What is geofencing?
Many industries use geofencing technology. For example, geofencing is often used for marketing to send a targeted email to customers who are near geofenced areas or ride-sharing services can alert passengers when there is a driver in their area. Geofencing is also useful in freight and logistics industries.
Geofencing is a virtual border drawn on the map in a fleet management system. These virtual boundaries or areas can be drawn like a single-lane street, shaped size as a whole country, or outstretched as a highway to help fleet managers monitor and manage vehicles. These geofences are used as a trigger for alerts when your vehicle/asset enters/exits in or from the geofenced area. As soon as the GPS tracking detects the movement, it will send a fleet manager an alert. It helps fleet managers to automate and simplify fleet management.
How does geofencing work?
To leverage geofencing, fleet managers need to create a virtual boundary around a specified location in GPS enabled map-based software application. The geofence will then trigger a response when an authorized device enters/exits that area.
How does geofencing help fleet managers?
Managing all your company’s vehicles and assets is a primary task for fleet managers but it is much easier if your company uses geofencing.
Utilizing a fleet management system automates the fleet manager’s tasks and creates more manageable operations. Below are the geofencing features fleet managers can benefit from to improve the efficiency and productivity of their valuable fleet assets.
Real-time alerts
With geofencing, fleet managers can receive alerts in real-time. When a driver enters/exits to/from the geofenced area, it will send you a notification. This helps fleet managers manage driver’s log time so that you can manage when a driver arrives or departs from the location. It also helps fleet managers monitor the fleet’s fuel and vehicle usage by checking how long a vehicle is outside or inside of the geofenced area.
Efficiency & productivity
Geofence provides you with valuable data and insights: the avg. time delivery duration, downtime, operational cost, fuel expenses and more. You can generate reports which contain various insights, like which vehicles are overutilized and vice versa, which routes are most expensive or efficient, and driver behavior like aggressive driving. These data sets help fleet managers make important business decisions, such as the timing of a worn-out vehicle replacement, frequency of vehicle maintenance, training for drivers, etc.
Communication & safety
Are you using manual confirmation when your driver reaches their destination? With GPS Tracking and Geofencing, you will be able to monitor the real-time location and be alerted when they enter the geofenced area.
Geofencing is the best tool when it comes to safety. As we mentioned earlier, if there are any unauthorized movements from geofenced areas, fleet managers will be notified and be able to monitor where a valuable asset is in real-time. You can prevent theft and act quickly against any unexpected emergencies.
Payroll management
Geofencing is not only tracking vehicles/assets, but also used for payroll management if you pay your drivers on an hourly basis. You can record accurate driver logs by creating geofenced perimeters around your job sites so that fleet management software can start recording the working hours. It gives fleet managers accurate logs of when drivers start/finish working and how long they worked.
This data can be used when your admin calculates payroll. It’s paperless, faster, and more accurate.
Improve customer service
Geofencing can help your company improve customer service by providing them with alerts and keeping them updated. Delivery on the time is a major factor to improve customer service. You can use GPS and geofences to optimize routes for faster delivery. Moreover, it allows fleet managers to ensure that employees are staying on task and meeting delivery objectives by setting alerts. This keeps fleet managers updated on how far your drivers are to their final destination.
