News

Truck stop technology

Kiosk deployments help companies keep tabs on a mobile work force.

February 2, 2010

Truck drivers are often viewed as the last real cowboys, riding the highways and byways, listening to country music and chatting with each other on CB radios.

But like almost everything else, truck drivers are moving into the modern age. More often than not, a truck's route is tracked by a global positioning system, that country music is playing over a satellite radio and the driver is just as likely to be chatting on a cell phone.

Technology is even coming to the truck stop. Today, more and more drivers are stopping at a self-service kiosk before even ordering a cup of coffee.

Drivers today must deal with a blizzard of state and federal regulations, covering everything from the amount of time they can spend behind the wheel each day to the logbooks they are required to maintain. And rising fuel costs are forcing drivers to cut costs wherever they can.

More and more, kiosks are helping truck drivers manage their time behind the wheel.

Driving customer loyalty

Flying J Travel Plazas offer three types of kiosks to serve drivers, A Driver Services Kiosk provides fax services, a fax mailbox, copy services and a driver load exchange board. The kiosks offer calling cards for sale and even allow drivers to arrange for the delivery of flowers to loved ones back home.

"Our driver customers depend on these services, as their truck is a moving business office and they need access to technology to conduct their business and communicate with their home offices," said Gary Barlow, president of Flying J Communications. "We have ongoing plans to continually update all our kiosks with newer hardware and printer technologies and improved software."

In September, 2009, Knoxville, Tenn.-based Pilot Travel Centers began deploying self-service kiosks in its own locations around the country. Pilot operates 306 travel centers in 29 states.The kiosks are manufactured by Duluth, Ga.-based NCR Corp.

Some Pilot locations also provide Internet kiosks for customer use. The high-speed units are located in driver areas and phone rooms, and allow customer to surf the web in a private booth. Customers can browse through a selection of free sites, or pay a small fee to send e-mail and check out different Web sites.

Petro Travel Centers needed a digital device to maintain a connection with their traveling customers and truckers. Nanonation provided customer loyalty kiosks to the Petro brand to communicate with 250,000 preferred customer cardholders as they redeem gas purchases for coupons to utilize important amenities at the more than 60 Petro Travel Centers across the United States.

"When you think about it, this is the only way to communicate with a group of customers that is continually moving around the country," said Brian Ardinger, chief marketing officer with Nanonation.

Promotions on the kiosk are updated remotely and include video trailers of DVD movies for sale at Petro locations, as well as special promotions for other Petro amenities. Each kiosk features a card reader, touch screen, printer and durable enclosure all designed to maximize the ease of use, functionality and return on investment.

Managing the fleet

Phoenix-based Swift Transportation Co. operates the largest truckload fleet in the United States, combining strong regional operations, transcontinental operation, various specialty and dedicated offerings and an intermodal package. The company operates a fleet of about 18,000 tractors and 52,700 trailers from a network of 33 terminals in 28 states, and has 22,000 employees, of which more than 17,000 are drivers.

Swift needed to deliver timely information to its driver workforce. Much of this information was available via enterprise applications and the Internet, but it was only accessible by supervisors who had a PC available. Wanting to empower employees while at the same time improving operating efficiencies, the company deployed a network of interactive kiosks which provide workers with self-service access to a variety of corporate applications and services.

Called the Swift Informer Self-Service System, the deployment features 150 kiosks that have been installed in Swift-owned distribution and repair facilities and customer locations where Swift maintains a full-time employee presence. The Swift Informer kiosk application provides drivers, mechanics and other employees with secure online access to payroll, benefit, permit, training and safety information, truck repair manuals and parts availability, as well as e-mail, company news, weather and directions.

"Swift was very forward-thinking when it came to the kiosks. They had put together an internal team that was very well educated on the value of self-service and kiosks, and they had good sense of the benefit they would receive even before the project was rolled out," said Robert Ventresca, vice president of marketing with New York-based NCR Netkey, which provided the kiosks for the Swift deployment. "They are still improving their kiosk program with new features and benefits for their drivers and employees, increasing the value of the kiosk for both the user and the company."

All kiosks in the network are remotely monitored by Swift from a central location using Netkey Manager software. The system provides the ability for remote application, software and interface updates to keep kiosk content current.

The kiosks are accessed more than 100,000 times a month, according to internal usage reports, with the number one use being pay inquiries. The kiosks have also become news and information portals for the drivers, delivering critical information like weather updates.

"Swift was also very smart about promoting the kiosks during the rollout process," Ventresca said. "They had a sort of 'swat team' of employees travel to the kiosk locations and conduct special launch-related marketing with posters and contests to introduce the kiosks to the drivers and other Swift workers."