D.H. Griffin is leading demolition company in the United States. For the past seven years, it has deployed Trimble’s cloud-based Fleet Management solution across its fleet of 500 vehicles, to identify, manage and improve operational areas such as driver safety, customer service, back office administration, fuel use and vehicle efficiency.
What’s more, an Integrated Driver Logs tool keeps track of each driver’s miles on the road. D.H. Griffin was an early adopter of Electronic Logging Devices (ELDs), which are now mandated for all fleets in North America, to comply with regulations under the Department of Transportation Hours of Service requirements.
Prior to installing the Driver Logs tool, drivers kept track of mileage with handwritten logs. “That system was a nightmare,” says Rick Swartz, D.H. Griffin’s Corporate Fleet Manager. “The drivers would enter the miles manually. The quality was poor and unreliable, and we lost productivity because drivers spent too much time maintaining the logs instead of driving.”
IMPROVING EFFICIENCIES
When D.H. Griffin initially rolled out Trimble’s Fleet Management technology, seven years ago, the company experienced an increase in its proficiency and efficiency by over 70 percent and productivity by 10,400 hours per year, across its 200-driver base. Since then, D.H. Griffin has realised additional benefits as they have progressed, migrated and utilized the system.
“You get used to the system and what you can do with it. We have been able to make decisions and gather information that we didn’t have the access to before”, says Rick Swartz.
DRIVER SAFETY AND PRODUCTIVITY
Aside from regulation compliance, D.H. Griffin has benefited from Fleet Management and Driver Logs in other ways, particularly through the built-in driver alert capabilities:
“We have experienced a big reduction in the number of speeding incidents with the built-in driver alert capabilities,” said Swartz. “We look at hard braking incidents, rapid acceleration and speed. It is important to ensure that trucks are going the correct speed, in the right zones.”
Driver productivity has also remained at a good level, since the Driver Safety feature has been rolled out:
“We don’t big brother our drivers, but we can do spot checks. We know long it takes to make a delivery and, if needed, can challenge them on if that delivery or travel time has taken too long.The solution holds them to the line and instils the need to remain professional and to get the job done at all times.”
SIGNIFICANT SAVINGS
D.H. Griffin now achieves significant savings by using the built-in driver alert capabilities to avoid traffic violations and determine unauthorized use. It is also able to use Fleet Management to track if a vehicle has been stolen.
“Over the past few years, we have recovered around 4-5 vehicles that have been stolen, by using the tracking device installed. In many cases, it has led us straight to the vehicle.”
Additionally, D.H. Griffin has saved thousands of dollars on quashing false insurance claims:
“We have a call-in number on the back of our vehicles. Around 5% of the calls we receive are from people making false insurance claims to get compensated. They often blame our trucks for kicking up rocks that smash their windshields. Now we can say, ‘I’m sorry, but our records show that none of our trucks were in your area,’” Swartz says. “I can send them a GPS-based report to prove it.”
To find out the full benefits D.H.Griffin achieved, download the case study here:
