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The team at Telogis have certainly been busy over the summer with major partnerships with Volvo, Hino and Ford all announced…

Telogis & Hino Trucks

Hino Trucks have recently announced a partnership with Telogis to exclusively release Hino INSIGHT. The platform is a next-generation solution hailed to be a fully comprehensive, web-based location and telematics solution built specifically for the medium-duty commercial truck market.

Hino INSIGHT 2.0 has been developed as part of Hino’s ongoing strategy of building an offering that gives their customers a much improved total cost of ownership (TCO), including better vehicle uptime and user experiences.

Launched within the last few months Hino INSIGHT 2.0 will be standard fit on 2015MY Hino 195h and 195h-DC hybrid models, and as an option on the 195 and 195-DC models and the full conventional truck product lineup.

Commenting on the collaboration Glenn Ellis, Vice President, Marketing, Dealer Operations and Product Planning for Hino Trucks said:

“This next-generation technology brings new functionality, a refined user interface and a robust platform to support the needs of our largest fleet customer or an individual owner-operator,” said Glenn Ellis, Vice President, Marketing, Dealer Operations and Product Planning for Hino Trucks. “Telogis’ significant investments in R&D and product innovation plus its experience in the OEM environment make them the standard for excellence in the connected services industry.”

Telogis & Volvo Trucks

Indeed Telogis are fast becoming a part of the furniture in the road haulage industry, with Telogis now also bringing built-in compliance, telematics and navigation services to Volvo Trucks customers in North America.

Volvo customers are able to access Telogis’ services via smartphones and tablets by leveraging Volvo’s integrated connected vehicle hardware, standard on new Volvo-powered Volvo trucks.

It is also available for the existing 60,000 Volvo trucks already equipped with the connected vehicle hardware, making the Telogis platform ideal for all-Volvo or mixed fleets.

In commercial trucking’s evolving legislative and regulatory landscape, Telogis’ offerings for Volvo Trucks help drivers and back office teams manage FMCSA compliance and keep drivers safer by delivering electronic log tools and routing information that is specifically designed commercial drivers.

“We’re pleased to collaborate with Telogis to deliver tremendous value to motor carriers seeking flexibility and the robust information needed to fine-tune their operations,” said Göran Nyberg, president, Volvo Trucks North American Sales & Marketing.

“Leveraging the connectivity of our vehicles to facilitate fleet management services represents a breakthrough for fleet managers, who are no longer captive to hardware. As part of our long-term strategic focus, we’ll look toward further integration of our vehicles with best-in-class fleet management solutions.”

“With increasingly complex compliance regulations and the need to more effectively manage safety, productivity and costs – telematics, compliance and navigation software are no longer a ‘nice to have’ – it’s now a ‘have to have,’” said Susan Heystee, executive vice president, worldwide sales at Telogis.

“The ability to easily access mission-critical tools and information from the Telogis platform will transform the way Volvo Trucks’ customers do business.”

Telogis & Ford Crew Cheif

Moving from trucks to vans we also find Telogis once again appearing in one of the largest launches of the year.

This time its in partnership with Ford Motor Company and their launch of the all-new 2015 Ford Transit line of vans – perhaps one of the the company’s largest, most significant commercial vehicle launch in their history.

Telogis is the exclusive technology provider behind Ford Crew Chief, the market-leading, light-duty commercial telematics solution that comes factory-fit in Ford’s lineup of 2015 Transit vans as well as its complete line of commercial light-duty trucks. Ford Crew Chief powered by Telogis again aims to home in on the growing awareness that telematics solutions can help fleet managers and commercial vehicle owners reduce costs, improve driver safety and optimise operations.

“The 2015 Ford Transit, America’s newest Built Ford Tough van, will no doubt become an essential part of any commercial fleet, and with Ford Crew Chief powered by Telogis added in, customers receive a whole new level of visibility into their daily operations,” said Bill Frykman, manager, business and product development at Ford Motor Company.

“Ford Crew Chief, another example of Transit’s smart features, complements the Transit line by helping customers save money through fuel management, and more effective route and work planning; keep their drivers safer by understanding and coaching driver behavior; and improving overall operations by getting a big-picture view of maintenance, location and productivity.” 

