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Telematics – an intelligent future, like it or not
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Oct/Nov 2008
HomeServe extends telematics system in £4.5 million deal
 HomeServe, the national home emergency services provider, has renewed and extended an existing telematics and fleet management contract with Eagle-i Holdings for a further four years. The value of the new deal is put at £4.5 million. HomeServe says it is hoping to save at least 10 per cent in fuel consumption and cut CO2 emissions by around 30,000 tonnes over the term of the new contract. The company has already been working with Eagle-i for two years, and has fitted 400 tracking systems in vehicles used by its property repairs businesses. Now the deployment is being extended to its national commercial vehicle fleet. Commercial and business transformation director Guy Bruce says the system should achieve the savings through better job despatch, route planning and driver speed awareness. 
The company did detailed research to confirm the scale of potential benefits. Ei Consulting, a professional services division set up by HomeServe earlier this year, worked extensively to model the cost savings that could be achieved in HomeServe's own operations. The company says a key feature of the Eagle-i package was its Monitor3 telematics system, which presents key performance reports in a special 'visual dashboard' format. It identifies speeding behaviours on all types of road at all times of the day and night. Eagle-i says research has confirmed that effective fleet management can deliver a return on investment in multiples of five to eight times the initial investment; but it points out that when left to their own devices, companies may have difficulty achieving the initial benefits that they have set out to attain. Its comprehensive reporting system is designed to provide information to help users maximise the benefits. *HomeServe has also rolled out a dynamic appointment scheduling system to manage the work of mobile staff in its plumbing and drainage operations, using technology from 1st Touch and Servicepower. More details in Keeping Track, page 37.
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