often disastrous consequences.   One major barrier that is everywhere is the barrier of space.

Parents and teens almost never seem to interact anymore within the same space.  Parents work; children go to school and have after school activities.  Parents have a TV in their room; teens have a TV in their room too.  Teens have personal computers; parents have personal computers.  Parents have cars; teens have their own cars too.  With all this physical separation between parent and child it is no wonder that some parents have felt removed from the life of their teenager and want to get back in the loop.

Now this is where the GPS tracking for teens comes into play.  Just like these tracking devices made sense for business owners they can also make sense for parents.  Parents need to know that their teens are obeying the law when it comes to the speed limit and other driving regulations.  GPS teenager tracking is a great tool for helping parents know this type of information and much, much more.

Here are a list of 5 questions that may help you determine if GPS tracking for teens in right for you and your family:

1. Is your teen regularly engaged in dangerous or reckless behavior behind your back?
2. Has your teen been in a car accident where they were speeding or otherwise at fault?
3. Does your teen sneak out at night?
4. Are they sexually active well before you had agreed?
5. Is your teen at high risk for abduction or other malicious acts committed by a third party?

If you answered yes to one or more of these questions then GPS tracking may be a good choice for you, your teen, and your family.

GPS Fleet Tracking Company and Teen Tracking

Remember how I mentioned that once you have developed the technology to track one type of asset it is pretty simple to leverage that technology to track another type of asset?  Well, that is what one GPS fleet tracking company decided to do.  They already offer a host of options for businesses who want to manage their fleets, so why not diversify their revenue and provide a new product that is essentially the same product that they had always been selling?

Teen tracking is pretty basic.  Install a GPS data pusher in the teens automobile.  The device will hook up to the car’s battery so that the need to touch the device once it is installed will be next to nil.  Then whenever the car is turned on or the device is turned on remotely, the position of the car is broadcast to the GPS tracking provider’s data center.  The company then takes this information and makes it available to the consumer.

If you are looking into this type of tracking for your teen then you definitely want to consider the costs – which are anything but cheap.  Not only do you have to pay the device, but you will also end up paying at least $6 a month depending on the detail you want in your plan.  In these hard economic times it is doubtful many will take advantage of this technology unless they absolutely have to.

Either way, it is a very interesting development when a company that specializes in GPS fleet tracking makes a soiree into the realm of GPS tracking for teens.

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In an effort to help you find the best deals out in the GPS fleet tracking market, we are going to provide you with some information on different provides int he fleet management field.

The first provider we are going to be looking at is SageTracker World Tracking Solutions. The website for this company is fairly clean and straight forward. Navigation is principally found on the left sidebar and top link menu. Since the site also offers their own web-based real-time GPS fleet tracking they have a clearly marked section for the login for this feature under the ‘My Site’ link. This could probably more prominently placed, but it is sufficient to have it where they do.

The next thing that I noticed on the website for World Tracking Solutions was the following warning:

The use of a GPS vehicle tracking device to track a person without their permission could be illegal or result in a legal action against you, even if you own the vehicle.

Tracking another person’s vehicle is usually illegal without a warrant.

You should seek legal advice before using any GPS vehicle tracking device as the regulations vary from region to region.

I though that this was interesting for a couple of reasons:

1. What are the implications for employers in this case? Are they unable to track their company’s vehicles? Do you need to get a lawyer to check out your GPS fleet tracking system?
2. How many people use this to track people in an unlawful manner? Are they mostly psychos who are stalking women or children? Or paranoid spouses concerned with the every where about of their significant other.
3. Why have this on the front page?

The site also has products on the landing page, which is useful for those seeking information immediately. Of the products on the main page the prices range from $215 for a simple data logger to $499 plus a subscription fee for a ST Sentinel GPS Fleet Tracker. According to the companies website the ST Sentinel is a durable and weatherproof GPS that has a batter life of years. It is designed to be used for remote and exception monitoring. The annual subscription of one hour reporting for this device will run an additional $499 per unit, bringing the total to nearly $1,000.

If you have question about any of the companies GPS products you can call the toll free number that they list on their website.  I am sure a friendly sales person or customer service representative will take your call and provide you all the information that you need to make an informed decision about the best type of GPS to buy for your fleet management needs.

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One of these individuals, James Marcotte, a retired pilot now boat captain in Florida, has very little inkling on how these systems will generate the savings promised. He was quoted as saying, “A GPS will not aid in any way. It will tell you where the bus is and nothing more. How then will we realize $790,000 in savings?”

Not only is the average tax payer suspicious of the new tracking system, members of the school board are also voicing concerns over the plan. Faced with a tightening budget, the members are hard pressed to realize the savings that the plan is projected to produce. If they don’t, they could lose be held responsible by the public.