DA Systems' David Upton looks at how we must try to change the perception of technology costs from an expense to be justified to a necessary investment when approaching the board...

Recent research undertaken to understand attitudes towards investing in technology highlighted a generic problem within the transport and logistics industry. Companies all appreciate the benefits mobile technology can bring, yet they are not succeeding in securing the necessary investment required from business leadership. Why? Because technological investment is seen as an expense to be justified rather than an investment in reducing costs and generating more profits.

It was a problem for 80% of survey respondents, 88% of whom said that they wanted to introduce new mobile technology, but faced budget restrictions.

This suggests a further underlying issue because it means that they are not developing a compelling enough business case to address the return on investments to be expected. If they were, the funds would be flowing more freely. Most business cases centre on increasing revenue.

Obviously there is a revenue element to consider, but the primary advantage of mobile technology is that it increases the likelihood of a parcel being delivered first time around – which minimises some of the largest costs associated with business operations. This article explains how to develop a business case for technological investment and prioritises the benefits.

In the case of investing in mobile technology to provide customers with an estimated time of delivery to reduce the cost of failed deliveries, building a compelling business case should be relatively straightforward. The overall impetus should be cost reduction, with a focal point of preventing the cost of a missed first time delivery. This is estimated in the region of £23 per drop and causes a very significant erosion to profit margins when it isn’t achieved.

On average, 15% of deliveries fail on the first attempt because the customer was not aware of the delivery time, which could be managed by adopting mobile technology. Even absorbing the inefficiencies of a slightly empty delivery van because orders that have been pre-loaded get cancelled, is better than the cost of a missed delivery.

 

Optimising a delivery round to take the most economical route means saving on fuel, mileage time and being able to do more drops per vehicle. In turn this means a reduction in the number of drivers and vehicles, which again saves money. So taking all these factors into consideration, the emphasis in a business case should be on technology, which is self-financing, with payback achieved within the first year of investment at the latest.

Taking DPD as a good example of how costs can be reduced and revenues increased as a result of technological improvements, they have grown sales by over £100 million as a result of implementing ETA messaging. Of course enhancing customer interaction is an important factor, but the real benefit is derived from getting deliveries right first time and reducing the cost base.

If 15% of operational costs can be saved by getting deliveries right first time, achieving better optimisation of delivery routes and requiring fewer journeys means fewer drivers are required. And courier productivity levels can be further increased by using route optimisation software, which in turn can reduce the number of miles to be driven by 10%.

For a large delivery company with a £16 million fuel bill, this creates the potential to save up to £1.6 million on fuel costs. Given their profit margin is roughly 10%, this creates a net increase to the total bottom line of 10%, a huge bonus.

To quote another delivery company example, after it implemented route optimisation, fleet mileage was cut by 17% and overall fleet size was reduced by 7%. This is the type of rationale that needs to be used in a business case for technological investment, going beyond customer and branding benefits to deliver hard cost savings and potential for greater profits.

So far we have outlined just a few of the solid cost saving justifications to be included in a business case for investing in new technology and there are many more, ranging from improved communication with call centre staff and traffic management options, to reduced fuel consumption.

When developing a business case, delivery companies need to be clear about the tangible benefits and turn the way they approach investing in technology around. Think of it as less of ‘an expenditure to be justified’ and more as a way to make greater profits with immediate payback.

Masternaut, one of the largest European providers of telematics solutions, has announced the MT400 telematics hub which has been designed exclusively by Masternaut’s dedicated R&D team for Masternaut’s Connect platform.

The MT400 delivers unprecedented levels of connectivity, modular applications, and over-the-air device & application management. Masternaut’s patented technology for Vehicle CANbus data acquisition is fully integrated so that real time, accurate odometer, fuel, diagnostics and other floating car data can be extracted for reporting and telemetry applications such as driver behaviour, risk profiling, crash detection, and remote diagnostics.

The MT400 can integrate directly with tachographs, temperature control units, salt dispenser units, weighing sensors and other on-board vehicle equipment. All of this data & control is seamlessly integrated with Connect to provide accurate and flexible reporting, alerting, visualisation and control. MT400 can connect to smartphones, tablets, and other screen devices for rich driver integration features including navigation, messaging, workflow, etc.

