Washington Gas improve fleet reporting using FleetWave

We interviewed Girish Ranade, Fleet Project Manager, Washington Gas about his experience using FleetWave to manage over 1000 vehicles and associated assets. Washington Gas is a regulated natural gas utility serving approximately 1.1 million customers in the metropolitan Washington, D.C. area, and they have been using FleetWave for over a decade, since 2012 to manage their fleet of vehicles.

Could you explain a bit about what your company does?

“So I work for Washington Gas in D.C, just outside of D.C, and we supply gas to the whole DMV (District of Columbia, Maryland, Virginia) area.

I’m in the Fleet Department, we’ve got about 850 vehicles and 400-500 assets.”

How does your fleet of vehicles enable your success?

“Well, I mean, if we don’t have reliable vehicles, you know, our crews can’t get out to the job sites. They can’t fix leaks. It’s an incredibly important you know, we have new construction, So that’s getting pipes in the ground, we have repairs, we have damage control. So we have so many people that rely on the vehicles.”

What type of vehicles and assets make up your fleet?

“We’ve got a little bit of everything. Well, first of all, we have diesel, CNG, normal fuel. We have vans, pickups, crew trucks, box trucks. We have literally everything, dump trucks. And then our assets are trailers and excavators and forklifts.”

What are some of the challenges of running a fleet in your industry?

“Technicians using the system, you know. I think the system for us is the key, gives us all the data we need, allows us to do some, some analysis and be proactive and not so reactive, but I think it all starts with good data, good system, tight system.”

How has FleetWave helped overcome the challenges you were experiencing?

“We are capturing a ton of data, that much is that’s clear. But I think one of the things that FleetWave has done, because any system can just collect, but I think the analysis tools, the dashboards, we’re using those every day and at all levels.”

What features do you use most in FleetWave?

“The reporting, the dashboards and I think the workflows, we’re getting stronger with that, you know, getting some good help from, from our consultant. But yeah, we’re trying to tighten the system down a little bit and FleetWave just makes that so easy.”

Why would you recommend Chevin?

“I’ve just found them totally responsive to everything that we’ve asked for. Whether it’s our consultant, our account exec, they’re easy to work with.

And now, having met some of the people at the conference, I think it’s not just one or two people, it seems to be the culture of the organization, and it just makes it easy as a client.”