5 Metrics Fleets Can Track with Toll Management

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Perfect. Alright, thank you so much everyone.

It’s really exciting to have you join us today. My name is James Loper.

I’m a marketing manager at Bestpass,

and I am thrilled to welcome our speaker today. Uh,

Heather shed, Heather has been with Bestpass for almost three years,

and in that time has helped hundreds of fleets to, uh,

to really realize the benefits of a comprehensive toll management solution. So,

Heather, welcome.

Thank you, James. I’m really happy to be here.

So, a couple of things for the audience here as we are getting started.

So, one today,

we are recording our webinar and we will be sharing it via email after the

event. So look in your inbox and, uh, you’ll be able to watch it on demand.

Second, if you have any questions today, feel free to submit it.

There’s a q and a button at the lower portion of the screen,

and there you’ll be able to submit your questions and at the end we will

have time to answer those questions.

All right, so our focus for today’s webinar,

we’re gonna be talking about five toll metrics that fleets like you

can track, uh, in your day-to-day operations and, and really, you know,

what kind of impact that it’s gonna have on your operations and on your

business, how it’s gonna go, dive deep into that dive. And then afterwards,

Heather’s also gonna talk about how Bestpass is addressing and helping

fleets like you to, uh, use, uh, to track those metrics,

to use that data and just a little bit more about Bestpass in our solution.

And then, as I mentioned earlier,

we will have time for questions at the end.

There are, uh,

a lot of challenges that we hear from our,

our customers and in really fleets of all sizes.

So we thought it would be good to, before we dive in,

just frame up what those challenges are. Now,

some of the common themes within each of these points that you can see on the

screen is the amount of time, money,

and really overall resources that that toll management puts on fleets.

We commonly talk to fleets that do not know how much they’re spending on toll

every month. That how much time it takes, again,

takes sometimes dozens of hours or hundreds of hours that they’re processing

toll bills or violations.

And what we hear a lot too is that they have a patchwork of toll plans that

really just leaves incomplete coverage for the, the vehicles in their fleet.

So this now brings us to our first metric,

our toll cost by vehicle. And, and Heather,

I have one question as we look at everything on the screen,

which is just if you can explain for the audience why is it important that

fleets can then see which trucks are incurring toll expenses on the road?

Sure, James.

So tracking toll by vehicle is one of the most important metrics that we speak

with customers about. There are a few key things that are important here. First,

tracking the toll by vehicle creates a foundation to properly manage and then

track that toll spend across your business Toll’s. Really,

it’s a small piece that fits into a bigger picture,

especially when you’re looking to calculate things like the total cost of

ownership. So most expenses like fuel maintenance, insurance,

E L D G P ss, those are already being tracked per vehicle today.

So this is just an additional cost that can be allocated appropriately.

And then it also helps to keep that data clean.

So just like you track fuel cards that are linked to drivers or vehicles,

this helps prevent fraud and theft.

So managing toll transponders in the same manner really can ensure that the

devices don’t go missing or they don’t end up somewhere that they don’t belong.

The second piece is when you’re tracking, um, toll by truck,

it also gives customers insight to which units cost them the most and whether

the drivers are running the most efficient routes.

So from that vehicle level toll data,

you can determine things like which regions are higher toll costs and which

routes are the most efficient.

So using that historical toll data a step further can help predict future cost

and when adding new drivers or factoring in the total cost, um,

when adding new routes.

So the most important thing is that toll is a distraction for businesses.

Your teams are very busy dealing with day-to-day priorities.

So things like safety are always at the top and staying on top of organizing

and automating those little things like toll can really help fleets stay focused

on their core business.

Great. So Heather, yeah, I mean it definitely sounds like this is one of the,

the missing pieces for fleets to be able to then calculate

a, a very important total cost of ownership per truck. So, you know,

what I’m wondering is without having a centralized toll management, how,

or is it even possible that fleets are able to factor in toll cost

into a total cost of ownership per truck?

Sure. So it can be done, I mean, most fleets tackle bigger issues every day,

but there’s just, they’re busy. It’s,

it’s too much of a deep dive into the metrics, um,

for them to handle and add to their day-to-day.

So fleets can use some guesstimates or some generalization,

but to get to that accurate figure, it can be very tedious and time consuming.

There’s a few things that we hear quite often when we’re talking to customers.

Um, really the, the main one is, you know,

nobody really handles toll at the location, so it’s a byproduct of business.

