The Tasman Bay Christian Trust (TBC Transport) has six buses operating a service transporting students to schools located in Motueka, Lower Moutere, Mapua and up the Moutere to Richmond, Upper Moutere. Something unique about TBC Transport is that they aren’t about making money – being a charitable trust, any surpluses from the school Bus services go towards the Trust’s charities. Wayne Wardell is the Operations Manager for TBC Transport, and he has his hands in all the pies – which is why GPS tracking has become more than just an MoE requirement, but rather a way to ease his workload too. “For larger companies, an operations manager may focus solely on organising the buses and their drivers. Whereas I wear several hats; I deal with the Ministry on a daily basis, I do all the daily reporting and Fleet maintenance records and all those extra things where in a little operation like ours, it’s not practical to have another full-time person doing”, says Wayne. He discusses how having facilities like Fleetpin is integral to have at his fingertips for efficiency when dealing with the variety of work required. Wayne says, “It’s not a big operation, but you wouldn’t believe how easy it is to miss something”, most of our customers know this all too well. Wayne’s fleet of six vehicles require servicing, repairs, COF’s and road user charges to be kept up to date, and to do this Wayne has enabled alerts to pop up on his phone and email when, before, and as these are due. He also utilises the Overspeed Report, reciting that just recently, a member of the public called saying that one of their drivers was speeding. Wayne was able to verify the complaint utilising Fleetpin and prove that the driver was actually driving within the speed limit. Their drivers are integral to the success of TBC transport, and it is important that they are taken care of. Wayne finds Fleetpin useful to track a bus if they haven’t shown up or aren’t operating at the correct times, “it could be all sorts of reasons why a driver hasn’t had a chance to get hold of me” says Wayne, who is glad he has the ability to track his drivers route progress if he hasn’t heard from them, to make sure they’re safe. Wayne also discusses the importance of implementing Fleetpin’s SOS button when it comes to being able to track when a bus breaks down, “we get penalised if we miss a bus run or have a breakdown, so we need to make sure that we never have a situation where our school students are compromised”. Wayne finds the Fleetpin web app user friendly and easy to navigate, he finds it perfect for an operation the size of the TBC Transports Fleet. “Fleetpin isn’t the cheapest, it’s middle of the road. It’s practical and has the facilities in it that we need”.