MT400 is designed using latest automotive grade electronics and mechanics to provide best-in-class performance and reliability, with a streamlined installation and in-field support process, minimising vehicle installation times, and ensuring devices can be fully managed remotely.

Alex Rothwell, Masternaut’s CTO comments “The MT400 transforms in-vehicle solutions and is a step-change from current “black-box” technology. It is the culmination of substantial R&D investment, building on Masternaut’s patents and know-how from 10 years designing market leading telematics devices.

“To ensure our customers get the most out of Connect, they need flexible in-vehicle solutions which provide the telemetry, vehicle system integration, and driver interaction demanded by advanced telematics applications. MT400 addresses this need, and with a new automotive grade design also provides superior performance and reliability.”

Martin Hiscox, Masternaut’s chairman and CEO, added  “Masternaut is unique within in the industry in that we design and develop all components of our core service ourselves, from hardware right through to SaaS-based end-user applications. Our vision is clear, and by structuring the development process in this manner – and supporting it with the largest telematics R&D team in Europe – it is our responsibility to execute it.

“To ensure our customers get the most out of Connect, they need leading hardware which is not only versatile enough to support our full suite of modular applications, but which delivers business intelligence based solely on absolute vehicle data. The introduction of the MT-400 technology as standard provides even greater accuracy for our customers, enabling them to get even more return on their telematics investment.”  

 

Results of a recent survey by DA Systems into attitudes towards technology amongst firms within the UK transport and logistics industries highlighted that whilst the majority believed in the importance of technology to create a superior service offering, getting access to the financial and operational backing required to make the necessary investments still remains an issue for many companies...

88% of companies participating in the research agreed that technology was an essential source of competitive differentiation, yet over 50% of respondents revealed that they have yet to introduce real-time track and trace capabilities, although it was high on their wish lists of process improvements. This ‘relaxed’ attitude towards implementing new technology was further highlighted by the finding that 58% of delivery fleets are not using mobile data services to enhance driver information and provide real-time job monitoring capabilities. Budgetary constraints may be a key factor behind the lack of technological investment, because 80% of respondents cited budget restrictions as the main barrier.

According to DA Systems, these findings highlight that companies are failing to make the connection between the introduction of technology and an ability to generate additional revenue to offset the initial investment costs. This can be achieved through operational savings from paperless working and by improving service levels to ultimately become a delivery partner of choice amongst consumers.

“The research showed up some surprising results, for instance, companies understand the role technology needs to play but have some way to go to making the investments required. And clearly, although there is a perception that ePOD (electronic proof of delivery) is a mature market, many within the industry remain reliant on paper based proof of delivery processes, which cannot be good for profit levels,” says David Upton, Managing Director of DA Systems.

Returning to the survey findings, although business confidence is improving, costs remain a concern and this was reflected in the improvements respondents cited they would like to make to delivery processes. 88% said reducing driven mileage and fuel consumption was a priority, followed by improving driver behaviour monitoring (47%) and reducing the total number of hours worked by implementing efficiency improvements (also 47%).

Demonstrating the business impact of controversial BYOD (bring your own device) IT policies within the transport sector, 53% of companies who were using POD solutions (proof of delivery) said they were considering the possibility of allowing their drivers to use smartphones instead of traditional rugged devices.

E-commerce has undoubtedly had a big impact on the UK’s transportation sector and this trend continues. Nearly 1/3 of the companies surveyed (28%) believed that the free click and collect services offered by retailers were ‘a possible threat to a courier’s delivery business from e-commerce orders’. This finding can be further verified by the recent launches of new sameday or special Sunday deliveries by major delivery firms working with e-commerce companies, again demonstrating the need to continue improving service levels to compete with increased consumer expectations for faster deliveries and the growing popularity of click and collect.

When given a wish list of improvements they would like to make to their own service offering, ensuring the highest level of customer satisfaction was clearly an ongoing business priority. Almost three quarters (70%) of the survey respondents said they would like to offer an estimated delivery ETA messaging capability and have the ability to send an email or text to recipients alerting them to expect their delivery at a particular time of day. A further 41% said they would like to allow recipients to change the delivery drop location for convenience.

