Oct 02 2011

Determine how much fuel and C02 idling is actually costing you and the environment

We have a customer that really needed to precisely measure how much fuel and CO2 emissions their idling was costing them.

Not all vehicles are created equal, so at the individual vehicle level, we made the fuel type and estimated number of gallons consumed per hour idling something our customers can set.

Here’s how you get there:

Open Vehicle Administration

Open Vehicle Administration

There is a new option in vehicle admin called “Update fuel and emissions info”:

Update fuel and emissions info

Update fuel and emissions info

We have a “liters engine size to gallons idled per hour” converter which allows you to plug in your engine size and determine a fairly accurate number of gallons idled away per hour:

compute and override the # of gallons per hour spent idling

compute and override the # of gallons per hour spent idling

Here I am editing a SALES vehicle driven by KEVINJS:

update fuel type and gallons per hour idling

update fuel type and gallons per hour idling

Once you have overridden any defaults necessary (we default to unleaded and .4 gallons per hour spent idling), then you can run your report:

Run an idle report with fuel usage/CO2 emissions

Run an idle report with fuel usage/CO2 emissions

I ran it for the September for the Albuquerque group (ALB) which contains the newly changed 5.0 liter F-150 which burns .55 gallons per hour of diesel:

How much fuel / emissions is idling costing me?

How much fuel / emissions is idling costing me?

In this case, KEVINJS had roughly 7 hours and 3.863 gallons of idling, which we compute (based on the properties of the different types of fuels) to equate to .034 tons of emissions.

Together, the ALB group idled 512 hours, costing 209.6 gallons of fuel and 1.846 tons of CO2.

Now by using GPS Alerts, you can notify your drivers that they’re idling and ask them to shut down the vehicle with a text message or email (and since they’re idling and not actually driving, there are no distracted driving issues).

Then later on, you can easily determine your fuel and CO2 savings by running this or other idling reports available within GPS Insight.

Enjoy!

Rob

Feel free to contact us if you are interested in seeing a more in-depth demonstration of our GPS fleet tracking solution.

Tags: , , , , , , , , ,


Aug 14 2011

I got caught speeding to Sedona

Thankfully not by the police, but by GPS Insight.

I was heading to Sedona this afternoon with my family and got this alert by email, showing that I was doing 61 in a 35 MPH zone, along with a map showing I’m coming up on a curve:

Posted Speed Limit alert for me

Posted Speed Limit alert for me

I thought there was no way I would go that fast over the speed limit so when I got home from my trip, I checked GPS Insight to see if we had the right posted speed for that area.

We have an internal-use-only “pincushion” tool we use which shows the various speed limits based on which direction you’re traveling, relative to the roads nearby and some reasonable assumptions.

The pin says it changes from a 55 to a 35 a little way before my vehicle location was sent with instantaneous speed of 61:

GPS Insight "pincushion" posted sped limit tool

GPS Insight "pincushion" posted sped limit tool

I thought that was unlikely, so I went down to street view, and found a 35 MPH speed sign right there (above, it’s the yellow pushpin):

Proof that it's a 35 MPH zone

Proof that it's a 35 MPH zone

I guess I was speeding.

So what’s my defense?  I didn’t see the sign?  At least I can measure the distance until the turn and see that there was LOTS of room to slow down before the curve that 35 MPH zone was put there for:

Rob speeding (61 in a 35)

Rob speeding (61 in a 35)

You can see I measured 600 feet before the BEGINNING of the curve, which is plenty of time to get from 61 to 35.  That’s 2 football fields.  And since my prior max was 65 (in the info bubble) I was slowing — just not fast enough for the speed limit…  But at least you can drill down and get some better context for the posted speed alert.  That’s ideal — without the ability to easily drill down for more information, you don’t know the context of the speeding alert, and can’t make good decisions on how to approach (or not to approach) your drivers about these alerts.

So even GPS tracking company owners speed.  Maybe it was so I had some good material for a blog article?  Yeah, that was it.

