Tracking Employees in Your Vehicles

It was brought to my attention this week that I haven't talked much, if any, about the benefits of GPS tracking for fleets. Well, I can't argue with that. So, let me tell you a story we recently heard.

A local company installed a GPS tracking system and told their drivers about it. Of course, the drivers knew that completely disconnecting the device would send an alert to management. So, they did not dare to do that. Instead, this pair of less-than-highly-motivated employees purchased a large magnet and placed that magnet over the GPS antenna. Unfortunately for these 2 employees, their little scheme failed to disable the GPS unit and it was discovered that the pair was simply leaving the office daily and parking. I hope their card games (or whatever they did to occupy that time) were worth their pentions. Both were 4 years from getting a full retirement.

Anyone who has managed people, white collar or blue collar, knows that employees often look for ways to improve their own situation at the expense of the company. Whether it is employee theft, endless hours of solitaire on the PC, or taking a company vehicle somewhere it should not go, companies lose an unbelievable amount of money yearly do to lack of productivity and theft. One article I found states that employee theft of small businesses totals $40 billion yearly. The same article states that 30% or workers in America will steal at some time in their careers. Wow! Anyone have 3 or more employees?

I've had employees working for me consistently over the last 14 years. During that time, I have never had an employee that was free of the need for supervision. The great thing about GPS tracking is that, for the most part, it can be used for numerous legitimate reasons other than just ensuring your employees are where they say they are. With the added benefits of fuel cost reductions, route verification, mileage logging, and more, loss of morale that might arise from the installation of a GPS fleet tracking system can be completely avoided.

We would all like to think that our employees are upstanding citizens who would never steal or cheat us out of money. If that is true for you, you have beaten the odds. But, chances are, if you knew the whole truth, you might find otherwise. So, we can take our chances or take control.

Take care,


Steven Van Ooyen

CTO