An audit is important for running a business successfully. It helps you to evaluate certain important terms. If you are a fleet manager, you must audit your fleet’s performance to boost efficiency. You may be confused and want to know how to audit your fleet’s performance to boost efficiency. You are at the right place. In this article, we are going to provide you with all the important tips that you can follow in auditing your fleet's performance.
Fleet audit is important for fleet managers to run their business smoothly. There are various points that a fleet manager should keep in mind while auditing. Fleet audit is compulsory to know what exactly your vehicles need and what they lack.
Ways to do fleet audit
Vehicle data
As a fleet manager, you know very well about your assets. The main assets that you own are your fleet vehicles and your drivers. The more you take care of your important assets, the more your fleet's performance boosts.
You can replace a driver if he is not working well. How do you get that the driver is not working well? Of course, you can only know this by regularly checking the driver's performance. This provides you a data at the end and you decide whether to change him or not.
On the same pattern, you also need to change a vehicle when it’s necessary. How you will get to know this? This is only possible when you get the proper data about your vehicles’ performance regularly.
Here is a big question now. You might be thinking about how to track fleet vehicles and drivers' performance regularly? There are many ways to keep a record of all these things. You can use fleet management software for getting regular data. You should have cloud-based software for fleet management. It will help you in several ways and provide you with calculated integrated information. Following are some calculations that you get from this software.
- TCO(total cost of ownership)
- Per mile Cost
- Utilization
This data provides you with an important base for proper auditing of your fleet’s performance to boost efficiency. In short, it is the first step towards boosting efficiency.
Risks Elimination
Another factor that is important to audit fleet’s performance to boost efficiency is risk elimination. How can you do risk elimination? It is necessary for you as a fleet manager to control the risks to your assets.
Following are some steps that are helpful in risks elimination.
- Your vehicles should be monitored properly.
- Drivers’ performance should be checked regularly.
As a fleet manager, you must arrange proper training sessions for fleet drivers. It will directly boost the efficiency of your fleet. In short, it is a compulsory step for boosting your fleet performance. You can also do all this employing software for fleet management. Go ahead and take this crucial step.
Legal documentation
All the vehicles of your fleet should be registered. It is important for your effective fleet management. You should have all the legal documents that are required. It will save you from certain road issues.
This is one of the crucial steps while you decide to audit your fleet’s performance to boost efficiency. What are the important documents that you should have as a fleet manager? Following are some of them:
- MVR
- Insurance
- Driver certifications
- Title information
- Records like background checks, drug test results, tax forms, performance reviews, and background checks.
- DVIRs
Keep in mind that if you want replaces a vehicle from your fleet; you need all the legal documents there too. The fleet management software makes all these things easy for you. You can have all these records on hand with this software. Move forward and give technology a chance.
Managing the budget
Budget is an important aspect of running a business successfully. As a fleet manager, you have to keep a sharp eye on the budget of your fleet. Your fleet's performance needs to manage the budgets. You must make a proper fiscal budget for your fleet. The budget should include:
- Total Fleet maintenance cost
- Fuel cost
- Driver’s payments
- Vehicle replacement cost
Consider all the budget important factors in mind while making a budget. Try to reduce unnecessary expenditures. It will lead you to do some savings for unexpected losses. Fleet budget management is an important factor in auditing your fleet’s performance to boost efficiency.
Give technology a chance
Technology is evolving day by day and making life easier. We cannot take off our eyes from becoming technology users. If you want to boost the efficiency of your fleet, you should give technology a chance.
The use of proper software in your fleet management improves its efficiency. It helps to get data that can be helpful while you are on deciding to audit your fleet’s performance to boost efficiency. Following are some important technologies that are helpful in data generating.
- Fleet management software
- Calculator of ROI calculation
- GPS tracker
All these are helpful in not only monitoring your fleet vehicles but also for monitoring fleet drivers' behavior. In short, you can get all the necessary data that can be way more important for your fleet's performance to boost efficiency.
Conclusion
We have discussed all the ways that you can follow to audit your fleet’s performance to boost efficiency. We hope you have read them all. Following is a summary of all the main points that have been discussed above. Have a look if you haven't studied all the points thoroughly.
- Vehicle check
- Risks elimination
- Proper control measures
- All the legal documents
- Identify all the fleet issues
- The cause of incidents should be investigated.
As promised, here is your complete audit checklist tool. If you need any help regarding anything, comment below and we will help you out. Click the link below and get a more deep insight into fleet management.