Here is a picture from Sedona, by the way:

Sedona, Arizona

Sedona, Arizona

And I didn’t speed on the way home, as evidenced by the alerts report I ran for today for my vehicle (Nav2):

Run an alert history for my vehicle for today

Run an alert history for my vehicle for today

But I did idle for 8 minutes while we stopped for snacks for the ride home (and my device went out of range when I pulled into the garage, since I live in the middle of nowhere, and my oil change and rotate tires maintenance items never got updated…):

My alerts for today

My alerts for today

This is the point of having a GPS fleet tracking solution — set the alerts, and wait for your drivers to do something you want to be alerted to.

I’m paying for my own tickets and gas, and I know I’ve got a 4×4 and 600 feet to slow down before a curve in a pretty desolate area, so no real issues here.  But you certainly want to know these types of things about your drivers.

Especially if it’s your money for fuel, drivers’ licenses at stake, and your liability should they be driving too fast.

Rob.

Tags: , , , , , , ,


Aug 10 2011

Traffic added to GPS Insight browser maps

GPS Insight has supported traffic for years via Google Earth.

Finally we’re bringing real-time traffic data to the dashboard and 2D mapping.

Here’s a screenshot:

 

GPS Insight releases traffic data in maps

GPS Insight releases traffic data in maps

 

Just a single click and you’ll get real-time, color-based traffic overlays in your maps.

Enjoy!

Rob.

Tags: , , , , , , , , , ,


Aug 06 2011

Tracking (and using) the Branson MO “Downtown Trolleys”

I am on a Summer trip with my 2 boys for their vacation to Branson, MO.  It’s like Disneyland for kids in the Ozarks in Missouri.

As we were getting onto the Trolley which shuttles you around “Old Town” Branson, I realized they were a customer of GPS Insight’s, and asked a support person to send me the Mobile Map link to their vehicles so I could “track myself” and see how close the trolley was later when it was time to get back on. [Mobile Mapping is a free capability within GPS Insight under the "Mapping/Mobile Mapping" menu.  You just need to retrieve the unique, secure link and you can view your vehicles from any smart phone or tablet]

Here is a picture of the boys on the Trolley:

 

My boys on the Branson Downtown Trolley

My boys on the Branson Downtown Trolley

So within a minute or so my support person was able to text me the link to use from my smartphone to see the Trolley position:

Where the Trolley is according to GPS Insight

Where the Trolley is according to GPS Insight

Then quickly I clicked on Street View to see where Google thinks it looks like out my Trolley Window:

Google street View from Trolley Location

Google street View from Trolley Location

And quickly I took a picture with my iPhone to show it was EXACTLY like that at the moment:

Actual picture I took from the Trolley window

Actual picture I took from the Trolley window

Not bad, Google (or GPS Insight)!

The Branson "Downtown Trolley"

The Branson "Downtown Trolley"

I got off at the Bass Pro Shop stop so my kids could look around in advance of their big fishing trip the next morning.  I’ll talk about how I was able to minimize my wait for the Trolley (it was 111 degrees and HUMID) in the next article.

I’m glad we’re able to help Branson with their Trolley Tracking initiative.  Great town to visit with your family.  For more information click here!

Thanks,

Rob.

 

Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,


Jul 29 2011

New Timestamps in Garmin Dispatch/Messaging Module

With our new timestamp functionality you can now check the time a Garmin Message or Dispatch Item (stop) was:

  • Sent by Dispatch or GPS Insight automatically or via text
  • Delivered to the Garmin
  • Viewed by the Driver
  • Accepted by the Driver
  • Marked as complete by the driver

Here’s how:

The other day I Dispatched myself by texting “gps rob dis robhouse” which is short for “gps [rob 4000] [dispatch] [landmark named robhouse].”

Here are the timestamps of each of the status changes (available under the “Custom->Garmin” menu):

View Garmin Dispatch Status Change Timestamps in GPS Insight

View Garmin Dispatch Status Change Timestamps in GPS Insight

Note all I need to do is “hover over” the “Done” status at the end of the Message field, and the date-stamped statuses are visible.

