Northumberland County Council has introduced Masternaut’s vehicle tracking solution to its Local Services Group to improve the efficiency of road maintenance, traffic management and refuse collection across the county.

Via Masternaut’s real-time, web-based system, the council is now able to monitor and coordinate its Local Services Group, using knowledge of vehicle whereabouts to manage job scheduling by quickly deploying nearby drivers as issues arise.

The council selected Masternaut for its ability to demonstrate the real-time tracking of the Group’s 300-strong fleet of gritters, refuse and recycling collection trucks, large road sweepers and smaller transit vans.

The pan-European telematics provider will be tasked with reporting the whereabouts of the fleet across a predominantly rural county with a road network of approximately 3,400 miles.

Following a phased implementation process, which ensured that the 300 vehicles were not all off the road at the same time, Masternaut also provided tailored training to service and area managers within the department.

The technology has also paved the way for an improvement in the level of service provided to locals by the council, which coordinates around 7.5 million kerbside collections of refuse and recycling from local homes and businesses a year.

This includes a decrease in the time taken to address customer problems and complaints.

The whereabouts of a specific vehicle can be quickly checked by area waste managers fleet managers in response to a missed bin report, for instance, then allowing drivers to be alerted to the issue while on the job, without wasting time in returning to the depot.

Northumberland County Council’s fleet manager, Davey Robertson, said: “Masternaut’s vehicle tracking technology has enabled us to increase the efficiency of the fleet used to deliver our Waste Management, Highways and Neighbourhood Services, enabling the coordination and management of hundreds of drivers and vehicles across a vast, rural area.

“As a result, we are now looking at expanding our use of the technology into other departments of the Council.”