Tracking Maintenance Expenses

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thebluffs1

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Jul 18, 2008
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Good Morning,

Curious to know if you could share what software programs you use to track the ongoing maintenance expenses for your tractors and trailers.

The one we are currently using is strong on managing service intervals, but weak on associating costs "correctly".

Any insight is appreciated.
 
If you are using dispatch software, they should have a maintenance module that bolts on.

Are you just trying to track costs, or do you have mechanics in your own shop, and want to track inventory etc?

There are a range of products that can do various things. I have had very good experience with a product called MIR-RT by Datadis out of Quebec. Many years ago we had language barriers, but they had that resolved. It sucks at retail if you do that out of your shop, but it is good for real time maintenance and inventory.

It might be overkill for your application. When I bought that many years ago, I researched several other programs and it was way better than those. I don't remember what the other products were though.
 
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I've used Fleetmate. It's good and may be what you are looking for. However, it's completeness is very much dependent on how diligent and accurate the users are. It operates by setting up your trucks and trailers and then you update records. Repairs, fuel, tires, routine work (people may refer to that as "A" service and "B" service, depending on where you go.) It can help automate a lot of things, like knowing your miles per gallon or if there's a problem with tires on trailer that has a lot of blowouts and there's a nice reporting function on the program so you can pull how many miles your fleet did. It very much will associate costs on any scale you choose - from an individual truck to the whole fleet or a group of assets, for any length of time you choose to look at.

Now, here's the kicker: the information you get out of it is only as good as the information you put into it. I've seen people use Fleetmate and forget to enter something (i.e., a fuel purchase, repair, enter an odometer reading incorrectly) and then everything is out of whack. It works almost entirely off of odometer readings and if you miss something or do it wrong, your reports will truly be "garbage in, garbage out." You won't know something is wrong until you look one day and ask, "hey, how come truck # 666 has such a lousy miles per gallon?" or "I thought we just serviced that trailer...how come that tire repair isn't in Fleetmate?"

If I'm not mistaken, Fleet Manager (which is TransPlus's trucking software cousin to Logistics Manager) has a similar method to track your asset maintenance history. Again, it's only as accurate as the information you put into it and I don't think it allows you to cost out repair jobs to average out your maintenance per mile rate. The good people at TransPlus would gladly write the code for a fee, I'm sure.
 
FleetManager does have a maintenance module you can buy, but we never used it. It wasn't as well developed as the dispatch side. That said, things could have changed in the last 3 years.

However, if you have a program that bridges into your dispatch software, it saves a ton of duplicate entry.

I wish you luck, I found software procurement one of the toughest decisions. You never know how it is going to fit your current business practices, and how much you are going to have to change your procedures to make it fit.

Try to stay away from custom written bridges if you can. Every time either program releases a revision, you need to revise the bridge.
 
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