"Companies that don't use satellites to track trailers? If they have more than 50 trailers, they're probably not competitive any more," warned Kevin Slaughter, vice president of Operations for James Brown Trucking in Lithonia, Georgia.

"If you're running 100 trailers you'd better be tracking them...probably six are not producing. Of those six, two or three are gone and you're never going to get them back. The rest are idle and you don't know where they are," he said, adding that the financial blow from idle or missing trailers can be substantial.

Brown Trucking is more than competitive: The 42-year old company has quadrupled in size in the last five years. Brown's 12 terminals manage 500 trucks and 2,900 trailers over the last five years. The company delivers dry van loads across the southeastern United States.

Before satellite tracking, Brown had trouble managing its trailers efficiently. "When we grew to 600 trailers, we had one employee who spent all his time tracking them, and he just couldn't keep up," Slaughter said. "When we hit 1,000 trailers five years ago, tracking them was a two-person job. Even then, accuracy was really poor. It might take a week to track all of them, and the information was old," said Slaughter. "It was a mess."

Without precise, timely maps of trailer locations, Brown had trouble utilizing them efficiently. "We knew we had a lot more trailers than we really needed," Slaughter said.

Slaughter's team investigated satellite tracking and bought GlobalWave^®. "We looked at the leaders, we talked to other companies. [GlobalWave] had the edge, the best technology," he said.

Brown installed mobile satellite tracking units on 100 trailers as a pilot test, and within a year had installed them on the rest of its trailer fleet. GlobalWave helped Brown to right-size its fleet and eliminate waste, according to Slaughter. "If we didn't have GlobalWave, instead of 2,900 trailers I'd probably have 3,300. At $26K per trailer, that's a lot of money," he said.

Ease of installation was a big selling point: "It takes 15 or 20 minutes to install a GlobalWave unit and have it recognized by the satellite," Slaughter said.

Fewer missing trailers

Brown got the utilization efficiency it was looking for, with an immediate reduction in a typical carrier headache: misplaced or stolen trailers. "If you're a drop-and-hook operation, you lose trailers every day. It's just part of the business. A shipper loads the wrong trailer and another company pulls it out, a driver forgets to document where he left a trailer, a driver picks up the wrong one...and now you've got a missing trailer. They could be lost for years before you get them back," Slaughter explained.

Missing trailers drain a company's bottom line. "You lose revenue from that trailer, maybe $350 a month or more, plus the costs of getting it back. If someone else is using it, you have wear and tear on the trailer. If it takes you six to nine months to get the trailer back, you've lost all that money," Slaughter continued. If you don't get the trailer back, he pointed out, the costs are even higher.

"Even with depreciation, you lose at least $15,000 on a trailer that you can't recover. Without satellite tracking, all you can do is replace those trailers and hope you don't lose them next year," he said.

"Any company with more than 50 trailers knows that you need to track them; they've all had trailers go missing," Slaughter continued.  "Now, when a trailer goes missing, we know, because it's in the wrong location in our reports. We call the company that took it, and we often have it back before it's even unloaded, usually within 24 hours," said Slaughter.

Slaughter said that trailer tracking units may actually deter thieves. "Everyone knows we track our trailers. The thieves skip ours and go steal from someone else."

Better trailer utilization

Slaughter said that Brown was one of the first companies to integrate satellite trailer tracking completely into its transportation management software (TMS). "It was a requirement, and now it's a lot of the benefit." Before, it could take two full-time Brown employees one week to produce an inaccurate fleet report on 1,000 trailers. Brown now receives an accurate report on nearly 3,000 trailers "by 6:00 AM every morning, and it's part time work for only one employee," Slaughter said.

The ability to rapidly acquire accurate trailer tracking data not only helps Brown to make better use of its trailer fleet, it's also allowed the company to provide similar services to customers. Brown employees e-mail at least 1,000 fleet reports to customers each month.

Brown's customers often use Brown trailers for auxiliary storage. "Maybe they only have receiving areas for only one trailer, but have four or five trailers to unload. So they use our trailers as mobile warehouses," Slaughter explained. "We can show customers what trailers they have and where they are," he continued. "We actually help them manage their fleet more efficiently."

A customer might call to ask for another trailer of goods but, thanks to GlobalWave, "We can say ‘you already have four and one of them has the goods you need.' It saves a lot of time and money."

Customer saves more than $1 million

Brown saved one customer more than $1 million per year by using these reports to help them manage trailers more effectively. "We helped them look at each location, maybe 15 shipping facilities and 150 drop locations, and see where, instead of four trailers, for example, they only needed three," said Slaughter. The company was able to reduce its fleet by 25 percent, from 800 trailers to 600. GlobalWave trailer tracking data has been so popular with Brown's customers, in fact, that it's become a key differentiator in new sales. "We sell it up the supply chain to shippers and manufacturers. I don't think anyone else has tried that, but it gets people's attention," said Slaughter.