To add to the pressure, the bus drivers are resenting the notion that their every position will be monitored. They see the money as a waste, assuming that they already choose the best routes to pick up the children. They also claim that they already implement fuel saving techniques such as reducing the amount of time spent idling and driving the speed limit so that expectations of fuel savings are overblown.

That might be the case, but bus drivers from a school district in Orange county saw an 10% reduction in fuel related expense once the GPS devices were enable on the vehicles.  With gas prices running at their current prices this is a very significant amount of money.  When you add to that the improved efficiency of workers, streamlined routes, and improved central routing that could add up to significant savings.

While pressure is mounting for the district to abort the plan it might be in the best interest of the school board to take a big picture approach and implement the GPS tracking.  Over the long run, this system will help enhance the overall functionality of the fleet, improving fuel economy and worker efficiency.  It even has some added benefits that you would not normally think about in deploying this type of system – knowing where students are at any given time.

In the case of emergencies – catastrophic bus accidents, bus hijackings, school shootings, earthquakes, hurricanes, tornadoes, flooding, mud slides, or wild fires – it is always good to know exactly where the children are so that you can respond in exactly the right way. This information is provided by this system. A parent is only a phone call away from knowing that their child is safe and secure on a bus or that when something does go their child will have a first responder there in no time because of the GPS.

If the school board succumbs to the pressure of the bus drivers, public opinion, and pandering politicians they will miss out on this golden opportunity to keep their children safe and to save money as well. While there are plenty of ways the district might be spending its money, this is an expenditure that will hopefully in the long term free up more resources for those needs than spending the $411,000 on them now. It is a risk, but it is a risk that is well worth it.

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All those cool models on an oversized map move about to represent the reality of the battle was intriguing to me.  In order for the head quarters to have reliable information to make command decisions about where to send forces, push the enemy, or build defenses they had to have reliable picture of the way things really are out in the field.

It is exactly the same way with your small business.  In order to get your driver, serviceman, or package to the right location as new needs pop up in real-time requires you to have a fleet management solution that empowers you to provide a superior service that leaves your customer with an impression of significance.  GPS fleet tracking can do this for your business.

There are a few different ways that GPS is able to do this, but the primary way is through a web-based interface.  The way it works is like this: Each vehicle in your fleet is equipped with a GPS device manufactured specifically for fleet management.  This type of GPS differs significantly from your standard auto GPS in that a regular auto GPS unit only gathers, logs, and displays information for the driver of the vehicle.

GPS for fleet management, on the other hand, does all these same things but it also transmits this information to a central processing station via radio or cell tower waves.  This central processing station then interprets the position of your fleet in real time – enabling you to get a bird’s eye view of your fleet as they make the calls that make you money and prosper your business.

There are a variety of options available depending upon your particular locality, but almost all of them work around this basic premise.  Charges for the service normally work the same way across the board.  There is a large up-front fee to purchase the GPS unit.  Then, on top of that, they charge a monthly service fee for use of the processing station.  The devices can probably be hacked to transmit the information to another location, but if you already have the skill to set to do that then you could just hack a cell phone to do essentially the same thing without the large upfront fee and a much smaller monthly fee.

However you plan on making use of fleet management technology what is important to your bottom line is that you do it.  That way you can build that war room for your business to get the job done better and faster.  That will make your customers happy and your business successful.

If you are interested in more information about the how GPS fleet tracking benefits small businesses check out the post looking at the Aberdeen report on the subject.

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To accomplish that goal one metropolitan area is seriously considering using GPS fleet tracking to create efficiencies in their fleet of around 3500 vehicles. Currently, workers have to use road maps or print out directions from places like MapQuest or Google Maps in order to get directions to the place they want to go. Once they are out in the field, they have limited flexibility in terms of responding to an additional – they have to know exactly where the new call is or they have to go back to the office to get more directions printed on the computer.

To end this cycle of wasted paper and unnecessarily consumed gasoline the Nashville, Tennessee is considering installing a GPS monitoring system in many of its vehicles. This system would not only help workers save fuel and arrive at destinations on time, it would also assist city managers in ensuring that their workers accomplish the tasks that they say that they do in a timely and efficient manner. The potential for savings of the GPS fleet tracking system are therefore twofold, and elimination of wasted gas and of wasted time.  However, it is hoped that the system will not have to be used punitively against city workers, but that seems to be an inevitability considering that statistically speaking there have to be some poor employees among the many municipal workers.

Right now Nashville is just considering the use of the fleet tracking system. They want to make sure that the cost does not outweigh the benefits. One city councilman, Charlie Tygard, was seen in a TV interview saying that the devices, when used properly, will pay for themselves in a matter of months – indicating that the he thinks the devices will be an excellent investment for the city. When a slow moving bureaucratic organization like a municipality is awakened to the benefits of GPS, don’t you think your business might benefit from it as well?

For more information on this story consider reading the news story found here:
Wireless Tracking System For Metro Govt. Cars

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