And yet whilst these service improvements may be high on the business improvement agenda, continuing budget restrictions and a perception amongst budget holders that this type of technology is potentially being seen as a ‘nice to have’ by some, could result in a gap forming between the smaller independent transport providers and larger operators with greater resources to invest in new technology.

“It is clear from the findings that delivery firms have not understood the potential to reduce costs and generate additional profits as a result of investing in technology and working more efficiently. Being constrained by budgets is a short-sighted view because the business case for an investment in proof of delivery software, or a messaging system that notifies consumers with an ETA for their parcel deliveries, will deliver an immediate return,” concludes David Upton.

 

BJB Lift Trucks, the intelligent materials handling solutions provider, is using Masternaut’s powerful fleet management solution to monitor the location of its fleet and distribute workloads accordingly, to create the most cost-efficient and productive workforce.

BJB Lift Trucks has seen widespread benefits across the business, since installation, with Masternaut’s solution giving it the ability to distribute work loads according to exact vehicle positioning. This has produced a 15% drop in fuel cost through cutting down on the unnecessary time vehicles spend out on the road.

The knock-on effect from this has been a reduction in vehicle usage, meaning that vehicle depreciation has been lowered, extending the vehicle life-cycle and reducing the requirement for maintenance or repair work. Operational efficiency has been improved, with a cut down in driving as well as quicker depot turnaround times, meaning that each member of staff is fully utilised throughout the working day.

The HR division has seen a number of benefits, with Masternaut’s in-depth retrospective reporting providing evidence for disciplinary matters such as speeding, while forming a comprehensive audit trail. The finance department benefits from improved operational efficiency as these reports can be cross-checked with timesheets instantly, making expense claims easily verifiable.

“We selected Masternaut above other telematics providers due to the high level of professional service they offer at a very reasonable cost, in comparison to competitors. Since using Masternaut’s solution, we’ve seen benefits across the whole business – not just fleet operations.” Commented BJB Lift Trucks.

“With 80% of our team out on the road, it’s vital we keep track of their locations and without Masternaut we couldn’t have done it. The team are always on hand to advise and support us whenever needed, and we look forward to working with Masternaut in the future to introduce further innovation to our business.”

Martin Hiscox, CEO and chairman of Masternaut, adds: “It’s great to see that as a result of our work together, we’ve helped oversee a 15% cut in fuel costs businesswise at BJB Lift Trucks.”

“With the bulk of BJB Lift Truck’s workforce mobile, we knew it was essential for fleet managers to have full visibility of their fleet at all times. Our solution has ensured this has been the outcome and we’re looking forward to seeing how we can further cut costs and improve efficiency with BJB Lift Trucks.”

Ahead of his speech to delegates at the 2014 Service Management Expo Giles Margerison, TomTom Telematics’ Director UK & Ireland, considers the impact of technology on the changing face of field service management.

The activities of field workers have traditionally been managed as separate, distinct, operations to those of the back office – but times they are a changin’.

The face and pace of service business is being revolutionised by innovations in mobile workforce management.

The field is increasingly being brought into the fold with technology forging end-to-end connections between vehicles, field hardware, mobile workers, the back office, management and other departments. The value of this cannot be underestimated with data generated by field service fleets proving invaluable to numerous areas of a company – from customer relations to HR, sales and accounts.

What’s more it is becoming easier than ever to connect business hardware and software with fleet management technology. Out-of-the-box integrations mean back office systems are seamlessly connecting with vehicles and mobile workers without the need for expensive IT consultancy.

Harnessing big data to boost business performance

By using connected technologies to make smarter decisions, informing advancements in operational processes, radical improvements can be made to business performance and the bottom line.

Business connectivity is already having a major impact in the back office, where the integration of CRM, ERP, workflow planning and other software platforms has allowed companies to achieve significant efficiency gains.

Fleet management systems that have open APIs are now extending integration capabilities to the field – helping businesses harness the potential of big data to cut costs and achieve unprecedented levels of customer service.

