Fleets for years have used performance data in driver scorecards to help identify and address problems. Now, with the help of companies that specialize in collecting and analyzing data, fleets are trying to go beyond identifying problems. They aim to head them off before they happen.
Part 1 of this series surveyed the predictive analytics landscape among trucking companies and the economy at large.
This story is the first of three remaining installments that examine three data management systems and three fleets that use them, with varying degrees of predictive analytics, to improve retention, safety or both.
In its six years of working with FleetRisk Advisors, Averitt Express has made big safety improvements, says David Broyles, operations manager. The Cookeville, Tenn.-based company is using FleetRisk Advisors for the 1,300 to 1,400 trucks in its truckload division and the 700 in its dedicated division.
Largely due to the FleetRisk program, the fleet has seen a 41 percent drop in preventable accidents over the last three years in its truckload division, Broyles says.
FleetRisk, a unit of Omnitracs, offers modules for safety, workers comp and retention. Averitt is using only safety, but has found retention to be a “byproduct” of that effort, Broyles says. With the advent of Qualcomm years ago, Averitt, like many fleets, “quit using the telephone like we used to,” he says. “You lose that relationship-building with drivers.”
