e30cossie

I've been told today at work we are going to be getting a tracker on our work van's.


I'm not very happy with this as there are only 3 van's on the road and they have many other ways of checking on us.

It is a small air conditioning company
1 van install team
1 van maintenance
1 van (me) service engineer

I work hard and do not take the piss and work long hours.

I'm wondering If I drive for 4 hour's then do 8 hour's on site then 4 hour's home ,Am I breaking the law and what breaks do I have to have ?

And I've said I will not go over the speed limit anywhere as every think is logged.


We have to do a job sheet every job or day and signed by the customer.
They can check our fuel receipt times.
They would soon get a phone call from the customer when we are not there.
They can check our parking receipt.

Do many other's have this problem ?

I was moaned at the other day for taking too long to get to a job.
Luton - (Yeadon) north Leeds They said 2 hour's.
The journey had taken me 3.5 hour's.

Big G

Did you not take the company Helicopter?

Alot of places have trackers for insurance purposes but I am sure they do have to inform you if they are watching you,
We recently changed trackers at our place and the gaffer saved a few grand on the insurance through it.

e30cossie

They first said to me it was to save money on insurance but they are only going to track the 3 work van's. I'm sure the insurance would be all vehicles on the policy not just some.
I think it may be time to move on as there starting to take the piss.

fez2i16v

i have a trakker on my van and it mainly is for insurance purposes,they only really need to do vans as they have tools in etc.

also if you ar traveling to a job and it takes you 3.5 hours instead of 2 they can see youve been sat in traffic on the m25 for a while,but there not all that good because i got back to the works and my van said i was doing 74 mph on the m62 near doncaster.

focusv8

We've had trackers for years.
Around 200 company vehicles and most have them, those that don't are short term hire awaiting replacement, like mine at the moment.

In 8 hours you must have at least a half hour break.

Driving time doesn't count in working hours, at the moment.

Ours were fitted originally because some of the fridge service engineers we had were definitely taking the piss.
Most of those left at the mention of tracker.

One guy we have at the moment is given a weekly tracker report to make sure his time sheet matches.
He is forever forgetting to book O-T and looses money without tracker.

.

ECU Monitor Enthusiast

iTrader: (1)

The company I previously worked for had these installed as demanded by the insurance company.
They record every thing !!!! (I modified mine so it was always offline...LOL )

AlexRS2782

The company i used to work for installed tracking devices on all its works vans/reps cars last year

Main reason was for insurance purposes incase the vehicle was stolen with tools in & could then be tracked but the other reason was that the company could keep track of what employees did with the vans both inside & outside of company time

I'm sure it doesnt apply to you but in the case of my old company after installing the trackers the company saw a big drop in the monthly mileage / petrol costs for the vans/cars as the respective drivers knew that they could no longer use their work vehicle to go shopping in, drive to the pub, drive to mates, etc like they had been doing & getting company to pay for the petrol rather than using their own personal cars

hitchwest

iTrader: (2)

if you not doing anything wrong you got nothing to worry about i work at atransport firm and all our vehicles have them
when the traffic office ring the drivers up and say where are you the drivers say
you know where iam so what you aking for
there is ways round them anyway mate
i dont think you need to worry about your ours its only if you go on to tachograph laws

Shings

They can be fooked with... personally I think you'll get over it.

I just used to drive everywhere stupidly fast (normal) and they got fed up of moaning, ultimatly they aint ass'd if you loose your licence, just that you get your work done and dont take the piss.

If you want to know about what is and isn't classed as "work" during your working day then you need to look up the "working time regulations" you will find it on the net, government act and all that and is law.

HTH

bigpower

we got Trackers fitted today to the company cars. TBH i aint fussed as i dont take the piss and if i still need to do something i will, but the main pisser is the ''lack of trust''.

Theyre are people who do take the piss, so should flush them out and also insurance is cheaper......


Just have to see how they monitor it and how they use the info?

nthorpey

do you have a company mobile?

How do you know they're not already tracking you

S1rst

If you dont take the piss, then you have nothing to worry about do you?

2 hours from luton to leeds without speeding? Whoever suggested that is clearly a bit thick.

Alps Pacino

We used o have them and there a pain i the arse, the gaffas seem to spend more time trying to catch you out than actualy doing any work. A mate of mine got pulled in the office for a bollocking for being late by half hour 1 morning, the tracker said he had left home at 8.33 and arrived on site at 8.37, The journey was 20 miles and the gaffa believed the tracker over the fact that you would need more than a caddy van to do 20 miles i 4 mins lol

xr2i-carl

Is it a legal requirement that the company tells you they are fitting them?

