Are you looking for a customizable fleet tracking solution? Would you like to boost the efficiency of your fleet, cut operating costs, and stay compliant with FMCSA regulations? If so, choose Geotab and use it to maximum advantage.
This complete telematics system provides fleet managers with everything from the driver and asset tracking to fleet maintenance and fuel management. It allows them to analyze fleet data over the course of several months and achieve their goals.
Whether you are looking for a fleet management software, GPS tracking hardware, electronic logging device, or mobile app, Geotab has something tailored to your needs. You just need to choose the solution that best suits your needs and budget.
Their highly customizable products and systems can help you improve CSA safety ratings, minimize violations, reduce administration costs, and much more. You can use them together or separately as per your needs.
In this review, we will walk you through all the important facts about Geotab. This will help you find out more about this company and its telematics solutions for fleets. Ready to get started? Let’s dig a bit further.
A Few Words About the Company
Geotab is a world-renowned telematics company that provides a whole host of logging and tracking vehicle products and solutions for any size fleet. All of their telematics devices and systems share a common bond: They are designed to help fleets analyze data, keep track of assets, and increase efficiency over time.
Aside from developing these solutions and products, the company also acts as a supplier. They handle customer support and sales through a reseller network. That means Geotab partners with different resellers to make sales instead of selling products directly to customers. This sets it apart from FMS vendors.
Keep in mind that it is not possible to get support via phone call. Training, as well as customer and technical support, is provided through Authorized Geotab Reseller. You will need to create a Geotab account to find your reseller and click the Support button.
The company was established in 1996, meaning they are not new to the transportation industry. Nevertheless, they still invest a lot in their final products. Geotab puts a lot of time and effort into tracking engine analytics, engineering Open API software, and developing hardware.
Key Features of Geotab Fleet Management
Geotab offers a broad range of fleet management solutions and tools that help transportation companies improve their performance, increase safety, reduce operating costs, and stay compliant with the laws and regulations at the same time.
Here are the most important features included in this incredible solution:
Driver tracking
At GEOTAB, they know how aggressive driving might waste fuel and cause unnecessary wear and tear of vehicles. Therefore, they have developed a driver tracking system that can potentially help you track your drivers, avoid collisions, expensive litigation, or injury. This way, this fleet management system helps solve issues like driver tracking and coaching with telematics.
You can also take advantage of MyGeotab’s flexible notification system to receive emails and text messages. Stay updated about your day-to-day driver activity and improve driver behavior over time.
Fleet reporting
The advanced Geotab reporting system delivers all the information you may need. Find all the useful reports and tailor them according to your business needs. Imply the Driver Safety Scorecard to maximize driver safety and improve driving habits within your fleet.
Run the Speed Profile reports for road speeds. You can now discover the endless possibilities with these custom reports. Geotab will also provide you with trip history and advanced risk management in the form of driving patterns. Manage the overall driving patterns for increased safety, efficiency, and productivity.
Routing and dispatching
The route management system by Geotab will help you achieve maximum productivity by saving the travel time and reducing the miles driven. This will happen even if the plans change at the last minute. You can optimize your fleet’s journey by planning your routes properly. That will make it easier for you to plan the series of stops, waypoints, and more.
Also, you can optimize and add new zones for closer monitoring and alerts. Use the optimization button to make your routing more efficient. There is also the possibility to adjust the orders manually. With Geotab, saving your gas, time, and fuel is easier.
Asset tracking
Not every transportation-related management solution provides an asset tracking system. With Geotab, you can improve your productivity and utilization with real-time asset tracking technology.
It will allow you to monitor your valuable assets when they are on the road. With Geotab’s solar asset tracking system, you can easily track your valuable assets in real-time. Aside from tracking your assets, you will also get deeper insights into how the assets are being used at all times.
Fleet fuel management
The GEOTAB Drive platform has a lot of reporting features for fuel performance. It eliminates counterproductive miles in an effective way. That said, it will help you understand all the facts of your fleet, including fuel management.
As a Geotab’s user, you will be able to take advantage of the fuel management feature to control and monitor the routes, speed, time, and maintenance of every single vehicle within your fleet.
There are also fuel cards that enable fleet managers to track the purchase and consumption of fuel. With this fuel management feature (available through the GEOTAB mobile application), you will never have to worry about the fuel management of your vehicles.
Fleet maintenance
GEOTAB Drive helps users with the engine diagnostics. This is presumably one of the best advantages of GEOTAB. It also helps the driver to inspect other vehicle resources. This fleet maintenance feature differentiates GEOTAB from the rest.
It helps users to quickly detect any problems with their vehicles and plan maintenance in the best possible way. With the help of this excellent fleet maintenance feature, you can effectively plan the maintenance of your vehicle before hitting the road, which involves replacing tires, changing engine oil, and so on.
