Cartrack – The Best Solution for Fleet Management in South Africa

For any South African fleet company. Small or large, fleet management is imperative. It helps the fleet operate successfully from vehicle maintenance and driver behaviour, fleet efficiency and productivity, and organised admin, right down to fleet compliance and identity management. However, with all the fleet management options to choose from which is best for your company? 

Let's dig in.

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Fleet management and fleet management software explained:

Fleet management refers to the governance of fleet businesses through a series of tasks involved in overseeing an entire fleet operation from dispatch to delivery. For any business that relies on a fleet of vehicles (whether 1 or 100+) to operate efficiently, fleet management includes, but is not limited to:

• Conducting and organising fleet administration 
• Tracking vehicles to track task completion rates
• Monitoring driver behaviour
• Ensuring asset management
• Managing fuel consumption and fleet costs 
• Ensuring timely vehicle maintenance

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Manually, the possibility of successfully conducting these tasks are very close to nil. However, there is computer software that provides fleet managers with a way to carry out fleet management tasks all-in-one platform, equipping them to successfully oversee an entire fleet - this technology is known as fleet management software.

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The fleet management climate in South Africa

Before fleet management software was introduced in South Africa in the mid-90s, fleet management was manual and largely paper-based. 

Today, South Africa is offering relatively mature fleet telematics, comparable to international standards. According to the 5th Edition of ‘Fleet Management in South Africa’, the active use of fleet management systems is set to grow by 12.6% from 2.0 million units at the end of 2021 to 3.6 million by 2026. While company penetration of the total population of fleet vehicles is estimated to increase from 41.5% to 68%.

Nonetheless, South Africa still has a large number of low-end vehicle tracking systems (lightweight solutions which include stolen vehicle recovery (SVR) systems extended with basic fleet management features such as vehicle tracking and real-time visibility and remote monitoring) represented in fleet telematics systems.

With this said, the South African fleet management market is dominated by five players that together represent 70% of the total number of fleet management systems in use in the country. However, Cartrack is the best full-scale fleet management solutions provider both in South Africa and globally, with over 1 700 000 active users (to date) around 23 global branches.

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How Cartrack's Fleet Management Technology Can Change The Way You Do Business

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What are the five main fleet management challenges in South African countries? 

Despite the new normal (banning, unbanning and re-banning of commercial goods and services, restraints of car movements and driver retrenchments) that resulted from COVID-19, the country continues to face socio-economic issues that have a negative impact on fleet management:

1. High hijacking rates: Recently, South Africa’s hijacking rates have been alarmingly high. Not only are hijackings frightening and endangering, but are also a huge loss for fleet businesses, with the average hijacking costing a company over R240,000. As hijackings are on the rise, vehicle tracking should be a top priority for a fleet operating in South Africa by keeping up with the latest hijacking trends and investing in reliable vehicle tracking devices and security services. This will help minimise the risk of car theft and maximise the potential of stolen vehicle recovery. 

2. Increasing fuel prices: In South Africa, fuel prices have been unsteady with the consistent increase (and some decreases), causing inconsistencies in fuel costs for fleet businesses. According to the Standard Bank fleet card transactions data, the average South African paid approximately R14 per litre of diesel in January 2022‒ amounting to R3 360 to fill a 60-litre tank four times a month. However, it would cost almost 50% more to fill the same amount of fuel today since the diesel fuel price is sitting at over R21/litre. It is therefore clear that improving fleet management in South Africa means improving fleet fuel consumption. That can be achieved with fleet management software that helps with better fuel management.
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3. Load-shedding: South Africa is currently facing its worst period of load-shedding to date. By the first week of February 2023, the country has already experienced more load-shedding than the whole of 2019. Load-shedding hinders businesses’ ability to produce products and render services, thereby hindering their ability to deliver outcomes or provide delivery services. Additionally, load-shedding contributes to weak card machine signals, which causes fuel tellers to swipe fuel cards more than once in the mistaken belief that the initial transaction failed. This results in multiple transactions and extra fuel charges. 