Incorperate your travelling time into your daily hours.

leecavturbo

what gets my goat with the service industry is you could bust your balls and get home early having completed the job.
but when they start with this tracking and paid by it then you just end up with un happy workers plodding on and still only completing the job.
unproductive measure if you ask me

snoopaloopa

iTrader: (3)

Yeah, we got them fitted to all our vans last year,all the goodwill fooked off right out the window, jobs running late etc.. but all they see is 2 grand saved on the insurance, costing them 10 times that over the year in lost work.
Can the tracker tell them i've walked to the beach and spent an hour eating an ice cream? can it fook
Plus we have all worked out how to bypass them already, it took about 30mins to work out lol

rstdave

iTrader: (3)

Surely if you've all bypassed them your bosses are gonna know this when it shows up the van hasn't moved lol??!! Or am i missing something? I'd hate to have one fitted too for the record, luckily for me i own my own work van so the boss could hardly fit one....he'd bloody love to and i'm 100% sure would spend most of the day glued to monitoring it lol!!

Fudgey

iTrader: (4)

got trackers on our works vans. they do use it to collate with your timesheets etc, also to see where you are incase a same day job comes in and they can see who is closest.

they havnt said anything about my driving style, im pretty much flat out everywhere and still do almost 12 hour days every day. i have seen 114 on the gps lol, and it records the max speed. only done it once mind when i first got it, now it struggles to get to 108 lol

so long as you dont take the piss, your ok...

FletchCossie

iTrader: (4)

Local motor factors have a TV in the office showing all delivery vehicles and their location using tracker. I think its a good idea for companies as sooooo many people take the piss, but its an arse for people who actually do their job.

Im not sure if any tracking device can tell your speed??

Fudgey

iTrader: (4)

the one my company use is called masternaut. and i have been informed that they do know how fast you are going

focusv8

Between any 2 given points,,Yes.

They've got a 42" plasma screen in our office with our trackers on, pitty I've been in a short term hire van for 12months!!!
.

stuboy

ateotd if u not taking the piss whats the problem

Eagle

iTrader: (2)

i love mine ... so long as your in the right and don't take the piss why are you worried ?
always nice when they say why did it take that long to goto there etc... just tell em to check the tracker ...
if you disable em they call out an engineer to find out why its not registering, if this happens as a regular occurance your company usually get a nice big bill for call outs etc ..
so embrace the new technology ....
it can work for your benifit ... 60 mph on dual carriageways in a van is the max speed for a larger style van vito or dispatch etc....
all our lot have slowed down and yeah they loose jobs through it but saves shit loads on insurance so cant blame em really...

stucos71

As mentioned above, its the lack of trust that annoys me.
They say its for cheaper insurance....... but most companies use them to coinside with timesheets hhmmmmmmmm!!!!

I'd say; if you dont trust your guys, why employ them in the first place.

My subs just string out a 12hr shift that could be done in 8, as they cant leave.
Give guys an insentive rather than reign them in, get more respect and more work done IMO.
Treat them like kids, this is what happens. Turns into "survival of the fittest".

anodised

count ur self lucky i have to carry my tracker round with me

this thing http://www.romtracplc.com/

stuboy

what the hell u do as a job?



postman!!

S1rst

Thats 300 mph!

Just shows how thick the boss was/is! I think he deserves the bollocking for being utterly stupid!

anodised

alarm response

Alps Pacino

All he kept saying to me mate mick was "the tracker doesnt lie" lol, he was nicj named cockboy which says it all really

Glenn_

iTrader: (1)

Big brother is watching you.

dojj

iTrader: (3)

it's all to do with them prooving that you don't use the company vehicle during no working hours to save themselves the extra Ł3000 per employee it's going to cost them in tax

our system, as i've said before, measures your speed, acceleration, ignition on/off, harsh braking, etc

but it's also linked into to our pod system, so you get to work and, as soon as you've got to work, the system says "ignition on 05.55, ignition off 06.00, mr dojj has arrived at depot 06.00"
you then sort your stuff out and leave to do your round, let's be simple here and say you have 5 drops to do
you put your name into the mdt to load up the route
the computer says "mr dojj, logged on to route 5 06.45"
you leave the office to get to your first drop
computer says "ignition on 06.46, mr dojj departed depot 06.47"
it then figures out how long it shoudl take you to get to your first drop
if you break the speed limit it shows up as "exsessive speed 61.5 mph location unknown, normal running, normal running, ignition off 08.00, arrive mr smith 08.00"
then you do your thing, get your signature and it says "depart mr smith 08.05, ignition on"

and so on and so forth

you have to understand that this info is displayed on 3 different screens and you have the vehicle data, driver data, drop data, pod data in one, then you have reporting data in another, then you have th eoverall overview to tell you how late/early/on time yuo are running on another

not to mention that there is another screen with a map on it and you can trace back vehicle movements for years and years since we first had them inslated, for vehicles that we no longer have

everyone who "disables" them just marks themselves out to the ocmpany as being in need of further investigation, so you get the shitty van while they look into why your's doenst work, we had one guy who'd disconnect the pwoer to the device, and then reconnect it again when he'd done what he was doing, but the mileage never added up so he was caughtout that way, then you have feul bills and all sorts

