Red Hawk Fire and Security: Driver safety and collision reduction

The challenge: Improving driver productivity and safety

More than 50,000 companies and institutions across North America rely on the resources and knowledge delivered by Red Hawk Fire & Security. The company provides a comprehensive set of advanced safety and security technologies that are custom designed to meet the specific needs of the businesses they serve. From a corporate perspective, management set a goal to service more customers in a day – which meant boosting employee productivity and customer satisfaction by going from 4 service tickets to 5.

The company also recognized the potential of improving driver behavior in an attempt to curtail accident rates. According to their fleet manager,

“We had a very high accident rate, which was most costly in our Northeast Region – and that needed to be corrected.”

Beyond improving driver productivity and safety, the company was also looking to reduce fuel consumption and spending by getting a better handle on the time vehicles spent idling.

The solution

After performing extensive research to find the best telematics solution that would not only solve their current challenges, but also have the flexibility to adapt to their future needs – the company decided to go with Geotab. Approximately 400 out of the 800 vehicles were equipped with the Geotab GO™ device, giving management detailed visibility into the performance of each vehicle through MyGeotab™ – an easy to use, web-based fleet management software.

The results

Since then ticket times improved, and after 1 year the company still continues to be committed to working with dispatchers to become more effective. An unexpected benefit, as indicated by their fleet manager, was that “timesheet audits identified employees that were erroneously reporting work done for a full day, when they, in fact, were leaving the job site after only a few short hours of work.” Not only was Red Hawk Fire & Security able to cut wasted overhead, but also the company was able to target the issues surrounding employee honesty and integrity at the workplace.

When it came to safety, Red Hawk Fire & Security reduced accidents by 80% in the Northeast Region. This was done in 2 ways: 1) monitoring risky driver behaviour and 2) taking corrective action on an as-needed basis. Today, the Northeast Region is at, or below, the accident level of other regions. Opportunities to make further improvements still exist, as most of the remaining accidents are with those managers and sales employees that do not currently have telematics devices installed in their vehicles. Due to the success they’ve had thus far, Red Hawk Fire & Security plans to roll out telematics to the remaining vehicles.

What’s more, the company was also able to drastically improve seatbelt use. The first day showed well over 250 incidents where a vehicle was in motion without the seatbelt fastened. After just 1 week of strong, persistent action, all employees were using their seatbelt.

Testimonial - Red Hawk Fire & Security

I would highly recommend Geotab’s fleet management technology. Part of what makes it of such great value is the rapid and effective response rate of my service provider. My Geotab reseller provides a response to my questions within minutes, and is always looking to simplify things for our team.

Also, the whole point behind telematics is being able to enhance productivity. When we looked at other potential telematics providers, we found that we would be wasting, on average, 15 days a month and spending an additional $1,200 / month on maintaining what we considered to be ‘junky equipment’. For instance, one provider in particular required that we call a repair technician to come on-site to repair their faulty devices that needed to be hard-wire installed. Combining that with billable hours and the days wasted… that would equate to over $200,000 in annual device upkeep! With Geotab, however, this entire process is completely avoided. They truly offer a solid solution that just works.

From an administrative perspective, our Geotab reseller is eager to give us the data and work with us to help better understand it. This is another huge bonus.

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From the Fleet Manager

“There are a lot of providers out there for telematics, but what it comes down to are the features and functions, device upkeep, and the level of customer service, our Geotab reseller is by far one of my best vendors, and has made the overall experience both productive and enjoyable” - Red Hawk Fire & Security