Top Five Fleet Tracking Benefits for the HVAC Industry

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1 How GPS Fleet Tracking Technology Can Help You Deliver Superior Customer Service

2 Maximizing your resources is critical throughout the year, but especially important during seasonal changes and peaks. Customer Expectations re at n All-Time High The strategy for any service business is to provide great customer service, while keeping costs low and maximizing revenue opportunities. Nothing could be truer for companies that service heating, ventilation air conditioning systems. Since the industrial revolution, these systems have been at the heart of each building. For most, they re systems we don t think about while they are functioning properly, but people tend to notice when they aren t. And, boy, do they notice. As the weather heats up each year, there s always a flood of service calls from residences and businesses Many HVAC companies struggle to handle the high call volumes only to disappoint clients and push them away. And who can blame them? How patient are you when it s 88 degrees inside your house? Or 48 degrees? Maximizing your resources is critical throughout the year, but especially important during seasonal changes and peaks. Without a clear strategy in place, managing your business is chaotic at best. There are many technological innovations that can help you put together a strategic plan for your business, including GPS fleet tracking solution. In this report, we ll visit some challenges for HVAC service companies and then look at how a cloud-based GPS vehicle tracking solution can help solve many of those issues. Barriers to Great Customer Service The HVAC marketplace is a crowded one. Whether you are a large company with several smaller groups nipping at your heels, or a small fish in the big pond just hoping to make a splash, there are some universal problems that all HVAC/HVACR service companies face. Driver productivity, or simply getting the job done, is a major factor in your bottom line. Part of the problem is that your employees don t have a set place to go to work every day. Sure they have a home-base and maybe even a standard supply house; but the vast majority of their workday is spent at other locations within your market. Navigating a new path every day even across familiar roads can easily be frustrated by wrong turns, stop-and-go traffic and that stop light that seems to favor one direction over the others. While small delays will only hold your drivers up a minute here and there, those minutes add up. Those lags turn into fewer scheduled stops, unsatisfied customers and, ultimately, lost revenue. Even if you try to create optimized routes by hand, paper maps can be outdated or you may spend far too long translating separate online directions into a workable solution. What is your time worth to you? After all, time is money. Poor routing isn t the only way that time is lost, though. Driver productivity, or simply getting the job done, is a major factor in your bottom line. Technicians are out on the road all day, visiting commercial and residential sites. But while they are out, it can be difficult to keep up with where your drivers are. You rely on their honesty when they tell you a job took longer than it should have, but how can you be sure? If you have 16 service technicians and each wastes half an hour being unproductive, that s an entire workday of lost productivity. Getting

3 back that lost time would be like hiring another service technician, for no money at all. The central pillar to your business is customer service. What would it mean to your business if each technician could fit in just one more job every day? You can also get hurt by technicians who take after-hours calls using your equipment. We all know in this tough economy, people can feel like they are out of options. There s nothing wrong with a person making a little extra money on the side using their skills. But when that extra money is earned using your supplies and your client list, it hurts your business. How do you make sure your techs aren t using their service vehicles after business hours? For a HVAC business, the theft of a service vehicle can be devastating. You not only lose the van, but you lose all of the expensive supplies inside. Even with insurance, there are still deductibles to pay and the potential revenue lost while you scramble to replace your stolen assets. What if you could get back even part of your investment? The central pillar to your business is customer service. It s not just enough to advertise your products and services you have to create a positive connection with your customers to keep them coming back to you. Customers want on-time, friendly service that is reasonably priced and has a basic guarantee of quality. Let s break that down into its parts. On-time service for each customer requires careful planning and near-flawless execution. Friendly service means you have to have technicians who show up free of the frustrations of their daily grind. You set reasonable prices by keeping your costs down. And you guarantee quality by not being forced to use inferior parts because of massive overhead in your operations. So how will a GPS-based fleet tracking solution get you to that top level of service? We re glad you asked. How Fleet Tracking Can Help Your HVAC Business Fleet tracking technology is based off of three basic systems: Global positioning satellite location services, wireless data transfer and mapping through web applications. A box installed inside a vehicle reads its GPS location, direction of travel and speed. The box then uses a connection with cell towers to relay the GPS information to a data server, where it is translated by software into an interface that can be understood by an end user. When it comes to creating daily routes or adjusting schedules on the fly, a fleet tracking system is an invaluable tool. Even though it harnesses many different technologies, the power of a fleet-tracking solution lies in the software s ability to compile many pieces of data and turn it into valuable, actionable information. problems facing HVAC companies today. When it comes to creating daily routes or adjusting schedules on the fly, a fleet tracking system is an invaluable tool. Using mapping interface, dispatchers can create custom directions based on scheduled appointments. Dispatching applications bring turn-byturn voice-guided direction to drivers, almost completely eliminating wrong turns and unnecessary delays. One of the most valuable benefits of a fleet tracking solution is being able to manage your entire workforce without having to physically be in the vehicle with them. Using alerts and real-time location tracking, managers can see where their vehicles are, where they are

