Since the catastrophic aftermath of

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1 By Lorraine Keating Since the catastrophic aftermath of Hurricane Katrina in September, fuel efficiency is again an issue of public debate in the United States. Even now, more than two months after the tragedy, every bottled water and point-of-use/point-of-entry (POU/POE) treatment company is likely experiencing some increased costs related to increased fuel costs. The goal for dealership owners/operators during this time is to implement fuel-saving steps in the effort to become more cost-efficient. Routing and scheduling efficiency is especially crucial in keeping fuel expenses down. The right routing software solution, integrated with handheld and survey options, a solid GIS module, a flexible customer base, and a well-trained staff are the necessary ingredients to maintain a fuel-efficient routing process for POU and bottled water businesses. It enables water delivery and treatment companies to grow even when gas prices are up and hurricanes seem to gain in strength and frequency. Here are 10 top tips for achieving optimum routing efficiency: Visit and type in keyword: Routing. For more information on related products, visit select Online Buyers Guide from the site menu, and enter keyword: Software. Tip 1: Review the routing process. Start by reviewing your software routing solution. Is your software solution in the office and on the road capable of increasing the density of your routes, rerouting for efficiency each day with mapped directions and dealing more efficiently with off-route and emergency stops? Additional software features like mobile devices can lift the software to another level and, with fuel prices still at an alltime high, there s no time like the present to consider re-investing in a new routing solution. Mobilization of both sales and route [August] alone. drivers doubles the gain. Salespeople may be routed with mobiles to concentrate on increasing sales in less-dense routes. Review how many more stops each driver will be able to make if customers are densely located. It is also important to understand how much fuel can be saved if a driver covers a smaller area with more stops per day. Whatever your situation, it is highly recommended that you take the time and evaluate the status quo of your routing process. Tip 2: Consider redesigning routes with a mapping (GIS) program. Dealerships should also take a look at the advantages of software products that map the daily routes. GIS mapping solutions cost from $400 to $15,000 and, regardless of price, a solid mapping solution adds a tremendous benefit to your company. Name: Al Sutherland Title: Owner Company: Las Vegas Water Company Location: Las Vegas, NV Since the recent surge in fuel prices Las Vegas Water Company s Al Sutherland has been doing his best to avoid using extra gas altogether, and not without good reason. My fuel bill has gone through the roof, Sutherland told Water Technology. It went from $1,200 to $1,800 last month Recently, Sutherland began assigning his employees subdivisions throughout the city. Work orders and installs go in according to an employee s designated area. This way, the dealership s drivers can avoid wasting fuel driving back and forth from one side of town to the other. It s not easy for any of us right now and everyone s pulling together to deal with the situation, Sutherland said. Most route sales companies are structured so that the route salespeople own their routes and do not encroach upon each others customers. Time appointments and emergencies must also be factored in, making mapping programs ideal for POU or bottled water businesses. The stops for the day are passed to the 30 Water Technology November 2005

2 mapping software where they are visually displayed on a map in an optimized stop-sequence priority. As would be expected, the level of detail with mapping software varies with price. For example, some GIS software has to make an extra loop to service the customer in the afternoon. With an efficient system in place, the conflict may have several solutions that are fuel-conserving: optimizes exclusively on the basis A mapping program can of distance from the depot to the depot per driver. More expensive and sophisticated software considers the construction, the size of the truck, time appointments and various other specialties in deciding the optimum route. Once the mapping program has arranged the stop sequences for each driver, the routing software prepares the mobiles of each driver in accordance with the optimized routes. When gas is expensive, every mile counts and every bit of optimization is a value. quickly reroute the stops with the time preference considered. Perhaps the first customer has no time preference and can be moved to another time slot. A phone call can quickly resolve this inefficiency. There may be a hot spot driver who can serve as a spare driver to cover the emergencies. It is also possible that a person calling may not be out of water and are willing to wait for a day or two. Some dealerships respond to all call-in customers as if they were emergencies, Tip 3: Reevaluate customer schedules. however, businesses should always make a phone call to verify the Another fuel-efficient strategy seriousness of the order before making a requires that a route manager reevaluate move. customers perceived versus real need in light of the established routes Tip 4: and schedules. Rethink customer needs. For instance, a customer asks to receive their bottled water delivery on Tuesday afternoon but the driver of this particular route is scheduled for another delivery in the area at 11 a.m. Without any changes in the schedule, the driver Rethinking your customers needs involves several forms of analyses. First, dealers will want software that reports on customers who continually skip their delivery. These customers should have their frequency extended and/or be required to take a minimum amount of bottled water or bags of salt, for instance. This procedure eliminates the inefficiency caused by having drivers make unnecessary stops. Another solution to the problem of serving customers on different time slots of the same The first step is to re-evaluate your routing software. day requires a more Always verify customer emergencies. radical approach. Water treatment and bottled water dealers may actually find that it is much more costly to service a customer who is not flexible with the delivery appointment, than to refuse the service altogether. Refusing to service an inflexible customer can be cost-saving and often leads to considerable efficiency in time and transportation cost. Tip 5: Implement a digital and color-coded dispatch board. Routing software often includes a dispatch board, which visually represents a day s work, and can quickly indicate where bottlenecks exist. Office personnel and managers view the board electronically, which can be color-coded by route, driver or status in order to make the visual handy at-aglance. Dispatch boards provide different views so that sales personnel appear on a unique board, while drivers appear on a separate view. (Continued on next page) November Water Technology 31