We all know that, um,

typically the person handling that toll has a current workload with higher

priorities. So toll’s just a very small piece of, you know,

of their day to day and then gathering the data as a chore.

So it’s a very manual process, especially if you’re using, you know,

traveling across multiple states and using multiple providers.

So that manual process requires downloads from multiple accounts and then

matching that data back up to the truck. It can be frustrating.

So without a solution it is possible,

but with a toll management solution in place, it’s very simple.

It requires very minimal time investment and then that creates savings and time

and effort and then financially as well.

That sounds like a huge benefit, uh,

to have that we just covered toll costs by, by vehicle,

by truck. That’s in a fleets second metric here is another important one.

It’s toll cost by business unit or region.

Sometimes fleets will consider them hubs, but Heather,

is it imp Why is it important that fleets are able to see a breakdown

of toll cost by regions hubs or, or business lines?

Yeah, so tracking toll by business unit or region I think is, is important.

Mostly fleets,

especially when there’s a multiple locations or companies have to build back

toll to drivers, jobs, terminals, maybe even other companies.

So really any business that has a multi-layer hierarchy that needs that view

of toll, um, really needs to be able to broke, see it broken down by location.

Um, the toll data from authorities, like we discussed, it’s fragmented.

It has to be combined in some cases with other data points.

So that takes some effort from employees and then just the combining of those

multiple sources alone can leave some room for error when you’re tracking by

toll by vehicle and then by location the customer has a visibility to see spend

by location. So with that added level of insight,

fleets can easily predict monthly and annual toll spends and then budget those

costs out. You know,

we find that budgets and predictions can be a great asset to the corporate

level. Um, for example,

I worked with a large service lead a few years ago that has several locations in

Florida and the fleet had been dealing with SunPass,

they had several accounts open, um,

they all had different deposits and replenishments,

I believe the fleet told me they were getting replenishment, um,

through their funding on their account every other day.

So really consolidating that into one piece was a, was um, a big deal for them.

The benefits were all there, um,

made the account easier to manage from one central source.

The deposits were returned so it helped with their cash flow and then they had

that one bill to pay.

But the big issue that remained with the new solution is they lost that ability

to track by location because the authority didn’t offer that.

So it required them to tally up the charges and then divide them evenly among

their locations in Florida. So that means like heavy toll regions like Orlando,

um,

really got a free pass because they weren’t paying for the toll that they ran.

And then locations in Florida like Tallahassee with no toll, um,

were getting hit with an expense to their bottom line that they didn’t incur.

So for this fleet without the data by location,

it really impacted the profit and loss for each location.

Very interesting. Yeah,

so a lot of very beneficial information that can come from being able to see

toll by broken out that way, but using this information,

what can a fleet do to optimize their business?

Yeah, so James getting that total solution in place, you know,

using this fleet as an example,

it allowed them to continue to see benefit of a centralized toll management

solution. Not only is it easier for them to manage it lowered their costs,

but now they’re also able to use the data to further optimize for their

corporate level reporting as well.

Great. Thanks Heathers. That’s now two different metrics. Total,

total cost by vehicle and then total cost by business unit or region.

The next one that we have is an interesting one that’s told by route and it,

you know,

made me think about a conversation I had last week with one of our customers.

It’s a fleet of I think over 700 trucks and their,

one of their VPs was telling us that they are using the,

the data that we provide them almost on a weekly basis to help

route, uh, and plan their routes for, for all their truck drivers almost weekly.

I,

I found that pretty fascinating and I know it leads into this metric,

which has one question for you then, Heather, which is, you know,

how can fleets use toll data to optimize routing for their drivers?

So we’ve been, you know, discussed so far,

toll’s handled by a combination of effort.

There’s really not that one central person owning the process typically at a

location. So really it’s a combined effort, multiple different ways, um,

for the customers that we talk to. But typically operation says, Hey,

we ran the toll, um, it’s approved, it belongs to us,

and then they send that over to AP and AP will process that and get the bill

paid. Um,

but some fleets are taking the information that data a step further,

so they’re being able to use the data to assist with routing,

which can offer some great benefits. Um, fleets can upload the data.

They do this with a combination of other data points like G P s and fuel usage.

So they’re able to determine the most efficient and cost effective routes.

And then some fleets, you know,

have the school of thought today that avoiding toll roads altogether can help

limit their toll costs. But by factoring in those toll costs with other metrics,

fleets can complete their own analysis and determine whether this toll,

you know, toll roads are possibly safer and more efficient or not.

