There’s no doubt that mileage expense is the most significant for the field sales team, and that accentuates the need to account for it accurately. Sadly, accuracy will remain elusive if your sales team still manually records odometer readings to compute business mileage. You can achieve accuracy and efficiency with the best mileage-tracking app for sales.
Remember that your sales reps are humans, and letting them manually record their mileage exposes you to many errors. Some reps will forget to record their start odometer readings only to guesstimate their mileage at the end of the trip. Others will run a few personal errands and add the miles to your business log.
The best mileage tracker adds automation, removing the human aspect from mileage tracking. As a result, you can better understand how long sales reps drive for business and compute their reimbursement more accurately. Read on to find the best mileage tracker for your sales team.
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What Makes the Best Mileage Tracking Apps For Sales?
The best mileage tracking app for sales should track and verify mileage accurately. Here’s a sneak peek of the apps that ticks these boxes:
Timeero — Mileage tracking app with segmented mileage feature
MileIQ — Mileage tracker with one-swipe drive classification
Everlance — Mileage tracking with commuter disallowance tool
MileageWise — Mileage tracker with multiple options
Driversnote — Mileage tracking with iBeacon
One thing to consider is how the app tracks mileage; the app should support automatic mileage tracking. Moreover, the best mileage tracker for sales reps should have a simple way to categorize trips.
In addition, it should be easy to use to boost tracking efficiency. The app should also enable you to apply the standard mileage rate to monitor your mileage expenses as they stack up and streamline work-related deductions.
Some mileage tracking apps for sales take it a notch higher with unique features that help with route planning and determining how much reps spend with the customer.
Top 5 Mileage Tracking Apps For Sales Reps
Even though these apps log and track mileage efficiently, they work differently, and one is better suited for your business than the other. We will dissect each app and put the feature set on one side of the scale and pricing on the other.
The goal is to help you find an app with the bells and whistles you need without breaking the bank. Let’s dive in, starting with the number one mileage tracking app for sales — Timeero.
Timeero: Mileage Tracker With Segmented Tracking
You can download the Timeero mobile app on Google Play or Apple’s app store.
Unique Features
Segmented mileage
Suggested mileage
Route replay
Pros:
Easy-to-use mobile apps
Offline mode
GPS location and real-time tracking
Robust notifications system
Cons:
Unique features are available at slighltly higher prices (still affordable, though).
Timeero is the best tracking app for sales reps, thanks to its automated mileage tracking, GPS location tracking, and geofence-enabled time clock. It’s an apt tool for all sales reps, including door-to-door sales reps, freelancers, self-employed reps, and real estate agents.
Whether you want to track sales reps’ real-time location and mileage or monitor each rep’s route, Timeero is your best bet. Timeero Android and iOS apps are easy to use for all employees.
The app uses drive detection technology to automate mileage tracking. You only need to set the base speed (say 4mph), and that’s it. When a sales rep exceeds the stipulated speed threshold, the app automatically logs their mileage without them lifting a finger.
The app has unique tools that set it apart from other mileage trackers. Let’s shed light on some of these tools and their benefits:
Segmented Mileage Tracking
Segmented mileage tracking helps compute the time sales reps spend with each customer.
Clocking in and out as you move from customer to customer can be tedious and error-prone. If the sales reps forget to clock in or out, you won’t get a clear picture of mileage between customer locations. Consequently, it would be challenging to compute the expenses (time and mileage) you’re putting into a customer vis-à-vis the value you’re getting from them.
With segmented tracking, you only need to create customer locations and assign them to the sales reps. And then set the speed threshold and maximum idle time for segmented mileage. This way, the sales rep will only need to clock in once and clock out at the end of the day.
Timeero will track their trip and segment their mileage based on the customer visits. Employee timesheets with the segmented mileage will feature a car icon. You can click on the icon to get details about the reps’ day, including:
Mileage tracked between customer locations. It doesn’t matter how many customers the rep visited.
Time spent driving between customer visits
And most importantly, the duration of the customer meeting. No more guessing how much time a rep spent with their account. Timeero is computing everything for you.
Commuter Mileage
Beyond segmented mileage, Timeero allows you to take into account reps’ commuter mileage. Remember that commuter mileage is not reimbursable and should be deducted from overall employee mileage.
When you activate the commuter mileage feature, Timeero logs mileage when the rep travels more than the predefined distance. For example, if you know the distance from the rep’s home to the first account is 10 miles, you can set the threshold to 10 miles. Timeero will automatically log mileage when the employee travels more than 10 miles.
