02/ 01/ 2005
Dennis Paschalis never worries about his employees wasting time on the road. As the owner of a 10-employee national trucking business, Paschalis used to require his drivers to call in with updates on their locations at least three times a day. But uLocate ( http://www.ulocate.com ), a fairly new-to-the-market wireless location-based service, has freed up his phone lines for good. “With uLocate, I can track my employees through their cell phones,” says Paschalis, owner of P International Trading Corp. “I know where they are, how long they stop and even whether they’re speeding.” The product, which uses global positioning system technology, allows users to track field personnel through either a Nextel cell phone, the Web or e-mail. For Paschalis, it’s streamlined his customer service. Now, he can quickly pull a report on a driver’s location and send it to the customer, all within a matter of seconds. Once affordable only to major corporations, GPS technology is now available for any size of business. For any small business that has employees in the field, these kinds of products can help improve customer service, reduce unauthorized use of company vehicles and enhance workforce safety. “It gives you everything you really need to know,” says Paschalis.
