The needs of fleet customers are quite different from the average consumer. For example. uptime is extremely important, and every minute saved performing mundane tasks like maintenance is also a dollar saved. To that end, the first-ever all-electric Ford Transit – the 2022 Ford E-Transit – offers a variety of benefits for fleet customers thanks to new Ford Commercial Solutions.
Ford Commercial Solutions offer a host of fleet-wide energy monitoring and vehicle management tools to provide electric-vehicle data, charging reports, and web-based pre-conditioning, plus new features that can help secure vehicles and help enhance driver performance.
With the new electric vehicle tools, fleet operators can monitor the performance of individual vans, manage energy usage, and gain key insights into their performance. Using electric vehicle-specific data such as kWh consumption, charge speed, distance to empty, and more, managers can better understand how they’re operating in real-time in order to help optimize running costs and uptime.
The new tools also enable remote cabin pre-conditioning, so fleet operators can optimize cabin
temperatures while the E-Transit is plugged in to optimize battery efficiency. Alerts notify managers if a vehicle isn’t plugged in when it’s scheduled to be, while other tools let them remotely manage transactions for public charging and receive reporting to support reimbursement for employees who charge at home.
Ford is also introducing in-vehicle, real-time driver coaching through SYNC 4 voice assistant. Any time a driver exceeds a speed limit, rapidly accelerates, brakes harshly, leaves the engine running while parked, or fails to fasten a seatbelt, they will receive an in-car audio message asking them to correct their behavior.
Additionally, Ford Telematics will enable customers to secure and remotely monitor their vehicles after hours. New alerts will notify fleet operators if a vehicle is potentially being stolen, if it’s used without authorization, if it’s being towed, or if it has been damaged while parked. If any of these events occur, GPS tracking also allows managers to see the location of their vehicles even when they are turned off.
Ford is also offering integrated Driver ID, giving managers an easy way to associate specific drivers with vehicles. By allowing drivers to enter a driver-specific code into the SYNC screen, fleet managers get an accurate record of which driver is using which vehicle. By associating a driver with a specific vehicle, managers could analyze performance metrics to potentially identify new coaching opportunities to help manage driver performance.
All of these features build on Ford Telematics’ existing offerings, which include GPS tracking and geofencing capabilities, vehicle health alerts, fuel and energy consumption data, and more.
We’ll have more on Ford Commercial Solutions soon, so be sure to subscribe to Ford Authority for more Ford Transit news and around-the-clock Ford news coverage.
Comment
These services aren’t exclusive to the E-Transit. Ford just happened to announce them together.