Software Search: Vehicle tracking.

["Roger Vicker, CCP" <rv-lists@xxxxxxxxxx>]

I've got a customer that I am in the process of totally revamping their
i5 applications and this has got them thinking (actually a good thing)
of all the "wouldn't it be nice to..." things.

Now they are asking me about a way to know where their field people are at.

They have a dozen people that range about a 60 mile radius from the
office. The trucks have private band two way radios, although they are
using cell phones more and more. They only need to know where the truck
is at about every half hour or so. They would also like to have the
reported locations for the day so they can tell the general direction
headed. They really aren't interested in a detailed tracking to know
exactly where they go and how long they spend there.

All this is so if a customer calls in the office people can quickly know
if they have someone currently (more or less ) in the area and not
headed away. They don't want to waste time trying to get a hold of the
field person to only find out they are too far away or headed in the
wrong direction before giving the customer an estimate.

Is there any solution package that is in the economical range instead of
the mega$ satellite up linked range like the systems UPS or Ruan
trucking uses?

I could deal with a system where a GPS unit in the truck regularly keys
up the radio, transmits an ID and the coordinates that the base listens
for and dumps into a database. They would like a GUI that shows a map
with little trucks that they can zoom in on and then zoom on the
customer to compare locations but I am doubtful that it will cost
justify compared to a text based "Distance between truck x & customer y."

TIA

Roger Vicker, CCP