3 Name: Charles Wooten Title: Owner Company: American Water Conditioning Location: Elk City, OK In the weeks after Hurricane Katrina roared ashore in the Gulf Coast, American Water Conditioning was forced to raise its service prices in order to battle high gas prices and in response to increased prices from its wholesaler. We have raised our prices for a service call and are charging more per mile traveled, owner Charles Wooten explained. While the thought of converting to diesel trucks has crossed Wooten s mind, the price of the trucks is too costly. Another cost-saving option American Water Conditioning has considered since the fuel price increase is investing in smaller trucks. However, it was ultimately decided that smaller trucks would not be able to house all the tools needed by the dealership s service technicians. (Continued from prior page) An electronic dispatch board is traditionally more useful for service technicians than salespeople because service stops are generally more dynamic. Dispatch boards allow office personnel or managers to click and drag the stops to another day or driver. Personnel can also click and drag a stop to a suspend area where office personnel can call those customers and attempt to reschedule them if possible. Tip 6: Purchase a mobile solution for drivers. Purchasing mobile solution for route drivers keeps them on route; enables them to make more deliveries in one day; and helps to reduce time spent at each stop. It also gives them the exact route schedule from the beginning of the day. A solid handheld unit solution enables drivers to take orders; make sales; do deliveries; service equipment; capture signature; print a receipt with signature; and reconcile each route at its completion. Inventory can be controlled at the truck level and the check-out process can reconcile both inventory and cash. Mobiles reduce the printing of paper tickets, report of missed stops or nodelivery stops, track empty bottles and make drivers more professional. There are both return on investment (ROI) and value on investment (VOI) a benefits: Fewer errors on the route translate into more stops completed and more revenue created. Less confusion about the routes means more fuel efficiency per truck. Tip 7: Conduct driver surveys. Some handheld solutions contain a survey option that allows the driver or salesperson to collect information that is useful for management purposes. Created by a route manager or someone responsible for the efficient flow of stop completion, the survey will present questions to the driver to answer either at the end of each stop or during the service of the stop. For example, a survey may ask a driver to specify the truck mileage at the start or end of a route. It may also query a driver about a competitor s products and pricing. Survey software collects information on equipment at the site or indicates if a salesperson needs to follow up with a customer. It allows for individualized attention and information to improve route and delivery efficiency that is otherwise difficult to collect on a regular and systematic basis. The collected information can be routed to various managers via a website, by or reporting. Drivers can do more with handheld mobile solutions. Tip 8: Retrain personnel in the office and on the road. It is also time to consider retraining office and delivery personnel and to remind them of the goal to work cost efficiently and to increase incoming revenues. Since route changes are a daily occurrence, it is imperative to avoid underutilizing the software system. Staff has to be able to schedule reliably with both time-saving and fuel-efficient routes. A repeat-training program ensures that staff members have more than a basic understanding of the routing software 32 Water Technology November 2005

4 and become able to negotiate its manifold features skillfully and appropriately. Such software usage requires a wellrounded training program during which staff is able to ask questions, make mistakes, and learn the details about the system. Training enables staff to navigate the system on their own with confidence and skill, and the result is a well-trained staff that schedules and executes the most fuel-efficient deliveries. Tip 9: Integrate offline knowledge in your routing habits (circular). Software that is customizable is a big advantage because it adapts to specific procedures or logistics characteristic of a dealership s routing process. Customized software helps a bottled water or POU company to perform its (Continued on next page) A survey option for drivers provides valuable information for managers. Circle Product Information no. 237 on page 50 November Water Technology 33

5 (Continued from prior page) daily tasks in the best way. This includes, of course, time- and energy-efficient routing and scheduling of deliveries. For example, some companies load trucks the evening before, while others have the drivers load the trucks in the morning. Some use load sheets developed by the computer, while others trust that the driver knows what he/she needs each day. Some dealerships load serial numbers onto the truck for scanning purposes, while others type the serial number when installed. There are many other company-specific procedures that software is able to accommodate if the routing solution is both flexible and customizable. Name: Chris Sims Title: President Company: Rain Soft of Birmington Location: Birmington, AL While at press time Rain Soft of Birmington had not yet taken any measures to combat the region s high gas prices, according to the dealership s president, changes were on the way. We are going to be adding a fuel surcharge to services out of the county, Chris Sims explained. We are also considering making our service technicians bring their trucks back at night or charging them for a tank of gas per week. Rain Soft of Birmington is also starting to cut down on gas usage by making multiple service calls at one time. Tip 10: As a last resort: Add a fuel surcharge. If you have made all the necessary Circle Product Information no. 233 on page Water Technology November 2005

6 Last resort: a fuel surcharge. changes in the delivery routes supported by routing software and staff, but the Circle Product Information no. 207 on page 50 fuel costs are still skyrocketing, adding a fuel surcharge may be your last resort. Customers won t like it, of course, and your competitors might be willing to cover the extra fee in order to gain your customer. It is a tough choice. In the end, however, a surcharge is an option to be seriously considered. After all, fuel prices will not significantly decrease since global demand is up and is expected to stay high into the new year. Consider the facts: Suppose a driver drives an unnecessary 1 hour per day, or approximately 50 miles. If one assumes that a truck gets 10 miles per gallon, the daily increase is 5 gallons or 100 gallons per month. At $4 per gallon, the increase approaches almost $400 per month per truck. This is a significant increase for each truck, especially since the margins on water deliveries are relatively small. Lorraine Keating is president of Prism Visual Software, Inc., Port Washington, NY, a software company that develops solutions for the field service and delivery industries. Circle Product Information no. 229 on page 50 November Water Technology 35