Rumping Saves Time with Trimble Telematics Solutions

With Trimble’s on-board computers and software solutions, Rumping Transport has taken a major step toward digitizing its processes. The planners and managers of the family-owned business from Beverwijk (The Netherlands) now have more insight into the drivers’ working times and performance.

Since it was founded in 1928, JWJ Rumping & Zonen has grown into a medium-sized transport company with a fleet of 70 motorized units and 130 trailers. The company transports steel, building materials and powdered building materials throughout the Benelux and Germany in curtainsider trucks and bulk trucks.

Jaap and his brother Niels are the fourth generation of the Rumping family to enter the transportation business. Together with father Jaap, they are now Executive Management. “A great combination,” said Jaap Rumping Jr. “We are not only extremely experienced but also a young and dynamic company.”

The latter is evident from the recent investment in IT. For example, Rumping has equipped all 70 vehicles with Trimble’s CarCube on-board computer. In addition to the using FleetWorks back-office system, Trimble has also implemented the FleetHours (wage and expense calculation), Tachotime Manager (tacho archiving) and Performance Portal (driving behaviour and coaching) applications at the office. “That investment is the result of furthering our goal of automating and digitizing all our processes. Personnel costs are our largest cost item. Digitizing processes gives us more insight into those costs,” explains Rumping.

The Trimble solutions were part of an extensive selection process that ultimately took an entire year to complete.

“This applies to their on-board computers, for example. We can obtain more information from the CarCube, than from any of the on-board computers of the other companies on the shortlist. I’m thinking of the amount of fuel in the tank, the remaining travel time and rest periods, the expected arrival times and the tasks that the drivers are currently performing.”

FleetHours in particular makes things much easier for Rumping. Until recently, the only way the drivers could keep track of their hours was in writing. This led to a large number of time sheets, which the planners had to manually check, based on the GPS data from the telematics solution we had then. The corrected time sheets then ended up on a colleague’s desk, who would then be responsible for the manual entry into the transport management system (TMS). Only after this system had performed the CA (Collective Agreement) calculation rules, could the result be exported into an Excel file and imported into the salary package.

“The planners only have to check whether there are no errors in it, e.g. because a driver has switched vehicles. If they agree, everything in the salary package can be immediately prepared for payment.”

The Trimble solutions offer even more benefits. The CarCube makes it possible for Rumping to read tachograph data from drivers and vehicles remotely.

With Performance Portal, the family business can analyze the drivers’ driving style and adjust it if necessary. “This solution takes the different types of trips into account, so that an international trip to Germany is still comparable to a trip to downtown Amsterdam,” said Rumping. “This allows us to create a fair internal competition between the drivers. The result is that it saves on fuel consumption and it reduces CO2 emissions.”

With the on-board computer, Rumping has more insight into the activities of the drivers. Planners can not only see where they are, but also which tasks they are doing. “They can even look at the question paths and offer the drivers support if necessary,” said Rumping, adding that the drivers are also happy with it. “The drivers are particularly happy with the truck navigation on the on-board computer. Especially with open transport, we often have to deal with loads that protrude or that are heavier than normal. In that case, it is handy to have a navigation system that takes this into account. “

The two Rumping engineers installed the on-board computers by themselves. A one-day training at Trimble was all they needed. They also implemented it quickly, without many problems.

Rumping is not completely finished with digitizing their processes. In the short term, the company will start working on modernizing and expanding the Talis transport management system, supplied by TANS. That will also improve the integration with the on-board computers. “And once that is finished, we would like to get started on the digital waybill.”