Suggested Mileage
Tax deductions and expenses are the primary motivations for tracking business mileage.
Whether you run a small business or a large sales team, you should keep travel expenses down. The suggested mileage helps you achieve just that.
The feature suggests the shortest distance to a predefined destination. When all sales reps take the shortest route to their customer, you save fuel costs and minimize mileage reimbursement.
In addition, it costs $0.72 per mile to maintain a company vehicle, assuming the reps log 15,000 miles per year. Following the shortest distance can bring the vehicle mileage down to lower maintenance costs.
Route Replay
The route replay provides breadcrumbs with detailed timestamps to tell when the rep was where.
When Timeero suggests the shortest route, can you be sure all reps adhere to the recommendations? This is where the route replay comes in handy.
As the name suggests, it lets you recreate a sales rep route when on the clock. This way, you can tell whether they took the shortest or alternative routes for scenic or personal purposes. It instills a sense of accountability and can go a long way toward enhancing the team’s efficiency.
The route replay provides breadcrumbs with timestamps and vehicle speed details. You can click on a breadcrumb to zero in on the sales rep’s speed at a particular point in the journey to see if they abide by your vehicle speed policy. Learn more in our comprehensive Timeero review.
Timeero pricing: 14-day free trial. Pricing starts at $4, but you should get a higher plan if you need the unique tool.
MileIQ: Mileage Tracking With One-Swipe Classification
While it’s not as clean and sleek as Timeero, MileIQ is easy to use.
Pros:
Easy-to-use Android and iOS apps
Effective drive classification automation
Work hours and shift
Cons:
Misses trips shorter than half-mile
No offline mode
MileIQ doesn’t offer unique tools such as segmented or suggested mileage, but it has strengths. The mobile apps exhibit ease of use with logically organized menus; sales reps won’t fiddle around figuring out where key features are.
Unlike Timeero, MileIQ doesn’t track mileage when the vehicle exceeds the base speed. It still uses drive detection technology but logs miles when the sales rep drives over half a mile. As a result, it disregards trips that are shorter than half-mile and may not be ideal for door-to-door sales reps and real estate agents.
Regarding drive classification, MileIQ is up there with the best apps, thanks to its one-swipe classification. It lets you swipe the driver card right or left to auto-classify the trip as personal or business miles, respectively.
Reps can use the “Frequent Drive” to auto-classify future trips. For example, if a representative has to visit an account several times each month, they only need to set up frequent drives during the first two trips. MileIQ will auto-classify subsequent trips as business, freeing up time to focus on meaningful tasks.
You can also set work hours and configure MileIQ to categorize all trips within the works as business miles. Learn more in our full MileIQ review.
MileIQ Pricing: Pricing for teams starts at $50 per rep per year.
MileIQ integrations: Xero, Microsoft 365, Sage, Route4Me, and Bookkeeper360.
Everlance: Mileage Tracker With Commuter Disallowance
Beyond mileage tracking, Everlance boasts a reliable expense management module.
Pros:
Automatic drive detection
Effective expense management
Offline mode
Cons:
The app tends to miss some trips
Everlance is another reliable sales mileage tracker app that helps you ditch Excel tracking. Like MileIQ, it doesn’t come with suggested mileage, segmented mileage, and other Timeero’s bells and whistles, but it gets the job done. While Everlance isn’t as easy to use as Timeero or MileIQ, its learning curve isn’t steep.
The app uses auto-detection and will log miles as soon as the sales rep begins driving. By default, Everlance segments the sales rep journey into individual trips based on their stops.
During our rigorous testing, the app missed trips, which led to a drop in accuracy levels.
That aside, Everlance’s individual trips functionality is the closest any app comes to rivaling Timeero’s segmented mileage tracking. It lets you compute mileage between stops, but you have to do it manually. Sadly, there are no breadcrumbs, so you can’t calculate the time a rep spends with the customer.
Drive Classification
Like MileIQ, Everlance offers a one-swipe trip classification tool and work hours schedule. It also comes with a commute disallowance functionality. The feature automatically deducts commute rides from reps’ mileage, so you don’t have to compensate them for miles driven to and from work.
Expense Tracking
The expense tracking module gives you better control over business expenses. It allows sales reps to capture a photo of receipts for maintenance costs, gas, and other expenses. It uploads the data and lets you classify each expense as personal or business to streaming invoicing.
This is a handy feature for small business owners, rideshare drivers, or Lyft drivers who need to keep their expenses in check. You can also connect your bank account or credit card for expedient expense management and reimbursement. Read our comprehensive Everlance review to learn more.