So a complete toll solution in place can be a great tool for any fleet looking

to man maximize the routing. Additionally, with the program in place,

the opportunity for violations to occur is greatly reduced because the vehicle’s

properly covered and the data’s centralized, it’s managed, it’s kept current,

so things like violation, if they do still occur with a toll program in place,

it’s easy to identify,

correct the issue and then limit any further exposure to the fleet.

Yeah, another critical metric that fleets can, can use.

The next metric that we have is, I know a common paint, uh,

pain point challenge for fleets of all sizes, you know,

looking at violations and citations that they receive. Heather,

can you just kind of describe to the audience how much of an issue or total

citations or, or violations for an average fleet?

Citations and violations are always, I’d say a big concern for most any fleet.

Um, especially for those growing and those that have, uh, you know,

that lack of toll program in place, violations, as we all know,

they’re just a hassle. They can arrive really late.

I’ve heard fleets have shared with me that they have had toll arrive years late.

Um, and toll agencies all have different processes, procedures,

they have different laws. So this can just complicate that process even further.

If you get a violation from one state, it doesn’t necessarily mean, um,

that the other states are gonna handle those violations or,

or charge those same fees. So that can be a bit of a,

a frustrating point for fleets to deal with.

And then violations can also lack those important details for reconciliation.

So they’re arriving outside of any normal process that’s established and they

are always allocated properly.

So that can Im impact the future planning and budgets.

And then the added expenses, especially when they come late,

can take the profit out of narrow margins on a truck and they can impact the

bottom line because they’re just coded as maybe a general expense.

So fees alone, um, can be frustrating with violations.

We’ve seen them range from a dollar 50 per toll, over $90 per toll.

And I’ve recently been dealing with an owner operator fleet, um,

that told me a late toll bill arrived for one of their drivers and they had to

charge back $700 in one um, fee to their driver ’cause he is an owner operator.

So the settlement for the driver for that week was a thousand dollars.

So if you can imagine the,

the difference in paycheck that the driver actually took home due to those

violations, um, you know, this is something that doesn’t help anyone, um,

from the fleet level or the driver level,

especially in a time where driver retention is so important.

The great thing is though,

toll programs do reduce violations significantly over 80%.

So with a toll program in place, when those violations do occur,

they can be uploaded,

they’re then visible in reporting and can easily be reconciled as regular toll

without any extra steps for the fleet, um, to complete.

So the license plates at that point are then properly added to the toll program

and then proper coverage is in place and really, um,

future violations can really be avoided.

Great that that $700, uh,

violation just figure just threw me off so much because I think about,

I’ve visited your home state Florida a lot and I know I’ve gotten citations

whenever I’ve been traveling and, uh, and then I think it’s sun pass.

And so I often thought to myself,

how great would it be if I had a service that would allow, you know,

someone else to be able to find those violations, manage them and pay for them.

Luckily not to the tune of $700. Um,

Definitely.

Yeah. So, okay, so we’ve just covered four different metrics.

We’re looking at toll by vehicle of region business line,

and then also we’ve just now looked at violations and citations and the cost of

those.

The last metric that we’re gonna cover today is looking at,

uh, another common just headache for fleets toll misreads.

Heather, let’s, could you talk, talk about,

or maybe mention one thing that fleets aren’t doing today that could

dramatically improve their operations?

Right. Identifying misreads can save fleets money and optimize their spend.

So some fleets are already doing this today,

but the process can be a lot easier to manage.

A misread occurs when a driver exits a toll road at a particular location,

but they’re charged the full length of the toll road by the authority. You know,

we can speculate,

some might assume that it was a transponder didn’t read properly,

but it can also just be the, the tolling equipment is old for the authority,

it’s aged, maybe it didn’t work properly at the time. Um,

so fleets can work with the authority in some states to resolve this and try to

recoup those overcharged amounts. The process is complicated. Um,

it requires a lot of time and obviously back and forth trying to work that out

with the authority. But misread services, um,

especially the ones provided by Bestpass,

can really take that a step further for the fleet.

We automatically identify misreads using data points and other factors in our,

in our program. And then, um,

we have an agreement in place with some of these authorities to help manage the

process as well.

So our team automatically disputes the charges for fleets and then as a result,

the credit is applied back to the fleet account without any effort from them

whatsoever.

So it’s a great added benefit to just have this working in the background and

automatically apply as a credit to the account.

