The busHive trip management platform has worked wonders for Spencer County Schools, a small rural district in northern Kentucky.
From Days to Minutes
Director of Transportation Cameron Chesser oversees field trips & coverage, transportation staff training, policies and procedures, personnel and payroll, complaints, student and driver discipline, monthly vehicle inspections, and more.
Chesser shared that he decided to implement busHive in April of 2023 since the old process was simply not working for the rapidly growing district. Previously, field trip request forms would go from a teacher, to the principal, to the school bookkeeper, to the central office for board members to review, and finally to the transportation department.
“This process at times could take up to five to six days for one trip request,” Chesser said. He explained that he specifically looked for a technology solution that would facilitate an electronic workflow rather than requiring paper forms, and busHive fit the bill.
Now, once a trip is entered into busHive, a quote is returned based on predetermined costs Chesser previously entered into the system. This allows teachers, principals and bookkeepers to see how much a trip will cost.
As soon as there is a new trip request, Chesser receives an email and can log in right away to approve and schedule the trip. “I am now able to process an entire field trip request within minutes,” he verified.
A Much Better System
Scheduling field and activity trips is much easier with busHive, Chesser shared, as it stores the places visited and integrates with a commercial mapping system to find trip addresses and automatically generate driver itineraries with turn-by-turn directions.
Additionally, vehicle utilization is improved. If a school bus is out of service or scheduled for something else, busHive will notify transportation staff who are making the trip appointment that the vehicle is already in use and cannot be double-booked.
Chesser verified that busHive makes it easier for him to invoice trips twice a month. “As soon as I review all trips, I hit one button to create ALL invoices and then send them to each school bookkeeper within a matter of minutes,” he said.
There is no fear of payments becoming overdue or slipping through the cracks, either. Chesser said he posts payments promptly and can run a report each period to see exactly what invoices have not been paid and which ones are overdue.
From the start, Chesser said, busHive has answered every question he had, customized as much as they could, and made sure that his staff was trained and ready to roll out the system district-wide. “Anytime I email them, I get a response, with support, the same day,” he noted.
Chesser summed up by saying he would highly recommend busHive to any district. “This system is user friendly, easy to learn, has every feature you need to successfully run a transportation department, and truly lets you see the day-to-day operations of the entire department,” he stated.
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