Managing overhead costs is one of those make-or-break situations. When done right, your business grows while making a profit. If overhead costs are too high, you run the risk of going into the negative and possibly going out of business. As such, you need to find a way to keep costs low, especially fleet maintenance costs, while you continue to expand. In this post, we’ll go over some of the best ways to lower costs and keep money where it belongs: in your pocket.
Preventive Maintenance
Whether you service long hauls or on locally around town, your delivery trucks need routine maintenance. Aside from changing the oil or getting the engine tuned up, you also need to think about the tires. Tires that are too old or have lost tread can blow out without warning. One way to offset this is with a tire pressure monitoring system. a TPMS is one of the bests ways to keep your drivers safe behind the wheel. Since proper TPMS is critical to safety, it’s important to install a system that catches problems before they start. You should work with a parts vendor who you know has what you need in stock as opposed to ones that need to order and wait for them to come in.
Upgrade the Order Distribution Process
When you were just starting out, you may have taken orders by hand. This worked great because you weren’t busy and had the time to do so. However, once your business picked up speed, you probably needed to implement an automated inventory and distribution system to keep the orders flowing. If you haven’t that yet, you might find it too difficult to keep the distribution process running smoothly. There are plenty of options to choose from, so be sure to weigh the pros and cons of each before deciding. Your focus should be on efficiency, not which option is the cheapest.
Streamline Payroll
Remember the days when payroll was still done by hand? Employees punched a timeclock and you then had to manually calculate their earnings? It was a time-consuming, not to mention less accurate, way of paying your staff. The same as there are signs it’s time to scrap a car, there are signs it’s time to improve your administrative processes as well. Even if you’ve upgraded from traditional payroll practices, you still might need to take things a step further. Instead of hiring an outside company to do payroll, you can use online software that does the work for you. All you need to do is input everyone’s work schedule, including time off, sick pay, and hourly rate. The program does the work for you and sends direct deposits to their bank accounts on payday.
Revamp Onboarding
Hiring and training new employees is expensive. In addition to taking time to interview candidates, you then need to find the time to train them. While work duties can be learned via job shadowing, others need additional training. If your organization requires all employees attend and complete onboarding before their first day, keep things simple. Use online onboarding tools that new employees can use from home. They can view best practices videos and complete quizzes online, which notifies you when they finish. You can also use online messaging and chat with video to have face-t-face meetings without having them come into the office.