The telematics gateway for M2M efficiency

Using an in-vehicle telematics unit to transmit field data to the back office, signature capture devices, for example, can now make use of job and GPS positional data from a fleet management platform to prove a delivery was made to a specific location at a particular time by a designated driver.

Similarly, mobile printers, paired by Bluetooth to an in-vehicle telematics box, can now print receipts or invoices enriched with this same information.

Accessed via fleet management software, all field data can be shared with back office software, including routing and scheduling and workflow management systems. By doing so, managers can ensure jobs or deliveries are completed punctually and customers notified in advance of precise arrival times, with work schedules planned in the most efficient manner, taking into account factors such as traffic or proximity.

Tomorrow’s world ...today

Innovations such as TomTom Telematics’ PRO 8275 driver terminal extend field service capabilities even further, combining the capability of mobile hardware, satellite navigation and mobile business applications on a single device.

Bespoke apps for use on such terminals are now being developed, enabling it be tailored to meet specific business and service requirements – from conducting and submitting vehicle safety checks to recording proof of delivery.

Managers and drivers, as a result, are now being brought closer together than ever before with new M2M processes catapulting field service into a bold new era,

 

 

Enterprise Mobility expert, Jon Vass of Telogis, claims that instead of cutting back on services businesses should instead look to optimise their mobile workforces...

With the right technologies an organisation can save hundreds of thousands of pounds by simply working more efficiently. Route optimisation, improved vehicle maintenance and mobile technology can provide significant savings on the bottom line and give a competitive edge.

Pundits claim that Britain's 'Great Recession' started in the spring of 2008 and ended in the summer of 2009. Today many would argue differently, for figures show that businesses are still in slow recovery. The key factor over the last few years - and possibly the biggest - is that consumers, companies and the state are all locked in a race to straighten out their finances. Which means each of these will be trying to reduce costs.

Of course, for many businesses it is easy to reduce costs by looking at expenditure and simply cutting back, reducing staff and overheads, even moving premises. However, this is often reactionary and short term and does not allow for business growth or changes in customer demand.

For businesses with mobile workforces there is another way to reduce costs – and this involves optimisation of current resources with technology. With today’s advances in web based applications, investing in a business solution no longer means purchasing hardware, software and expensive support services. Solutions are now readily available that can be deployed in the field and accessed securely on the Internet without investing in costly infrastructure.

Optimising resources

For a business with a mobile workforce, the costs that need close scrutiny are the driver’s time and vehicle routing and maintenance. While a professional operations manager can plan and oversee driver routes, vehicle running and maintenance, a computer can do a much better job of analysis and planning.

An example is route optimisation. A simple route from A to B can be easily planned. Add into that route several drop off points and immediately the number of routes becomes more complex. Factors such as different average speed, traffic congestion, access and roadworks and immediately fuel costs will fluctuate. Planning so many variations to optimise routes is a task that a computer programme is made to crunch through.

 

And it’s not simply a matter of daily management and planning. Monitoring job completion over the air and comparing this with the plan is key. Ensuring regular vehicle checks can also reduce costly maintenance bills. Capturing such data and analysing it for meaningful intelligence can be easily managed using mobile technologies.

 

These arguments make even more sense when you quantify them with real figures. The average costs quoted for a driver and vehicle is £50,000 a year, a not insignificant amount. By utilising effective technologies to optimise route plans and eliminate unnecessary journeys a business could reduce these costs by 10-20%. This could equate to a saving of between £250k - £500k a year for a fleet of 50 vehicles or more. Definite food for thought.

Choosing the right technologies and provider

The figures easily support the case for why a business should adopt technology for its route optimisation and mobile workforce management tools – the second important decision is how to execute it.

Such has been the rapid innovations in the past few years that there are now many business applications available on the market that capture driver data, increase efficiencies and reduce costs. And many of these solutions are readily available, plug and play offerings.

Software available as a cloud based solution or software-as-a-service means that a business can benefit from the latest technologies, built-in security and the assurance that upgrades are automatically implemented. More users and increased storage capacity can be easily accommodated with no disruption to daily business and without big additional costs.

