Trade Star finds an all-in-one fleet management solution.

Struggling with manual, paper logs

Trade Star’s 196 drivers are spread out over several states: Montana, North Dakota, Colorado, New Mexico, Wyoming, and Texas. This typically isn’t an issue for fleets. But back in 2014, Trade Star’s drivers were still recording their logs on paper.

To audit drivers’ paper logs, Trade Star’s Senior Operations Manager Kari Gib had to wait until the drivers swung by the office in Saint George, Utah to drop them off. Then, Gib would manually audit each of them. He’d check each log one by one for Form & Manner errors or Hours of Service (HOS) violations. The distance his drivers traveled, coupled with the slow audit process, meant many of the logs had errors. Lots of errors.

“It’s horrendously difficult to maintain a DOT compliant record when your drivers are on paper logs. Period,” states Gib.

Gib had evaluated electronic logs throughout his career, but always came away empty handed. Some systems seemed perfect, but the price tag was too high. Others were affordable, but had outdated software that didn’t meet the needs of an oil hauling carrier like Trade Star. But then, he found Motive.

Switching to an all-in-one fleet management solution

Once Gib discovered Motive, he knew he’d found the solution that was right for Trade Star. “When I found Motive, I pinched myself because I thought I was dreaming,” Gib recalls. “It blew everything else we looked at right out of the water.” Gib loved that Motive incorporated the HOS rules and exemptions specific to fleets hauling oil, and that it didn’t cost him an arm and a leg. “I loved that Motive offered far more than HOS logs and DOT compliance,” says Gib.

Motive was also incredibly user friendly, making it popular among his drivers. And the ability to automatically audit driver logs anytime from anywhere empowered Gib with more visibility into his fleet than he could have ever imagined. “Even if my drivers are not 100% familiar with the HOS rules, Motive is,” explains Gib. “So using Motive is as if I was sitting next to my drivers instructing them when to pull over.”

Plus, roadside inspections have been perfect since Trade Star started using Motive. In fact, inspections have been so perfect that the FMCSA told Gib that they wouldn’t need to do a company wide audit this round because of how accurate his drivers logs are.

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