Everlance pricing: Free plans for freelancers, self-employed individuals, and teams. Besides the free mileage tracker, premium plans for teams start at $10 per user per month. Individual plan pricing starts at $5 per month.
Everlance Integrations: QuickBooks, Freshbooks, and Xero
MileageWise: Mileage Tracking With Four Auto-Options
Besides manual tracking, MileageWise offers four automatic mileage tracking methods.
Pros:
Four auto-tracking methods
Automatic trip classification
Reliable vehicle expense tracker
Cons:
No real-time GPS tracking
Mileagewise Android and iPhone apps are not as sleek and neat as Timeeo or MileIQ, but it’s still easy to use for most users. However, your greenest sales reps may struggle to find the way around, mainly because of the many mileage tracking methods.
The app supports three automatic mileage tracking methods: vehicle movement, phone charge, and car Bluetooth monitoring. As their names suggest, the method uses different techniques to log mileage, but the crux is that they track mileage as soon as the sales start driving.
MileageWise computes mass door-to-door distance based on customer address but doesn’t update the sales rep data in real time. As a result, you can’t monitor the sales rep’s whereabouts and must wait until after the trip to see the distance covered, time, and mileage.
Interestingly, if the app misses a trip, and by a good chance, you have recorded it on Google Maps, fret not. You can import business trips from Google Timeline to MileageWise and create IRS-compliant reports. Learn more in our full MileageWise review.
Drive Classification
MileageWise auto-trip classification does precisely as it says on the tin.
The feature classifies sales reps’ trips as personal or business miles to create IRS-compliant mileage reports for tax returns and accurate reimbursement. You can change the auto-classification settings in the reporting dashboard as you see fit.
MileageWise Pricing: 14-day free trial, premium pricing starts at $5.83 per month per vehicle.
Mileagewise Integrations: Freshbooks, Excel for client import, and Google Timeline
Driversnote: Mileage Tracking With iBeacon
Driversnote iBeacon tool can help you understand how much your reps spend with the customers.
Pros:
iBeacon mileage tracking
Automatic driver classification
Offline mode
Cons:
No base speed threshold
Lastly, we have Driversnote, another easy-to-use mileage tracker for teams and independent contractors. The app doesn’t use drive detection like most mileage tracker apps or track mileage when you exceed certain speeds. Instead, it blends the phone’s GPS and accelerometer to record mileage automatically.
Driversnote’s unique feature is iBeacon, and it certainly suits sales reps. iBeacon is a device you place in the car and sync with the rep’s mobile via Bluetooth. When the rep enters the vehicle, iBeacon transmits signals that prompt the mobile app to track mileage. When the representative exits the car, the signal is cut, and the app stops tracking.
You can determine how much time the rep spends outside the car, presumably with the client.
You only need to compute the time difference between iBeacon stops and starts, as the mileage logs indicate. Learn more in our complete Driversnote review.
Drive Classification
Even though Driversnote doesn’t support one-swipe classification, it’s still child-play for reps to classify their trip on the web portal. They only have to open the trip and click “personal” or “business” to submit it for reimbursement and tax purposes.
In addition, Driversnote allows you to configure different auto-classification rules. You can classify trips based on previous trips, which works best for reps who visit one customer multiple times. Alternatively, you can auto-classify trips based on work hours, always as business or personal.
Driversnote pricing: Free version (limited to 15 trips per month). Premium plan pricing starts at $11 per month. Plus, you must cough up an extra $40 to get the iBeacon device.
Driversnote Integrations: Microsoft Excel
Choose The Right App For Your Sales Team
The best mileage tracker apps we discussed are apt at tracking mileage. You don’t have to crunch the number at the end of the month or tax time, trying to figure out tax deductions or employee compensations.
Moreover, the apps integrate with bookkeeping and accounting software, allowing you to import timesheets and mileage expense reports directly to your go-to system for proper remuneration.
Simply put, you can never go wrong with either of these apps regarding mileage tracking.
However, if you need an app that goes beyond mileage tracking to give you a 360-degree of field sale rep activity, get Timeero. The app lets you monitor sale rep locations and the routes they take in real time. It also provides critical details, such as a rep’s time with each client.
Start a free trial today and get a glimpse of the segmented mileage and other unique features for 14 days.
Get a first-hand feel for Timeero segmented mileage tracking and other unique tools.
Samson is a mathematician turned content marketer specializing in SaaS and Tech content. He focuses on the practical aspects of software systems while keeping abreast of the industry’s cutting-edge principles to create informative and engaging content. When he’s not writing, Samson spends time playing or watching soccer.
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