After dispatching myself at 4:09, it instantly appeared as a stop on my Garmin.

I saw it, but then drove a bit so it would have a different timestamp when it became “active”, at 4:10, as I was about to turn North onto Scottsdale Road.  Note the change to “Active” at 4:10.  Here is where everything happened, after running a 3D history like this:

Run a 3D Map History for a day for my vehicle

Run a 3D Map History for a day for my vehicle

Leaving Work, accepting a stop to go home

Leaving Work, accepting a stop to go home

It took me until 16:18, and 5.8 miles to get home, where I was prompted by the Garmin to mark that stop as “complete” (we shorten it to “Done”):

Getting home and marking the stop as "complete"

Getting home and marking the stop as "complete"

Even if I didn’t mark the stop as complete, we still have the timestamp of when I reach that landmark available in the landmark report, and will eventually incorporate all of this information into a single “dispatch report” which allows our customers to get a single-stop summary of all their Garmin dispatch activity.

Here’s how to run that landmark report:

Running a GPS Insight Landmark Report

Running a GPS Insight Landmark Report

Note that our “1 day” landmark report extends backward and forward automatically to show you how long the vehicle was there prior to LEAVING (if it started the day in that landmark) and how long it stayed there through the end of the stop, if it was parked there at the end of the day.  These are the kind of “nice to have” features our customers (and we) insist on, so we provide it.

You can easily tell I left (late for the day, really…), then forgot something, came back, then left, and eventually came back, precisely at the same 4:18 PM time I marked the stop complete via the Garmin interface:

Times in and out of my house, matching the Garmin "Done" timestamp

Times in and out of my house, matching the Garmin "Done" timestamp

At least I left early the next day to make up for it — 6:22 AM.

This new capability is very helpful for proving service to a customer, determining how quickly your drivers react to dispatch items, and other investigations about your drivers’ daily activity.

Enjoy!

Thanks,
Rob.

Tags: , , , , , , ,


Jul 23 2011

New Dashboard Available and demo here

Category: dashboard dashlets,New Features,New Featuresrdonat @ 10:46 pm

We made the new GPS Insight Dashboard available last week to customers (in Beta).

Here is the new demo!:

New GPS Insight Dashboard Demo

New GPS Insight Dashboard Demo

Click on the image to watch the video and enjoy the new GPS Insight Dashboard.  It’s several months of hard work and REALLY good.  Enjoy!

Thanks,
Rob.

 

Tags: , , , , , , , , ,


Jul 19 2011

GPS Insight helps a customer during a carjacking

Category: Extreme Return on Investment,Safetyrdonat @ 6:26 pm

We received this fax yesterday:

GPS Insight helps police arrest 2 carjackers

GPS Insight helps police arrest 2 carjackers

Our customer’s son was carjacked at gunpoint. The vehicle was quickly recovered and 2 suspects (and their firearm) were taken into custody.

The Press got it wrong — it was the customer’s cellphone which helped her track the vehicle and lead police to it.  She was using our iPhone app to track the vehicle every 2 minutes. The GPS Insight device was inside the vehicle. Had it been a cellphone, they probably would have thrown it out the window.

So 2 bad guys should be going to jail for a long time.

We love these stories, and usually get one or two every month.

GPS Insight: $32.95 a month. Not losing your car, and putting the 2 guys who put a gun to your kid’s head in jail:  Priceless.

Rob.

Tags: , , , , , , , , , ,


Jul 19 2011

GPS Insight customer satisfaction survey

We recently hired a dedicated representative to proactively contact all our customers regularly.

She will:

  • Determine customer satisfaction
  • Take note of (free) training requests
  • Inform customers of new functionality
  • Review the account for where there is potential for more usage/ROI
  • Be the customer’s dedicated resource for things non-support-oriented

Her name is Shelly, and she’s at extension x8060 (877-477-4321 is our toll free #).

