Continental believes that Vergölst’s regional breakdown management enables even more effective truck breakdown services.
Continental Partnerships with Verglost
More trucks on the roads also means more truck breakdowns are likely. This is reflected in the callout figures for the truck breakdown service operated by Continental subsidiary Vergölst. Whereas its 150 breakdown service vehicles stationed around Germany were summoned about 20,000 times in 2019, the figure fell by over eight per cent in Covid-affected 2020. With Covid-19 restrictions easing in 2021, traffic volumes increased once again. By the end of the year, the total had reached 20,000, making Vergölst one of the largest truck breakdown assistance firms across the country.
As part of its plan to meet the challenge of these rising numbers, Vergölst has switched to regional breakdown management. With truck logistics firms incurring substantial costs as a result of vehicle downtime, Vergölst needs to do everything to assist their customers as reliably as possible in the event of a breakdown. To this end, regional breakdown management, an integrated feature of the FleetFox tyre management system allows specialist companies and commercial vehicle centers to coordinate their efforts much more effectively. So if a breakdown service vehicle in the immediate vicinity is already on a call, the next-nearest vehicle can be deployed. This significantly reduces breakdown call rejection rates.
Regional breakdown management was trialed last year in the Rhineland and Ruhr regions of Germany. The systemic interconnectedness in the region leads to even better communication and closer coordination between the parties involved. By this, the company was able to immediately reduce call rejection rates.