There are also two other important factors to consider. Choosing the right professional services partner is key to ensure that the technologies adopted are right for the business. This means selecting a first class provider with proven industry credentials that can provide responsive support both at start up and ongoing. A rapid start up minimises costs and ensures a fast return on the investment.

The second factor is to choose systems from one provider and on one platform. Selecting different solutions and supplier platforms can result in costly integration issues and difficulty in sharing data, reducing the ability to use important intelligence to optimise resources.

There is no doubt that the power and versatility of technologies available today, coupled with the ubiquity of fast Internet connectivity, means that organisations are now able to harness enterprise-grade solutions for managing their mobile resources. Businesses that choose to adopt these technologies can quickly reap the benefits of these developments by optimising their workforce and reducing costs.

Following a three step approach will ensure business success; by selecting a proven industry supplier, adopting a single platform for connected vehicle services and thirdly ensuring that the data is used for future planning as well as resource optimisation.

 

 

Overview: 

While most people are enjoying their summer holidays, the staff at GRITIT are hard at work getting ready for the long, cold winter months ahead. It’s the tough winters that GRITIT counts on as the UK’s leading provider of gritting services, supplying winter services protection and winter risk management services to organisations in the retail, commercial, financial, high security, industrial, logistics, health and education sectors.

With more than 166,000 service visits, of which 99.99 percent were successfully completed, maintaining a 99.2 percent customer satisfaction rate and the British Institute of Facilities Management Service Provider of the Year 2013 distinction, it’s clear that customer service is of supreme importance to GRITIT.

“We work from 6pm to 6am, so are an ‘unseen service’, therefore it is critical that we can track and manage our operatives on site and have the ability to guarantee to our customers that the services they requested have been completed,” said Brendon Petsch, IT Director at GRITIT.

“So confident are we of our service, and our ability to ensure customers’ sites are safe for the public and employees, we stand the liability for clients in the event of an accident or claim.”

Harnessing the Power of the Cloud to Manage Data:

To support this bold stance GRITIT accumulates millions of pieces of data during the course of a season and employs cloud-based telematics – also known as location intelligence – software from Telogis that works with its existing technology investments to identify the key pieces of data it needs to improve overall operations. The ability to create efficiencies within its workforce and streamline processes – particularly through the ubiquity of mobile devices – is passed on as an added value to GRITIT’s customers.

“Smartphones and handheld devices are the backbone of our business. Despite the phenomenal increase in usage and adoption of mobile devices and cloud based technologies in the last five years, the telematics software industry has not kept pace. That is where Telogis is different. The combination of its cloud/Software-as a-Service software platform and cutting edge mobile solutions means the very latest technology is always used,” said Petsch.

Platform Approach Supports Multiple Devices:

The first stage of the plan was to replace GRITIT’s existing systems with Telogis’ fully integrated, single platform for location intelligence. Previously GRITIT used two disparate systems, one for mobile device reporting and job allocation and the other for locating vehicles and assets. Getting the two systems to talk to each other in the past took some major software development.

The appeal of Telogis was the automatic integration of all of its solutions, so the initial implementation was smoother and the GRITIT team was up and running more quickly.

“Operationally, updating our systems to work with just one platform is great. The (Telogis) system works really well and is easy to use,” said Petsch. “The rest of the industry is still in the dark ages when it comes to smartphone and tablet software, whereas with Telogis we are able to use the very latest Android and iOS devices.”

Location Intelligence supports GRITIT operations in the Field:

GRITIT is now using numerous solutions as part of the  comprehensive Telogis platform: Telogis Fleet is used to track all vehicles during and after service for proof of attendance. As the vehicle arrives on site, the amount of data collected is increased to enable them to track exactly where the vehicle is within the site, as well as monitor driver behaviour like speeding, idling and out of hours use of the vehicle.

Telogis Progression offers real-time job creation, tracking, alerts, job reassignment if things don’t go to plan and job completion reporting. It also provides real-time alerts that notify GRITIT supervisors when drivers have completed work and validation that drivers were on the job site to complete their work. This helps them maintain their job completion rate throughout each shift. If staff are running behind, jobs can easily be assigned to other drivers by dragging and dropping a job onto another driver’s route, where it automatically shows up on his job list. At the end of the shift GRITIT performs a final check by reconciling completed jobs with the actual location of the vehicle at that time. This allows the company to maintain its gold-standard customer satisfaction rating.