I was pleased with the initial results of our customer satisfaction:

Initial GPS Insight customer satisfaction survey results

Initial GPS Insight customer satisfaction survey results

Of 59 customers surveyed, 39% were Extremely Satisfied, 54% were Satisfied, and only 5% were Dissatisfied.

One customer stated they want to cancel their service.  When asked why, they stated that it was too expensive.

This particular customer has been threatening to quit unless we reduce their price since they became a customer in June of 2006.

Over 5 years later, we haven’t reduced (or raised) their price, and they’re still a customer.

In any case, over 93% of our customers asked are satisfied or extremely satisfied.

Maybe we should count that customer as satisfied, since they have remained a customer over 5 years.

That makes us 95%, which I think you’ll find is as good as it gets in this industry.

Even so, we now have someone to ask those 5% of customers why they aren’t satisfied, and I hope we can get that up to 100% by following up and fixing their complaints.

Rob.

Tags: , , , , , , ,


Jul 18 2011

GPS Insight makes the Inc. 500/5000 again!

Category: PURCHASING CONSIDERATIONSrdonat @ 4:34 pm

GPS Insight is happy to hear that we’ll be making the Inc. Magazine Inc. 500/5000 list again this year.

Last year, we made the Inc. 500 list of fastest growing privately held companies in the U.S. at #281.

This year I’ll be happy to make the Inc. 5000 list at a position around 1000-1500, since it’s based on growth, not income, and our 3 year growth was down from 1,076% last year to roughly 200% 3 year growth this year.  As even Google found out, you can only keep crazy huge growth up for so long before it begins to taper off.

GPS Insight makes the Inc. list again

GPS Insight makes the Inc. list again

Thanks to all our customers, employees, vendors, partners, and families for their help making GPS Insight the success it has become.

Rob.

[P.S., don't tell the folks at Inc. Magazine that we let this out before they told us we could...]

Tags: , , , , , , , , ,


Jul 17 2011

GPS Insight saves my wife & daughter from 3 hours stranded in traffic

Category: Arizona,Google Earth,GPS Insight Employees,Safetyrdonat @ 6:21 pm

As my wife was driving back home after dropping my boys off for a week at sleep-away camp, she hit the worst traffic you can hit.  Cars were stopped dead on a divided mountain road, and people were getting out of their cars since no one was going anywhere.

She called me up to check traffic online through GPS Insight (since she has a device on her car (named “nav2″).

I got “directions” from our directions dashlet, then turned on Traffic :

Directions from my wife's car to mine

Directions from my wife's car to mine

I was able to instantly pull up the fact that there was an accident 3 miles ahead of her which had the road completely closed, and it was estimated to be closed another 3 hours.

Pulling up crash data from Google Traffic within GPS Insight's directions functionality

Pulling up crash data from Google Traffic within GPS Insight's directions functionality

Then I pulled up her location and recent 30 minutes of history within our 3D mapping (Google Earth):

Pull up Nav2's current status and recent history

Pull up Nav2's current status and recent history

She said people were turning around and driving on the shoulder of the road BACKWARDS to get to the nearest off-ramp.  I told her it was .5 miles.

My wife, .5 miles from the nearest offramp

My wife, .5 miles from the nearest offramp

She called me back and told me everyone was going the wrong way down the on-ramp to get over to the other side of the highway.

Within 3 minutes she had escaped a really bad traffic-jam, before it got jammed up too much behind her.

Then she needed alternate directions which I was able to get her instantly, as well as watch her progress on a route only about 20 miles out of the way.

Which sure beats waiting in traffic for 3 hours.

And a quick right-click “directions from/directions to” in Google Earth tells me she’ll be home in 39 minutes.

Directions/ETA and recent history

Directions/ETA and recent history

So I can fire up the grill and have dinner ready when they get home.  As I was typing this, she texted me the same thing:

Better go make dinner

Better go make dinner

Now I really better make dinner.

Rob.

 

Tags: , , , , , , , ,


« Previous PageNext Page »