"I wouldn't run 100 trailers, let alone 2,900, without satellite tracking. Globalwave keeps me ahead of the competition," Slaughter concluded.

Need a load for your flat? You’ll find it faster on the 3sixty™ Freight Match or DATconnect.com^® load boards. Powered by the legendary DAT^® Network, these TransCore freight matching services enable carriers and brokers to post and search by equipment type and lane. You can set alarms in DATconnect.com or 3sixty Freight Match, so the system will alert you automatically when additional loads are posted that fit your requirements. These and other smart searching tools are unique to TransCore load board services.

Both 3sixty Freight Match and DATconnect.com also provide rate data, drawn from a database of five million reported lane rates and surcharges, to help you evaluate the best-paying loads and routes.

Most important, brokers and shippers on “The DAT” are overwhelmingly reliable and creditworthy. Their credit scores are high – the average score is 91 out of 100 – with average days-to-pay of 28 days or sooner. Statistics are good, but case-by-case analysis is better. That’s why TransCore load boards provide tools and data to help carriers assess the creditworthiness and reliability of each new partner.

Here are a few more facts about the DAT Network:

• More than 70% of brokers and shippers on the DAT Network have credit scores of 96 and above. (Note: Companies who have been in business for less than two years typically have a low score or are not rated at all, because their credit history is insufficient.)
  
  
• Both DATconnect.com and 3sixty Freight Match enable you to search for loads suited to your specific equipment types, so you can identify the right loads fast.
  
  
• The DAT Network is updated and refreshed daily, so load posts are relevant – and so are the phone calls from brokers when you post a truck.

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Respond to RFPs quickly and painlessly with Rate Index Pro.  Anyone involved in truckload lane rate pricing and contract negotiations will appreciate the speed and efficiency of this web-based service. Perform single-lane lookups in real time or submit a multi-lane request to receive prevailing market rate data in minutes. TransCore’s Rate Index Pro is available by monthly subscription, and is priced according to customer usage.

To learn more about Rate Index Pro, go to:  http://360.transcore.com/rate-index

Tom Genecco has seen it all during his career in freight transportation. He’s a carrier-broker based in Buffalo, New York, and his family has been in the business for three generations. Genecco rolls his eyes when he talks about life before TransCore’s GlobalWave satellite trailer tracking and monitoring.

“I had an owner operator leave one of my trailers in Baltimore, and it cost me $1,200 to hire a guy to go out and find my trailer,” Genecco says. “It was a three- or four-week ordeal.”

Since installing GlobalWave, Genecco’s results have improved dramatically. TFG Transport now can track and monitor its fleet nationwide in real time—effortlessly. Not only does it enable Tom and his team to track the location of trailers just about anywhere in North America, it also enables TFG to track the efficiency of its drivers to see who is—or isn’t—producing.

And whether a trailer goes missing because of a simple mistake or bad behavior on the part of a driver, GlobalWave saves Genecco’s team time and money.

“I had a guy quit in Tennessee, and I found out where my trailer was by using GlobalWave in about ten minutes,” Genecco says.

Getting refrigerated shipments down cold

TFG Transport owns 20 power units and 31 trailers, and the company specializes in refrigerated freight. So Genecco’s company takes advantage of TransCore’s Sense & Track, which adds cargo and temperature sensing to the standard Slap & Track satellite trailer tracking system. In addition to the ability to check the location of every trailer he’s responsible for at any time of the day, he can check the temperature inside his reefers, which is critical for getting his trailers loaded and the loads accepted by the consignee.

 “When a customer is in Syracuse, New York, and the truck’s in Nogales, Arizona, I can go on the Web site and tell them that the trailer’s pre-cooled and ready to go,” said Genecco.

Reducing losses from fraudulent liability claims

Fraudulent insurance claims are a common hazard in the freight industry. Now Genecco and his team have the ultimate weapon to fight them. In fact, GlobalWave satellite trailer tracking has helped turn Genecco and his team into super sleuths.

“Someone once had a picture of my truck and trailer and said that one of my fenders flew off and caused hundreds of dollars of damage. They said the incident occurred in Mississippi,” Genecco says. “GlobalWave informed me that the truck was in Virginia. We sent the report to the insurance company, and the claim was denied.”

Case closed. End of story.

“It’s a no-brainer.”

Genecco and his company are representative of small-to-midsized operations that nevertheless have a national reach. TFG is headquartered in Canadaiqua, New York, and has satellite offices in Delaware, Florida, Kentucky, Texas and Oregon—as well as a spacious warehouse on Long Island. That means Genecco and his team have to use technology to manage their fleet and the precious, perishable cargos of their customers spread across the country. Satellite tracking and monitoring provide complete visibility and accountability. Genecco knows within 35 feet where his trucks are and how fast they’re going. If they’re not moving, Genecco knows how long they’ve been sitting and the temperature inside the reefers, as well as other information critical to the viability of TFG’s business.