4 headed and how fast they are going. You can see if an employee is taking extra-long breaks or making unapproved stops between jobs. if you were the first in your area offer accurate arrival times? Even your best technician can be a danger on the road if they aren t driving safely. Fleet tracking allows you to monitor driving behavior and decide how you want to reward the good and address the bad. Once you begin tracking vehicle data, many insurance companies will give you a discount on your premiums. GPS-based fleet tracking is also easy to integrate into your business strategy. When dealing with multiple technicians servicing a large area, assigning territories and working hours to each van makes managing your fleet easier. There s also no need to hover over the screen to get great tracking benefits. By utilizing alerts, the system can let you know when a vehicle leaves or enters a designated area or moves outside of set business hours using or text messages. This is especially helpful in curbing moonlighting and recovering stolen equipment. But for many HVAC companies, what a fleet tracking solution brings to their customer service is the greatest benefit. For customers, vague service windows are an annoying part of contracting with any company. What if you were the first in your area to offer accurate arrival times? By being able to plan routes quickly and efficiently, you can schedule appointments or even reroute a less busy technician to help one that might be overbooked. You can even dispatch the closest technician to emergency calls, helping to create loyal customers for your business. By removing the annoying parts of driving, your techs will be happier and more relaxed giving better on-the-job performance and leaving your clients with a great lasting impression. Those positive experiences will help grow business through word-of-mouth, which is some of the strongest marketing around. Fleet tracking solutions will help you save money and let you pass those savings on to your consumer. When you cut down on overhead costs like gas, insurance and maintenance, you ll start seeing your expenses shrink and profits increase. Extra savings will even help you be more competitive in your marketplace as you can offer a level of service unparalleled at your price. Why NexTraq is The Best Choice When choosing a fleet tracking company, it s important to take into account a number of factors. But in the end, there s only one word you should remember: value. NexTraq, the value leader for GPS fleet tracking, and its applications Fleet Dispatch, Fleet Metrics and Fleet Mobile is truly dedicated to creating the best product for its customers. Our cloud-based system means there is no software to buy or install. You can simply access the system from any computer or mobile device with a web browser and Internet connection. Fleet Metrics allows you to focus on one vehicle or look broadly across your entire fleet. You can easily see who the individual top performers are for your company but also how simple behaviors, such as excessive idling, add up to major expenses. With more than 20 reports and 17 real-time alerts, NexTraq puts you in the perfect position to monitor every aspect of your business. The reports and alerts are why many of our clients see a return on their investment in as little as three months. Our intuitive system means training employees is a breeze, but our customer service team is available 7 days every week to handle questions and issues for our customers.

5 With more than 20 reports and 17 real-time alerts, NexTraq puts you in the perfect position to monitor every aspect of your business. You can also add our Fleet Dispatch service, which utilizes in-vehicle Garmin devices for easy turn-by-turn, voice-guided directions. Messages and new service calls can be wirelessly sent to vehicles, meaning drivers don t have to fumble with their phones while driving. You may find some of the same features throughout the telematics industry, but you won t find another company that gives you as much value for your dollar as NexTraq. Call us at for a free consultation. Or, if you d like more information, visit our website specifically dedicated to your industry at nextraq.com/hvac.

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