so the company saves money, gets rid of it's troublesome staff, it's a win win situation for them so you just have to deal with it or find another job

ffs, even buses now are tracked

dojj

iTrader: (3)

http://www.microlise.com/TMC.aspx

just scroll down halfway to see what benifits it gives the company

• Vehicle inspection (start and end of journey)
• Odometer capture (start and end of journey)
• Depot departure notification
• Delivery point information and notes
• Consignment and consignment item
• Delivery and collection
• Ad hoc delivery and collection
• Transhipment to 3rd party locations or between vehicles
• Receive real-time updates to journey
• Manual and barcode scanning of items
• Capture of reason codes for un-delivered / unmanifested items.
• Configurable capture of text and images for reason codes.
• Asset delivery and collection
• Customer signature capture
• Customer site image capture
• Customer delivery point arrival and departure notification
• Return to base notification
• End of journey upload
• Working Time Directive compliance
• Driver debrief capability
• Proactive critical service monitoring identifies system or interface issues
• Configurable web based subscription to reports delivered directly to the users e-mail inbox

• Implement best practice process to drivers
• Configure and capture vehicle inspection information for vehicle road worthiness and defect tracking.
• Track mileage covered for journeys.
• Capture on time departure performance through automatic driver confirmation.
• Ensure the driver has all the information he requires for the delivery through the addition of delivery specific information and notes.
• Flexible to allow both deliveries and collections to be carried out simultaneously, both planned and unplanned.
• Enable changes to the plan to be sent automatically to the driver in real-time and to cope with breakdows, bulk outs etc.
• Ensure items with a barcode are proactively scanned by the driver during delivery / collection.
• Accurately record reasons why items / deliveries could not be carried out through configurable reason codes.
• Configure reason codes to capture additional text and images as required to improve customer service response to customer.
• Ensure costly assets (e.g. totes, rollcages, stillages) are tracked throughout the delivery process and ensure empty assets are returned.
• Capture customer delivery signature or an image for unattended / left on premises deliveries.
• Accurately capture when the driver arrived and departed the delivery point to monitor time in motion.
• Real-time update of drivers arrival at the depot for efficient reuse of resources.
• Enable any additional non-critical data (images) to be uploaded using least cost routing.
• Capture of breaks, delays, non-working / non-driving / driving time.
• Warnings of pending breaks requirements.

C4llyT

Did you say tracker or tacho?

Ends up costing them as you stick to all speed limits and don't rush anywhere, as said done for insurance though.

Mike C

iTrader: (1)

As above. I have trackers on my vans and they're not there for the purposes you're associating them with. Presuming it's a "normal" van, you won't require an O-Licence and need to keep tacho records etc.

I've just ordered a specially-built 3.5t wagon with an extended 6.5 metre bed as needed a longer vehicle, but didn't want to go down the road of O-licences for this particular vehicle as I've been there, done it and it's a pain in the arse! I will have to do it again in the future no doubt as buisness grows over time, but at this stage it's more hassle than it's worth.

AndyGranger

We have all our vehicle's tracked with Microlise (150+)at our depot
They not only track your movements but also provide information on how the vehicle is being driven!
Harsh Braking
Overspeeding
Harsh Acceleration
Even how many times the door has been opened!!
Our drivers are being dragged in the office over these offence's aswell!
The lastest is excessive idleling whilst waiting at drops!

C4llyT

Thing is, if you're not task and finish, you earn more, and have a lot less risk of points on your licence, can't see the issue.

Smiggy

Fitted them to our fleet at my last work. Our fuel bill went down something like 12% in the first month. With over 200 vehicles that was a lot of money. Also stopped guys doing the bingo runs at night as we could see if vehicle was getting used outwith work hours. Stopped a lot of guys doing homers at the weekend with our equipment as well.

Do nothing wrong and you've nothing to worry about.

rspickup

a guy i know blocks his tracker with a black film type stuff! unsure what it is?

RichardB

Weve had them for years, started out as the insurance thing. Now when you hand your timesheets in they check them. Also, if you use your van for private use and arnt meant to, they cant legally check on your tracker out of working hours its an privacy issue!

dojj

iTrader: (3)

tell me about it

it's part of my job to dish out the bollockings because i'm at the other end of the computer

we had one guy who wouldn't turn the engine off when he got to the front door and so, if the van had gone walkies, he would have had a hard time explaining why he didn't secure the vehicle when he left it

it's an expensive bit of kit mind, but ours also tells us when the fridges go out of temprature range and we were, when they first got fitted, forever having to click the alerts, because the alert overrides everything else on the desktop so until you deal with it, you can't use the computer for squat

but it also stopped peole saying they've been to a drop when they hadn't, i remember one guy saying he'd been waiting outside a drop, and was looking for the address, when i had the customer on the other end of the phone asking wher he was as she couldn't see him, and he was 20 miles away on the way home