It’s likely that nothing will make Tom’s job easy, but with TransCore services like GlobalWave satellite tracking and monitoring, Genecco isn’t flying blind any more. His drivers, shippers and consignees know that when Tom speaks, he’s speaking with facts.

“To be honest,” Genecco says, “I look back and say, ‘How did I get by without this product.’”

“It’s a no-brainer.”

The phrase “hot fuel” refers to diesel fuel or gasoline sold at retail pumps at temperatures higher than the century-old government standard of 60 degrees. That is the temperature used in the petro-chemical industry to measure all petroleum liquids.

At the 60-degree standard, a gallon of diesel delivers a certain amount of measurable energy to move a truck down the road. But when expanded by higher temperatures, a gallon actually contains less fuel and delivers less energy.

Let’s say your tanks hold 200 gallons of fuel. Here’s what happens if you fill them with 75-degree diesel: It still takes 200 gallons to fill the tanks, but because you’re buying temperature-expanded fuel you’re effectively buying 198.8 gallons (as measured at 60º) for the 200-gallon price. If your truck gets six miles per gallon, you’ll travel 7.15 fewer miles down the road, and you’ll pay $4.43 dollars more than you should have (at the March 2008, average price of $3.71per gallon). At 90 degrees—not unheard of—you’d 14.2 miles fewer down the road and out $8.80.

Then again, it’s only money.

But if hot fuel makes you hot under the collar, visit www.turndownhotfuel.com. The purpose of Owner-Operator Independent Driver’s Associations (OOIDA) Turn Down Hot Fuel campaign is to educate consumers about how selling fuel at temperatures above the standard affects the real cost of fuel. It also provides an avenue for communicating to lawmakers the need for automatic temperature compensation at every retail fuel pump. Without input from drivers this issue will continue to be ignored. It will take a unified voice to bring this issue to Congress and achieve a solution. Visit www.turndownhotfuel.com now to learn more and to find a way to make your voice heard on this issue.

By Michael Lee, Fleet-Tech Transport Services 

We’re all (painfully) aware of the rising price of fuel and its effect on the bottom line. The U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) reports that diesel fuel averages about $3.33/gallon across the U.S., or a more than 70 percent increase since this time last year.

EIA isn’t predicting much relief for 2008, either; some analysts say we could be paying as much as $4 per gallon at the pump by mid-year. That means that if business is slowing down, you must find new ways to save money and offset fuel costs. Fuel cards may offer one solution.

Increase your control. Fuel cards allow you to control the way drivers spend your company’s money. A fuel card lets you set the spending limits for fuel, minor repairs, oil, winter additives, and other items your drivers need while on the road. After a purchase is made you have instant access to the purchase information, allowing you to monitor, track, and make changes if necessary.

A fuel card can also specify where your drivers can make their purchases, making it possible for you to negotiate special rates with preferred vendors.

Boost convenience. Fuel cards eliminate the costs and hassles associated with filing expense reports or reimbursement requests. If you choose a card that is accepted at all truck stops, for example, you’ll give drivers choices in deciding where to stop for fuel, taking a shower, or having a good meal - an important and much-appreciated perk.

Fuel cards can also make it easier for the driver to obtain products such as tires and repairs and services (such as towing) in the event of an emergency. They can allow access to ATMs, payroll cards, and money drafts that can be used when the driver’s other payment forms are unavailable.

Improve security. Carrying large sums of cash can be dangerous, especially if word gets out. By giving drivers fuel cards, you eliminate the problem. Before a purchase is authorized the driver must provide certain information (such as pin number) to prevent fraudulent use of the card, giving you additional assurance that the driver, not a thief, is the one actually spending your money. If a fuel card is lost or stolen it can be turned off immediately, just like a credit card, with a simple phone call or visit to the Web.

Increase savings. The right fuel card can save you money by allowing you to obtain the cash price at the pump and reduce fraud associated with the use of cash. Many fuel cards offer discounts at selected locations, saving you on every gallon purchased.

The best fuel cards maximize cost efficiencies by giving your company access to real-time pricing along the route. That can help you plan the best, most cost-effective route. In addition, since transactions are recording electronically, the driver doesn’t have to spend additional hours—often on the clock—reconciling an expense report.

Save time. In the home office, fuel cards make it much easier for accounting. Drivers’ expenses are tallied on a single, consolidated bill, making it easier to track and manage individual spending.

There are a lot of fuel cards out there these days; compare features and locations carefully and choose one that best fits the needs of your company.

>>Learn more about TransCore fuel cards>>

Unless you’ve been living under a rock (or hanging out on a sunny beach someplace—lucky you), you probably heard that the FMCSA decided to retain the maximum 11-hour driving limit and restart provision for carrier fleets (along with most of the other provisions), at least for the time being.

They cited studies showing that driving for 11 hours is as safe as driving for ten, a claim that’s hotly disputed by many drivers’ organizations.

What’s your experience? Do you think the FMCSA will change its mind? Do you think they should? Post a comment here (by filling out the "Leave a Comment" form, below).