Why should your chauffeur business adopt booking, dispatch, and management technology?
It is widely accepted that all businesses these days need to embrace IT, and it is better not to wait until you are pushed to adopt a system, the best business decisions are not made when you are under pressure.
Why are transport providers now under pressure to adopt IT?
Local councils, particularly in the UK, are increasingly making it a criterion for issuing a license to operate, that chauffeur companies use an appropriate IT system.
Also, the use of IT systems within the chauffeuring industry has sharply increased over the past few years, so your competition is leaving you behind, giving them a distinct advantage over you, and is negatively impacting your business.
Much pressure is coming from the client as corporate clients will often not even consider you unless you have a modern system that will offer them for example; corporate booking portals so their employees can book directly, invoice history and reports on their transport spend for management analysis, instant messaging and real-time tracking of jobs.
The future is crowded with aggregates and ride-hailing technology, trying to control the industry by their size, influence, and access to investment. Current market offerings prove that they don’t want to enhance the industry but provide an attractive platform for the client, driving down the price to the chauffeur company, while they cream off a percentage. Chauffeur businesses need to enhance what they have and introduce the appropriate technology to counteract this threat.
So why is this technology so attractive to the client?
And while your clients are calling you every 10 minutes, from 5 am, to reassure them that their vehicle will be turning up. Your competitor is sending out instant messages at each stage of the job, allowing the client and PA access to job status and tracking in real-time, with an SMS sent automatically with all images of the driver, vehicle, map, or image of the meeting place.
Your competitors are visiting the big corporate clients, with professional brochures telling them what they gain from using a company using up-to-date IT. They will win the corporate contracts every time, blocking you out, as they can show how technology offers them an integrated, streamlined, secure, efficient, and professional service.
Cloud technology is driving the Industry.
While you are shuffling paper around your desk, and struggling with various spreadsheets and diaries, your competitors can do their job on the road if they want, invoicing, inputting, and editing bookings directly from their phone/tablet/laptop.
The danger with running a business using paper, diaries, and old web-based technology is that you will fall foul of the GDPR regulations, as these options involve sensitive information being stored inappropriately.
It is crucial that business adopts the most up-to-date IT. Businesses that invested in a system many years ago could be running outdated, inefficient technology that has remained static, refusing to evolve with up-to-date options in the market, now leaving them in a disadvantaged position.
Small businesses are notoriously slow in adopting IT but this is to their cost and will hold them back from achieving higher levels of efficiency and growth.
The short-term pain of the investment and implementation of an appropriate IT system will be far outweighed by the long-term operational efficiency and increased productivity, which leads to sustained levels of growth, and the ability to scale up while remaining competitive.
We at Chauffeur Drive Systems provide you with all the tools you need to help you compete in a highly competitive, ever-changing industry. With our system, you will reduce your admin costs and effort while increasing your productivity and profit.
Our philosophy is to help the individual company survive and thrive, by providing the same tools that have been long available to large companies who have the big bucks to implement huge, expensive systems. Being huge and expensive is not always the best, we believe we are as good if not better than any that are out there. But we operate a very simple and transparent pricing structure, so you can compete on a level playing field no matter your size, without a crippling financial commitment. And with no contract or set up charge, you can leave at any time, to give you as little risk as possible.
2020 Plan of action
- You need to determine what are your business needs – so do your homework, and assess what you need and what you can realistically afford.
- Then match up what you need with what is out there, what is available in the market that is the best fit for your business.
- Take a look at our website https://www.chauffeurdrivesystems.com
- Give us a ring at 01786 611299, we don’t sell our system to you, we will tell you honestly if our software is right for your needs, and if it isn’t, we will advise you accordingly.
If anyone Manchester based would like to meet up with us next Monday, 27th January, we will be in the Eagle Labs, Albert Square, Manchester M2 6LW, Meeting Room 1, from 10 am -5 pm. Please get in touch to let us know beforehand, so we know to expect you.