Great. Thanks Heather. We you just, I, I want to, you know,

say thank you again for covering those five metrics.

Now let’s move on to,

I’m gonna kick things over to you to just tell the audience a little bit more

about Best Pass our solutions and,

you know,

how we’re addressing and how we’re helping fleets to look at those metrics and

then actually utilize those metrics.

Sure. So if,

if a fleet or business is experiencing any of those issues that we’ve discussed

today, um, Bestpass is here as a solution.

So we actively partner with every national tolling authority. Surprisingly,

you can see from that list there’s over 60 across the states. Um,

but we have that major, uh,

a hundred percent of major toll road coverage with one consolidated account.

So what this means for fleets is if you picture a company on the right there and

all the authorities that they may or may not be doing business with on the left,

I’m sure some of them look familiar, um,

but Bestpass is kind of sitting in the middle.

And what we do is consolidate all of that information.

We make sure that it’s coming in properly,

we check to make sure no duplication is happening,

and then we process all that information and then provide it to the fleet.

Taking that a step further,

if you look at it from a customer service perspective, um,

we are then dealing with all those tolling issues versus the fleet.

So we kind of take on that responsibility and then fleets can contact our

customer service team, um, by email, phone chat,

and we’ll work with with them to get everything resolved.

Yeah, the customer service team is almost the X factor, uh, best pass.

And then reporting is a, is a big piece.

We help leads solve complex tolling issues by offering this nationwide coverage

and our customer portal, which just went through, um, an overhaul this year,

so it looks really great, it’s very user friendly,

but the benefit to the customers and all that is they can easily manage all

their vehicles, trailers and assets from one central location. And additionally,

the reporting, um,

that they have access to within our portal will give them total usage visibility

by location and then, um,

show them that detail right down to that vehicle level that we’ve been talking

about today.

Great.

And then looking, um, how we’re different.

So Bestpass was started about 20 years ago, uh,

for truckers buy truckers. So, um,

all of our toll experts at Bestpass work with fleets to customize programs that

work for their fleet. We do that every day.

So we offer regional and national plans.

We have no per toll transaction fees,

no processing fees or admin fees that are tacked on to toll. So, um,

in fact that one of the great things that we do is pass along any of the volume

discounts that we’ve worked out with authorities along to our fleets,

which is a nice benefit.

And then just just to touch on a recent partnership between Bestpass and

Drivewise, the focus, um,

of our partnership is to allow our customers to be proactive with data and

provide, um,

all those total solutions for toll and bypass in one, you know,

in one offering there. So while our partnership still relatively new,

our teams are working behind the scenes to integrate our toll data, um, with,

with their data into existing systems that most of our customers use today.

So we’re heavily focused on building that out and what’s next all while we both

continue to grow our individual toll and bypass networks. So, um,

at the end of the day, you know, at Bestpass,

we know toll’s a distraction for our customers and it gets in the way of

day-to-day goals and objectives for companies.

So our goal is to provide support and then insight into tolling data and

eliminate any of those administrative headaches that go along with it.

Great. Heather,

thank you so much for taking the time to go through those five

critical metrics and then also providing a little bit more insight behind the

scenes about Bestpass.

So we have a couple minutes to answer some questions. I’m gonna take a look,

see what we have. First one that I see here is,

this one is for you Heather, uh,

is what does the process look like to implement, uh,

uh, you know,

a toll management solution considering everything you’ve just gone through all

the different metrics to consider.

And I think maybe it can be a little bit intimidating for a fleet to step into

a new solution. Can, you know, with all of those different metrics in mind.

So each fleet, um, has their own needs as far as toll goes. So, um,

working with our toll experts we’ll easily, um,

it’s something we do every day.

So we’ll work with them to gather their vehicle information,

we’ll walk them through the process of what they’ll need to do to, um,

transition from one program to the other and then really get them onboard.

Coverage can start, um, you know, within a week I would say.

That’s pretty quick. Yeah. Um, hopefully that’s reassuring to,

to some in our audience.

I don’t have any other questions that I see that have come through,

uh, since we got started.

So I would like to take the time to thank everyone who’s joined us

today.

It means a lot that we were able to share this time and then cover a little bit

of information with everyone. Again, I would like to remind everyone too,

we will be sending a recording of this so you can watch on the band at any time

and we’re gonna give you a couple minutes back on a busy Thursday.

So once again, thank you so much for everyone that joined us. Thank you Heather,

and we will definitely see you next time.

Thank you. Thanks everybody.