WALL TOWNSHIP, N.J. —Marathon Data Systems announced the immediate availability of its recently enhanced, integrated GPS vehicle tracking solution, PestPac GPS.

The current state of the economy, coupled with the rising cost of fuel, has business owners everywhere trying to squeeze every dollar of efficiency out of their operations.  At the same time they are trying to provide best in class service to satisfy and retain their client base. Field service companies such as pest control operators, landscapers, cleaning companies, and HVAC companies are being hit particularly hard on fleet operating costs.

In a continued effort to help their clients increase efficiency while maintaining superior customer service, Marathon Data Systems has developed route optimization products, focused on reducing waste by optimizing service routes while enhancing employee productivity and customer satisfaction.

"With gas prices projected to top $5 per gallon and customers continuing to be squeezed financially, the need to provide excellent service as cost effectively as possible is critical for field service companies to retain existing customers, attract new customers and deliver service profitably.  Our newest mobile workforce management offerings, PestPac GPS and PestPac RouteOp, are designed to help our customers efficiently plan their routes, quickly add new stops to existing schedules in the most optimal time slots, and get greater visibility into into the actual routes run by their technicians and how those actual routes compare to the planned ones", said Chris Sullens, Marathon's President and CEO.  He goes on to say "By tightly integrating these solutions with our office management applications, we simplify our customer's lives and enable them to realize significantly higher ROI's than they would using either of these types of applications on a standalone basis."

PestPacGPS provides important functionality such as the ability to:

• Track vehicles in real time
• Monitor truck usage and deliver alerts via text message or email to managers for aggressive driving, usage of the vehicle after hours, usage of the vehicle outside geographically defined areas and excessive idling among other trigger options
• Reduce insurance premiums

More importantly, by tightly integrating PestPacGPS into the PestPac office management software, PestPac customers only need to access one application to manage all their service, GPS and route optimization settings, reports and features, simplifying the lives of the owners and managers and increasing overall ROI.  For example, a fully functional GPS map and GPS dashboard view allows the user to see both current location of his or her vehicles and current service orders and scheduled appointments in one convenient location. PestPac GPS also features robust vehicle reporting with route comparison reports, so an owner or service manager can compare a tech's planned route with their actual route. Additionally, if users install Garmin devices in their vehicle, PestPacGPS users can deliver new appointments directly from PestPac's appointment screen to the technician's Garmin unit, which the technician can then access and map instantly, saving time and unnecessary and highly distracting phone calls, texts and emails between the office and the technician.

When coupled with PestPac RouteOP, PestPac's route optimization module, users can quickly create optimized schedules and routes and then measure their technician's actual performance against those optimized routes.  The actual data can then be used to help improve technician compliance and refine service work and drive times to continually improve the quality and accuracy of their data.

To find out more about PestPacGPS, PestPac RouteOp or both, please visit http://www.pestpac.com or call 1-800-762-030.