Using Telogis Mobile running on a smartphone or other handheld device, drivers receive their job allocations and are able to report on each job, logging arrival and departure times, any issues and site conditions. Details specific to certain sites for example, site access codes, are stored in the Telogis system and supplied to the drivers as required. This way, drivers can easily convey site conditions by attaching photos to their form responses which provides easy confirmation for supervisors and customers that a site has been serviced to spec.

Additionally, GRITIT managers complete random site inspections to ensure quality is maintained, and they too report back to head office in real time. Because all the documentation received from the field is available within the Telogis systems in real time these inspections can take place within minutes of jobs being completed. In this way, if there are any issues onsite such as a leaking pipe or someone that shouldn’t be there, the client is alerted immediately.

Powerful Real-time Reporting Provides Proof of Service:

Strong reporting is a key part of the Telogis platform, and an integral part of GRITIT’s service to its customers. With Telogis GRITIT is now able to build its own customised reports to exactly match client requirements.

Unlike most other organisations in the industry, GRITIT uses its tracking data proactively to provide proof of service, and as part of its daily reporting to clients. If any job does not go ahead as expected, an alert is produced by the Telogis system, enabling GRITIT’s management team to resolve the issue and alert the customer as necessary in real time.

Next Step – online tracking for the customer:

The next phase of the implementation is to further integrate the Telogis platform with GRITIT’s business systems, using Telogis Data Exchange (TDE). Ultimately this will enable the collection of information from drivers’ onsite via mobile devices that will pass through the entire organisation seamlessly such as providing information to contracts, finance/invoicing, and HR.

Brendon Petsch sums up; “It is still relatively early days with the Telogis system, but everything is running well and we are looking forward to a long and successful partnership. Ultimately GRITIT would like to provide live tracking data to our customers through Telogis Live, so that they can see for themselves exactly what is happening on site. We are proud to be taking this innovative approach and Telogis is the ideal partner to help us realise our business goals.”

 

 

Greggs, the UK’s leading bakery food-on-the-go retailer has reported productivity improvements of 60% in their service supply chain after implementing Aeromark Optimatics. In the first six months following moving to Aeromark’s smart technology, Greggs has seen the productivity of their directly employed service engineers  improve from 3.5 to 5.5 completed jobs per day.

In 2012 Greggs recognised improvements were needed to their Shop asset and service management system to allow them to use their own service engineers and outsourced service supply chain more efficiently.

“We needed a system that provided thorough visibility, quick data transfer and scheduling.” Said Chris Metcalfe, Shop Maintenance Manager at Greggs.

Following an intensive review of the market, along with creditable recommendations, Greggs opted for Aeromark Optimatics.“We needed a system that managed the whole process from our assets on site through to efficient scheduling of maintenance, to mobile apps and sub-contractor performance measurement. Whilst we evaluated alternatives, Aeromark Optimatics technology, along with the company’s approach for working with customers was way ahead of the competition.” Metcalfe added

Optimatics provides Greggs shop maintenance team with a single solution for asset management, dynamic real time scheduling of reactive work, integrated mobile workflows, vehicle tracking and seamless integration with subcontractors systems. “This system allows our planners to have full visibility of our engineers and jobs allowing for reactive jobs to be planned quickly and efficiently. The system shows how many jobs are outstanding and closed allowing for retrospective reports on SLA hits to be generated.” Said Metcalfe

Since the deployment of Aeromark Optimatics system, Greggs real time closure of planned and reactive jobs has improved through engineers data capture via effective integrated workflows.Roger Marks, Managing Director of Aeromark commented:

'In the current economy, businesses are looking for ways to lower wastage without having to commit to high capital expenditure. The right mobile workforce management and vehicle tracking systems can offer great value for relatively low investment, and start saving the customer money as soon as they are installed. The key is to find a solution that delivers accurate, reliable data and detailed, configurable reports in order to gain total visibility of your resources.

Greggs investment in the Aeromark Optimatics system has delivered quantifiable savings and continues to improve their customer service levels.