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4. Complex fleet compliance: The South African fleet transportation landscape differs from that of the rest of the world as in the majority of other nations, fleet owners are also “owner-drivers'' of one or more of their fleets which in most cases do not exceed 10 vehicles, making it easier for the owner to stay in the know about the condition, utilisation and legal status of the fleet. South Africa, on the other hand, has a lot of smaller fleet bussinesses but also larger ones, making fleet management and compliance more challenging. In order to improve fleet management, fleet managers need to find the best fleet telematics system to help them easily control the condition, utilisation, and legal status of the fleet  all in one place.
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5. High car accident and road fatality rates: According to the Automobile Association of South Africa (AA), South Africa has an average of 14,000 road deaths per year – making road safety a national crisis. The top three causes of road accidents in the country are distracted driving (such as cell phone use or fatigued driving), drunk driving and unsafe driving (such as speeding, overtaking and passing red traffic lights). Other causes of car accidents include j-walking, car faults as well as weather and poor road conditions. Not only does this cost businesses thousands on vehicle loss, repairs or insurance but it may also cost an employee's life. 

South Africa's best vehicle tracking solution to improve your fleet management company 

As a fleet operating in South Africa (or any of our other 23 countries) with Cartrack Solutions, you will not have to worry about these challenges. You can still improve your fleet management and elevate it with our fleet management software and features: 

1. Stolen Vehicle Recovery: With Cartrack's dedicated and highly-trained air and ground recovery team along with our advanced IoT tracking devices combining GPS, GSM, RF, and remote jamming detection technology, we guarantee your vehicle's tracking unit will continue to provide accurate location information. Additionally, our sophisticated installation process makes it more difficult for thieves to locate and disable your device. All these combined give us over 90% surety that your car will be recovered, saving you hundreds of thousands of Rands that could be incurred as a result of hijackings.
   
   
2. MiFleet: Cartrack's MiFleet feature integrates, digitalises, and automates fleet admin, maintenance, and cost analysis. This way, fuel risks by employees (such as syphoning, fuel card fraud, fuel card cloning, and multiple transactions) costing your company thousands are easily detected and automatically alerted when there are inconsistencies in the vehicle’s location, fuel data, and fuel card data. Additionally, fleet maintenance plans are automated based on car usage and diagnostics to avoid unnecessary breakdowns, downtime or fuel wastage, and ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning) or bulk import costs are integrated so you can receive detailed insights that help you understand your entire fleet’s costs and bottom line.
   
   
3. Cartrack Delivery: With our Cartrack Delivery technology efficiently dispatches drivers and assigns driver schedules in advance so you can combat the load-shedding delays caused in the production process and thus the delays in delivery. With Cartrack delivery, you can quickly catch up with delivery delays using route optimisation (saving you on time and fuel) or dispatch the nearest optimal drivers on demand based on their availability to meet even the highest delivery demands. This way, you can keep drivers and customers updated on any ad-hoc changes (caused by load-shedding) – building an efficient communication culture.
   
   
4. Fleet reports and logbook: Prevent vehicle misuse, ensure every vehicle is roadworthy and keep regulatory contracts up-to-date with headache-free compliance. With Cartrack Solutions you can choose from a range of over 40 standard reports including mileage, driver scorecard, speeding and productivity reports, and track vehicle utilisation with our GPS tracking devices that monitor driver behaviour and track vehicles. All this data is obtained by the fleet management system and can be accessed by the fleet controller via the internet, at any time. Use Cartrack's logbook to automatically log all car trips and categorise them as personal or corporate trips ensuring that you have a tax-compliant logbook by distinguishing between corporate and private journeys for SARS submissions.
   
   
5. AI camera solutions: Ensure driver security and prevent accidents with up to eight AI-powered and live-streaming internal and external cameras that detect distracted driving such as smoking, cell phone use and yawning. Additionally, our event-based footage instantly gives you the cctv surveillance you need and has the correct footage to defend your drivers from false claims. These solutions save you potential accident costs, increases driver detection and reduces unnecessary legal costs, and most importantly, improves driver safety and risk management.

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Ready to elevate your vehicle management with Cartrack tracking devices?  

Shoot your fleet’s productivity off the roof today with Cartrack’s fleet management software and tracking devices that empower you to control your fleet no matter the fleet climate.