A fleet management system is the software that gathers every vehicle's reports on one screen, plans routes, schedules maintenance and coaches drivers. A company pays for it with a monthly fee for each vehicle.
It takes in four kinds of data. First, the telematics device in each vehicle reports its location, speed and engine faults. Second, an AI dash cam sends short clips of risky moments. Third, a fuel card sends every fuel purchase. Fourth, the company's own plans, such as which van must visit which customer today, come in from its transport software.
From this data it does several jobs. It shows a live map. It plans routes. It works out when each vehicle needs a service. It scores drivers, and sends the scores to a usage-based insurance programme when the fleet pays less insurance for safer driving.
Consider a school bus contractor in Jaipur with 60 buses. The system flags 6 buses that have crossed 10,000 km since their last service, and books each one into a workshop on a day when schools are closed. It also sends an alert to the manager whenever a bus goes faster than 40 km an hour, and shows that one driver has done this 25 times this week, so the manager arranges coaching. Parents can see on the school's app that a bus is ten minutes away.
The value comes from three savings. Diesel is usually the largest running cost. For Indian trucking fleets, it is about half or more of the running cost. The software shows idling and fuel purchases that do not match the distance driven. A planned service costs less than a breakdown on the road. And a safer driver causes fewer accidents. For a contractor the software also helps meet customer contracts, such as a school's demand that its buses be tracked.
The big names in this software are mostly American, built for American trucking, and the American system also records driver hours. Indian fleets use both these products and Indian-made ones, which are built for Indian roads, fuel pilferage and mixed fleets. Several of the companies have large teams in Bengaluru.
Two parts sit inside it. The electronic logging device records a truck driver's hours behind the wheel, and is a US-law feature. The fleet operating system is the platform on which a fleet runs its in-cab apps and devices. Trucks also connect to a transportation management system, a digital freight marketplace and a trucking app for owners. The scene is described in fleet management.