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A guide to vehicle tracking
As costs continue to fall on GPS vehicle tracking systems, business owners are reaping the benefits. The cost of vehicle tracking equipment has dropped considerably over the last five years and the return on your GPS investment can be as low as a few months.
This technology can be of considerable benefit to your business offering you increased productivity and reduced costs but you need to ensure you make an informed decision before entering into any long-term contracts.
EyesTracking have put together this guide to simplify and explain what technology is available to businesses at present. We will also point out the factors that need to influence your decision and the questions you need to ask before committing to a lease agreement or purchase of tracking equipment. Following this guide will maximise the benefits to your business and minimise the risk.
What is vehicle tracking and how does it work?
Vehicle tracking is a technology that allows you to see your vehicles locations on a computer screen along with information on where they have been, what time they were turned ON/OFF, how fast they are going and a host of other features. This is made available by using a combination of GPS (Global Positioning System) technology, the mobile phone network, the internet, digital mapping and specialised tracking software.
The US Government is kind enough to allow us to use their GPS satellites that orbit the Earth. Each of these satellites is transmitting information to Earth which we can pick up with a GPS receiver (see diagram). With information from at least three satellites in the sky the GPS receiver can calculate its position on the surface of the earth to 5 – 20 feet. The receiver needs a direct line of sight with the satellite which is why GPS typically doesn’t work indoors and accuracy suffers slightly in built up areas where tall buildings along narrow streets impair the receivers’ view of the sky.
Once the receiver has calculated its position in latitude and longitude this information is stored in the tracking system located within the vehicle. The tracking system is also recording other information such as when the ignition is turned ON/OFF and in some cases when other events take place such as PTO ON/OFF. Every few minutes the tracking system sends the location and event information back to a remote server at a secure location using the mobile phone network. Your computers then access this information via the internet and it is overlaid on a digital map of the area allowing you to see where the vehicle is now at street level accuracy. Contradictory to popular expectation you do not see a flashing red dot moving along the street like in the movies.
Before the mobile phone network was well established the only way to get real-time information back to the remote server was to send it via the satellites, which was the equivalent to have a tracking system and satellite phone in each vehicle which made the technology very expensive. Now, with mobile phone towers so prolific, it is far more cost effective to get the information from the vehicle to your computer, which is why there has been a large price drop in recent years and a corresponding surge in demand. The GPS industry has built up to meet the demand as business owners nationwide began to realise the benefits of making their fleets more efficient and more productive.
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