A Funny Story To Share

Posted on May 14, 2012 by Drew

One of our vendors called us last week with this story:

During an environmental trade show in Austin,Texas, a Skypatrol GPS tracking vendor had a booth as an exhibitor. The company had a display case on a table show casing their products. Amongst these, was a TT8850 unit. At approximately 10:50 am a man walked up to the booth while the attendant wasn’t looking and took the TT8850.

The booth attendant noticed that the device was gone around 11:10 and immediately reported it stolen to the convention security staff and the Austin Police Department. The booth attendant proceeded to track the device via the Skypatrol web portal on her laptop. The device appeared to be heading south from the convention center towards San Antonio. Security at the convention center captured the individual who took the device on video and was able to provide a description to police.

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GPS Technology Helps Control Speeding

Posted on May 3, 2012 by Drew

Speeding has become a very common trend all over the country’s streets and highways, people seem to always be in a hurry and in desperate need to go faster than traffic, even work vehicles are constantly speeding, this presents a major issue for businesses with fleets since they are liable for the actions of their drivers, and if not corrected erratic driving can end up costing a business thousands of dollars.

Speeding has become a major concern amongst business owners, it not only makes drivers more prone to cause or be involved in accidents but it also puts the drivers at risk of getting caught and being ticketed by the police. However GPS vehicle tracking technology has helped put some of these concerns to rest.

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GPS Tracking Technology Offers Peace of Mind to Parents

Posted on April 26, 2012 by Drew

GPS tracking technology has proven itself to be a resourceful tool for business owners for years, making fleet management and tracking simpler.

GPS tracking technology has many uses in the business world; however the technology has found it difficult to break into the personal use market. GPS trackers can offer great peace of mind to families as well as other benefits.

Skypatrol Is currently developing a new user friendly interface that includes features designed for personal and family use. The new interface is intuitive and very simple to use, it allows for quick access via a computer or smartphone at any time.

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Official Skypatrol Press Release for NADA 2012 at Las Vegas!

Posted on February 2, 2012 by Drew

Las Vegas Expo

Skypatrol presents The Patrolman, Recover TTR and Lotman at The 2012 National Automobile Dealers Association Convention.

January 30^th, 2012. The 2012 NADA Convention and Expo taking place from February 3-6 at Las Vegas Convention Center brings together dealerships and related industries in an extraordinary “opportunity to exchange ideas, to [get] updates on the newest marketing concepts and to network […],”Rick Morrsion - NADA Convention Chairman.

During this event, Skypatrol will showcase the latest GPS tracking solutions for the automotive dealer focusing on automated inventory management and providing additional revenue stream opportunities. Continue reading →

Skypatrol: Providing Affordable and High Quality Solutions in the Marketplace

Posted on January 26, 2012 by Drew

While 2011 marked a transformative year in the non-prime automotive industry, many skeptical dealers and finance organizations managed to avoid the adequate evaluation and implementation of GPS-based payment assurance technologies. The economy proved a welcome test bed, though, as it struggled to get back on its legs, still reeling from the recessionary blues of previous years. Continue reading →

Better Safe Than Sorry

Posted on December 29, 2011 by Drew

We have all been guilty of it, at least once. We have to admit it. Whether by afew extramiles or sometimes even hundreds or thousands, we have overlooked the oil change due date or forgotten it all together. It is not our fault; our busy lives are full of so many other tasks that it is hard to keep track of the dates when our vehicle needs preventative maintenance; That is if you really can understand the importance of preventative maintenance and how much money can be saved by keeping a schedule. Continue reading →

Real-Time Alerts: Less Micromanagement, More Production

Posted on December 19, 2011 by Drew

Managing a fleet is not only about dispatching and routing vehicles efficiently. It’s also about managing people. As fleet sizes grow it becomes, more and more difficult to manage personnel effectively.

Management practices now require new and technology-based approaches in order to be effective in today’s fast-paced business world. Whether fleet managers have 10 vehicles under management or 1000, no one has the time to micromanage any one of their drivers. Instead, businesses are focusing their efforts on management by exception based behavior modification strategies, which are much more effective and less time-consuming. What does this approach mean? It means that managers don’t need to be notified of every single action their employees make. It is easier for them to be notified when a “rule” is being broken or a company policy has been violated. The manager then addresses the behavior with the employee, alerting him or her that they are being supervised resulting in a modification of that particular behavior.

