Reference Document
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•Fuel Economy Benchmarking App
Reference Document
0 mins to read
•Learn how to use the Fuel Economy Benchmarking app in MyGeotab to investigate how your fleet is performing against the industry average. Driven by data analytics, the Fuel Economy app compares fuel consumption between vehicles of the same or similar vocation, based on Geotab’s Similarity model and allows managers to identify which vehicles are underperforming.
Version-1 Lab Release: December 2019 Last document update: December 2021
✱ NOTE: We have concluded this experiment, and the waitlist is now closed. Thanks to the amount of interest shown by the size of the waitlist; we are working towards an updated version in early 2022.
Please join our Analytics Lab Community group for more updates.
What is Fuel Economy Benchmarking?
Fuel Economy Benchmarking is an experimental tool that classifies how performant your fleet vehicles are in terms of fuel economy when compared against the population of all Geotab-connected vehicles. The app helps you manage your fleet's fuel consumption and subsequent costs. Driven by intelligent data analytics, the Fuel Economy app compares fuel consumption between vehicles of the same or similar vocation - based on Geotab’s Similarity model (including vehicles' characteristics and usage patterns). This allows fleet managers to identify and understand which vehicles are underperforming and why. It helps fleet managers to:
- Decide which vehicles to purchase for their required activity or choose the most environmental-friendly vehicles; and
- Understand why certain vehicles are underperforming and take appropriate steps to improve driving behavior or routes, as needed.
The Fuel Economy Benchmarking app and API are available through the Analytics Lab Add-In available via the Geotab Marketplace.
Why do you need it?
Performance, in terms of fuel economy, plays a significant role in providing commercial fleets a strong competitive advantage over their competitors. The Fuel Economy Benchmarking app allows you to investigate how your fleet is performing against the industry average for fuel economy. It also helps you determine if switching the make and/or model of your fleet would improve or hurt your fuel economy. The app provides the following metrics and recommendations for better fuel economy:
- Top 10 and bottom 10 performers in the fleet
- Fuel Savings calculator (with batch calculation functionality)
- Vehicle group ratings
- Recommendation table
How does it work?
The Fuel Economy Benchmarking app leverages Geotab’s rich telematics data and uses intelligent data analytics to compare fuel consumption between vehicles of the same or similar vocation - based on Geotab’s Similarity model. This allows you to identify and understand which vehicles in your fleet are underperforming and why. Moreover, the Savings Calculator allows you to compare cost savings between your vehicles and vehicles with similar fuel-usage conditions over the past three months. Based on that, it provides a cost-saving estimate to help you identify how much money you can save by switching to more environmentally-friendly vehicles.
How is fuel economy benchmarked?
The app extracts data from your company’s BigQuery database (which is updated monthly to emulate your primary telematics database). It then compares your vehicles with others that are similar in characteristics and usage conditions. Every comparison is based on three months of anonymized data from thousands of fleets, totaling tens of millions of hours of activity. Some characteristics and usage conditions used for the comparisons are:
- Driving distances
- Geography
- Engine performance
- Vocation
How are vehicles grouped?
Each vehicle in your fleet receives a group percentile score based on how it compares to similar vehicles in the Geotab ecosystem. Then, based on these percentiles, vehicles are grouped into buckets: Poor efficiency for the lower third, Average for the middle third, and Good efficiency for the top third of the benchmark.
How to Use the Fuel Economy Benchmarking
✱ NOTE: For demonstration purposes, this document includes images of the experiment using an internal Geotab database.
1 | Install and launch the Add-In by selecting Analytics Lab from the MyGeotab navigation bar. ✱ NOTE: You must have Administrator security clearance to use the app.
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2 | On clicking the Try It icon on the catalog page, the landing page of the app will appear. By default, the app shows all vehicles it can access from your database, and compares to its benchmark (percentage).
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3 | Scroll down to view the fuel economy metrics and recommendations based on comparison to the benchmark.
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4 | Click on any of the bars to view further insights on the metrics and recommendations.
If you want to investigate the vehicles with poor efficiency, for example, click on that bar to open the Poor Efficiency page. You can then view your vehicles and the recommended alternatives. ✱ NOTE: You can choose to view the information on the imperial or metric scale by switching the toggle in the top-right corner. |
5 | You can filter the recommendations or alternatives by ignoring or matching the vehicle type and weight class, and by using the Select a make dropdown list.
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6 | Scroll down to view the Savings Calculator, which allows you to compare cost savings between vehicles with similar usage conditions over the past three months.
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! IMPORTANT: Although all fleet accounts are eligible to use Fuel Economy Benchmarking experiment, some Government and Public Sector fleets may be unable to access it. For more information, Resellers can contact their Partner Account Manager, and Customers can reach out to Support through their standard communication channel.
Learn More!
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If you have an idea for a new data experiment, click here and let us know!
Version History
Version | Date | Owner | Updates |
|---|---|---|---|
1.0 | March 2021 | Data Product Discovery Team | Initial Guide |
1.1 | December 2021 | DPD | Update on the deprecation of this experiment. |