Driver safety reporting
GEOTAB Drive has another excellent feature – driver safety reporting. This application takes care of safety concerns all the time. Aside from helping the drivers with a driver scorecard, it also helps fleet managers understand if any of the drivers require coaching. It will make you aware of the excellent performances of your drivers as well.
Driver coaching
Another cool thing within this fleet management feature is the in-vehicle driver input. With this incredible feature, your drivers can get on-road coaching and improve their performances. There are a lot of safety features and functions in this fantastic application.
You can check out these features on the official Geotab website. Combine as many features as you can for the best results. Eventually, this will help you make the most of your fleet in the long run.
MyGeotab Fleet Management Software
MyGeotab software is one of the best telematics solutions by this company. Although this open API software comes with Geotab hardware, it can be used separately with hardware solutions from other companies. That offers excellent flexibility to fleets.
Here are the top features of this open API software:
- Customizability
- Functionality
- BYOD (Bring Your Own Device)
- ELD Compliance
Geotab GPS Tracking Hardware
The company also offers multiple fleet tracking products and electronic logging devices. When it comes to hardware, the most popular Geotab options are:
Geotab Go (Geotab GO9)
Geotab Go9 is one of the best hardware solutions that make use of the GPS tracking system. It has a gyroscope with a 32-bit processor and a lot of memory space.
This plug-and-play device provides an incredible advantage to the user, allowing them to get the installation process done in a matter of seconds. Moreover, it helps in recording various data, such as engine ignition, route distance, engine idle time, vehicle speed, and more.
Furthermore, this GPS tracking hardware helps in detecting the in-vehicle reversing collisions. It can make it easier for users to detect the reversing collision of the vehicles. The Geotab Go9 can also record data such as temperature tracking while providing satellite tracking at the same time.
Geotab Go Rugged
This ruggedized telematics device can handle any harsh conditions. It is also able to handle other external installation without any hassle.
What users like about this fantastic device is that it can be suited for any particular fleet using heavy equipment, powered trailers, farm machinery, and yellow iron. That makes Geotab Go Rugged one of the best GPS Tracking Hardware offered by this company.
Geotab is offering numerous incredible benefits and features to its users through this hardware option. Some of the best features of this tracking device include:
- Ruggedized polycarbonate housing that is resistant to humidity, impact, and water
- Custom IOX harness
- GPS technology alongside g-force monitoring
- Battery and engine health assessment
- It meets IP67 standards
Geotab Drive App
Keep in mind that the Geotab application only works with the MYGeotab program under cellular connection or WI-Fi. The good news is that users can use this app while offline. After the initial login, this fantastic application will start to receive updates from the server. In case there is no cellular coverage, this application will work efficiently to pick up data whenever it gets connected.
The data that the Drive application obtains goes into the internal memory of the Geotab GO device. All the data collected offline will get transmitted to the server as soon the user finds cellular coverage. Once the application gets done with data coordination, the missing elements will go back to the Drive App once again.
How Much Does It Cost?
Geotab doesn’t list information about prices and contracts on its website. By the way, the prices vary widely between their products and software options. For example, if you are looking for the Geotab Go device, you will choose between these four plans:
- Base – It comes at the lowest price point and with the basic features only
- HOS
- Pro
- ProPlus – This is the most expensive option, and it has the most features included
Note: All the Go devices come with a standard one-year warranty.
How much you will pay will depend on what features and options you need. Choose a plan that suits both your budget and needs.
Pros:
- User-friendly interface
- Highly customizable
- Great accuracy
- Real-time tracking
- Easy to use
- Installation is quite simple
- Great online reputation
Cons:
- Irregular customer service: This concern is common to many fleet management and tracking solutions, including Geotab. Their customer service is not consistent, so you may have difficulty getting a quick answer to your question when encountering an issue with this solution. Luckily, the problems do not arise so often.
- Clunky maps: Some customers find the maps a bit clunky. Even so, driver tracking, as well as routing and dispatching services, are excellent. You will be able to track your vehicles and assets on the Geotab map in real-time.
Summary: Why Go for Geotab?
One of the best reasons to choose this solution is flexibility. As stated earlier, Geotab offers its hardware and software as separate products. So if you don’t want to use them together or if you already have telematics hardware from another company, you can pair it with Geotab Open API software. It will work as a complete management system.
The next reason to go for Geotab is that its products work for both heavy and light vehicles in large or small fleets. This means you will be able to use Geotab no matter how many vehicles your fleet contains.
Both software and hardware solutions are easy to use, flexible, and reliable. However, Geotab’s customer service is not always regular since it’s provided by third-party resellers. Besides service, this affects the price in the same way.
Geotab is not transparent about its pricing. Despite the fact that the scope of their services and operations is significant, you may have trouble gaining insight into the pricing and plan structure. Likewise, you may have difficulty setting up maintenance reminders.
Nobody is perfect. Geotab has advantages and disadvantages alike. Yet the benefits you may get from this fleet management solution outshine the drawbacks. So you should definitely consider choosing Geotab when searching for a fleet telematics solution.