So how can the “Real-Time Alerts” from Skypatrol’s Fleet Management Solutions help managers with this task? Managers can customize alert preferences for individual vehicles, groups (or sub-fleets), or the entire fleet. Triggering an alert will immediately notify management via SMS text message or e-mail detailing the specifics of the violation, including location, speed and time of day. With this sophisticated system, managers can grasp a better understanding of individual driver performance and non-compliance allowing them to address and correct issues before they cause major incidents. Some of the most common alerts that fleet managers use to supervise employees are:

- Excessive speeding alerts

- Harsh braking alerts

- Excess idling alerts

- Geo-fence violation alerts

- Off-hour activity alerts

Not only can these alerts protect companies against liability concerns like aggressive or dangerous driving employees, they can significantly impact the bottom line of any business through reduced vehicle maintenance expenses and gas consumption costs, as well as increased productivity per labor hour. These savings add up day after day and with “Real-Time Alerts”, managers can reduce company liability, increase cash flow and make more informed decisions every day.

Take The Guessing Out of Service Call Routing

Posted on December 6, 2011 by Drew

How many times have you lost or angered a customer because you were unable to promptly locate personnel to dispatch to the service call?

It happens time and time again. As a dispatcher or fleet manager, it is very difficult to know exactly where all your vehicles are, regardless of the size of your fleet. As much as you may have a carefully structured a route plan for the day, even when the drivers try to follow their routes, things can get complicated. An accident on the road may cause delays, an absentee customer may alter the route, and the list goes on and on with unpredictable issues. In the meantime, you’re trying to fulfill customer requests and provide service to the best of your capabilities despite the yelling on the other end of the phone. Stressful, huh?

The real-time location element along with the special “closest-vehicle dispatch” feature from Skypatrol’s Fleet Management Solutions allow fleet and dispatch managers access to the exact location of their vehicles and their distances to any service call, while providing a fairly good estimate of the length of time needed for the vehicle to arrive to the particular call. You no longer have to rely on luck, calling individually to each one of your drivers who you might think is available to complete the service call.

Providing immediate and accurate information to customers, directly equates to increased customer satisfaction levels, in turn, increasing repeat customers and referrals with no additional marketing or sales costs

Closest-Vehicle Dispatch will make your work easier. Won’t it? Surely, one or more of Skypatrol’s Fleet Management Solution features will complement it even more. Monitoring your drivers to avoid inconsistencies with time cards, pre-setting boundaries to prevent unauthorized use of the vehicles after hours, having fuel management reports available to help you make informed decisions, are just some of the tools that you as a fleet manager will have available, to help increase the bottom line earnings of your company.

Defender GPS for BHPH Dealers? Now, that makes sense.

Posted on November 22, 2011 by Drew

Having a Buy Here Pay Here (BHPH) dealer is a risky but very profitable business. With difficult economic times, and many more people, lacking the sufficient credit to finance vehicles in the prime market, are turning to BHPH dealers to fulfill their transportation needs. While this can be very profitable for dealers, it can be wildly destructive if lot owners don’t have a viable solution to manage the high default rates of subprime customers. So what can an owner do to minimize his or her risk? Simple, contact Skypatrol for information regarding our Defender Program: high quality, low cost, and reliable GPS tracking devices to help increase on-time payments, reduce over collections costs and when the need be, significantly reduce repossession time and costs. The Defender is not only about peace of mind, it’s about increasing cash flow too. Now, doesn’t that make good sense?

GPS Tracking Devices Used On Giraffes In West Africa

Posted on November 1, 2011 by Drew

GPS tracking solutions does not stop at vehicle and personal monitoring, it even helps us to protect animals in the wild. In West Africa for example, it is used to track giraffes facing endangerment.

GPS tracking is helping the Giraffe Conservation Foundation keep track of the threatened giraffes in West Africa. Eight giraffes were fitted with tracking collars in an effort to learn more about these animals’ movements and to keep them safe.

Why would GCF want to track giraffes? The reason behind tracking them is due to a series of bizarre circumstances. The West African giraffe was put on a red list by the IUCN when it reached a dangerously low 50 giraffes in the late 1990s. Today, there are now around 200 of these beautiful beasts. However, with this boom in population the animals are being forced father and farther away from their “natural” habitat in a search for food.

In fact, it is very difficult to put a GPS tracking device onto the giraffes. Since giraffes cannot have th

eir heart slowed for any period of time greater than half an hour, the fitting crew had to work extremely fast. After anesthetizing the animal, they have to attach a harness onto the beast with a camouflaged belt.

This new GPS tracking effort is going to help researchers better protect giraffes and make them a viable species once again.