GPS tracking has changed the way companies work. With GPS tracking business owners can easily keep track of their products and assets. Today, if you are in the moving business, you can track each and every truck that is part of your fleet, the same can also be said for transport companies. If you are involved in freight or shipping transportation, you can equip each of your shipping containers with a simple GPS tracker and know where every single one is, without the cost of having to manually track each one. Whenever or where ever they move, you will know.
In addition to this, business owners can also keep track of their employees. For example, GPS trackers can be used to know when employees come to work and how long they stay but GPS trackers do not have to be used solely for monitoring purposes. You can provide your employees with an extra layer of security by equipping them with a standalone GPS tracker that features an alert button. This can be especially important for private security workers, real-estate agents, or delivery service workers. These are but a few of the everyday business uses of this technology. Stay with us and discover the many uses and advantages of GPS tracking.
1. Tracking work time
The simplest and most common use of employee GPS tracking is its ability to assess each employee and how long they have stayed. It’s simple to use; all you have to do is either have a GPS tracking app installed on your employee’s mobile device or have your employee’s carry standalone GPS devices. Just geofence the building where your business is and once an employee arrives at the building the app or the GPS tracker will activate and start tracking their time.
The process is automatic, it stops once an employee exits the building and will continue recording hours once they return. This can also be used with employees who aren’t tied to the workplace. Instead of geofencing the workplace, merely activate trackers and app once a worker arrives for the workday and then keep it on while they are on the field.
2. Keeping employees safe
One of the simplest and most effective ways of keeping your workforce safe is through the use of GPS tracking and every employee’s privacy can be protected once mobile apps are being used solely during work hours or simply through the use of standalone GPS tracking devices.
The use of an app or tracker with an alarm button that once pressed sends an alarm message to an administrator informing them that a workday or shift has ended can be very easily introduced. Trucks or buses, for example, that do not have their own tracking devices would be able to integrate these properties quite seamlessly because many devices used for vehicle tracking also have this alarm feature.
3. Keeping your assets in check
Aside from making sure your employees are safe and sound, you can keep your assets in check with a built-in GPS tracker. For instance, installing one on your shipping containers will ensure that they are always visible on your GPS tracking map. Once a trucker takes a container for delivery, they can pair the two GPS trackers (theirs and the assets) ensuring that you will receive notification should your container go some other route. Trackers can be used for an entire vehicle fleet ensuring that you know where each vehicle is at any given moment.
4. Coordinating your workforce
GPS tracking guarantees the easier coordination of your workforce. All of your employees can be visible on a map, and by knowing where each of them is, you can create delivery routes or use their location to arrange for a better service. For example, if you own a plumbing business, track your workers and maximise their efficiency by sending them appointments that are nearest to their location.
5. Assigning clients and tasks to specific employees
Efficiency and focus are the keys to success.
By using GPS tracking to coordinate your workforce, you can also track the efficiency of each employee. This can lead to finding specific tasks or clients most suited to each of your employees. For instance, if you own a taxi company and notice that one of your employees has the greatest number of fares when assigned to a specific part of town. Either because they live there and know more people, or because they know that area best and can find shortcuts, this knowledge when shared can help to keep certain drivers assigned to that specific part of town, helping them earn more while also increasing your profits.
6. Optimizing your expenses and saving up time
By equipping your vehicle fleet with GPS trackers, you can track their routes along with recording them. This information when analysed by an administrator can be used to optimise your fleet’s fuel usage. This way your fuel expenses will be noticeably lower, quickly paying off the investment you made in getting GPS trackers.
And, as we explained above, by maximising the efficiency of your agents you will save time and get the most out of your workforce while all the while lowering your expenses.
7. Managing your vehicle fleet
GPS trackers are not only used to optimise routes but can be used to manage your whole fleet. See which employee is on the move or what driver is waiting for their next assignment at the base. With GPS tracking you can check out all routes, see departure and arrival times and assign new deliveries through its communication capabilities in order to optimize your fleets’ deliveries.
By overseeing your employees in this way it is easier to recognise their hard work and more importantly, reward it.
8. Track employee’s efficiency
As we mentioned above, you can track the efficiency of your drivers in order to give various benefits to the best ones. Tracking employee’s efficiency can be done for other business types, too. You can see who did most deliveries, which of your agents showed the biggest number of estates to clients (you don’t have to award just those who made the most sales), taxi drivers who did most miles during a month, etc.
GPS tracking doesn’t have to be a tool used only to supervise employees. You can also use it to see who’s best and to reward those who are trying hard to get their work done and to be the best workers possible.
9. Setting up customized shift hours
Some people are more efficient in the morning, others at night. In order to maximize performance, you can track workers’ efficiency and then suggest certain employees that they can work in shifts with in order to achieve the greatest level of efficiency.
This shouldn’t be mandatory, and we advise you not to make it mandatory because if you do, you’ll see that changing shifts without worker’s consent will just achieve the opposite effect. Find a way for them to agree on working in certain shifts. Give them a bonus on their base pay, or a few more off days during the year. While this may seem like an unnecessary expenditure, it will make workers happier and more efficient, and in the end, your profits will be higher. Look at these extra expenses as a long-term investment. This is precisely what they are.
10. Making the workplace better for your employees
While this seems like a strange use of GPS tracking, it can be done. Just equip your workers with a GPS tracking app, or a standalone GPS tracking device and then let the people from HR sector do their magic.
They can track employee routes and change placement of water coolers so that people working in certain offices don’t have to walk through half the floor in order to get a glass of water, the same can be said for the copy room and the printing dock.
11. Simplifying communication with your employees
There are a couple of ways GPS tracking can ease communication between an owner and employees and between employees themselves. First and most simply get a GPS tracking app with a messaging feature. This way all employees who have the app can communicate among themselves.
Secondly, administrators can look at the map and find agents who are closest to the next assignment, like in taxi companies, and send them on the assignment instead of calling out all drivers and waiting for someone to answer. Employees can also communicate this amongst themselves and in the event that someone needs help with their task they can just open the app, select the co-worker closest to their location and ping them in order to get the help required.
12. Setting up areas of coverage
If you run any business that deals with field work, you can easily set up areas of coverage for different teams and workers. Simply use your GPS map, divide your town, geofence each area and assign teams and workers to each one. This way your teams will be more efficient, and there won’t be any mix ups. Each task will be allocated to an employee in a specific area of coverage and all information can be easily checked and kept track of. If, by chance, all teams inside a certain area of coverage are busy, there’s an easy way to send an outside team. Just let your administrator check which team (or worker) is closest, and they can use the inbuilt messaging system to notify them.
13. Making sure your assets are used in the best way possible
Your company’s assets include your employees, your equipment, and your money, and you have to make sure that all assets are used in the best way possible. If you own a shipping business use GPS tracking to find out the most efficient way and day to ship goods. Through tracking your shipments’, you may discover that Tuesdays are the slowest day of the week, and that sacrificing one day by moving all Tuesday shipments to Wednesday may save you a lot of money.
If you own a chain of grocery stores, you can optimize resupplies by tracking supply routes and finding patterns. For instance, if some of your stores run out of cereals and mineral water in a span of a couple of days you can organize shipments that contain only those two products, keeping your customers happy and making sure each stockroom is filled with the needed goods. Maybe some other stores run out of coffee and oranges on the same day of the week? There’s an idea for your next optimized shipment route.
14. Making sure your employees don’t work too many overtime hours
Some truckers and taxi drivers may work for 20 or more hours at a time in order to finish their routes or to earn more money during weekends. This can be very bad for them, and for you. Drivers cannot work such long shift; their focus will be dangerously reduced and their chances of being involved in an accident increases.
In order to prevent this type of irresponsible behaviour, install GPS trackers inside your trucks and taxi vehicles and let administrators do their job. There’s a limit to how many hours drivers can drive during a 24-hour period, and once a worker goes over that limit administrators can give them a warning and notify them it is time for a break. They can help truckers in tracking their route and finding rest stops ahead of them so drivers can stop before reaching the time limit.
15. Using all, or some, of our advice to grow your business
We hope you found this article and the advice we shared useful and can see the many ways that GPS tracking can be used to help make your business better, your workers happier and more efficient, and your profits higher.
GPS tracking is here to get the best for you, your assets and your employees. It can and will help your business grow and your workforce flourish.
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