Challenger Motor Freight Cuts Costs, Enhances Operational Efficiency with Fleetworthy

Challenger Motor Freight, part of the Fastfrate Group, is a leading North American transportation and logistics provider headquartered in Cambridge, Ontario. With six locations in the U.S. and Canada and a fleet of more than 1,200 trucks, Challenger offers a variety of transportation services including truckload and LTL, temperature-controlled, dedicated, specialized, and more.

Since its founding in 1975, the company has earned a reputation for fostering a culture that prioritizes its employees and safety while providing a great customer experience. Challenger is consistently rated as one of the Best Fleets to Drive For and regularly earns other industry HR and fleet safety awards. Since the majority of Challenger’s drivers run long-haul routes across Canada and the U.S., the company is proactive in implementing technologies that help increase operational efficiency, reduce costs, and improve the overall driving experience for its employees. A few key solutions Challenger relies on are toll management and weigh station bypass services through Fleetworthy’s Bestpass and Drivewyze brands.

Less Time Managing Tolls with Bestpass

For Challenger, managing toll bills received from trucks traveling across the U.S. was no easy task. That’s why, in 2013, Challenger moved away from manually processing toll bills and subscribed to Bestpass’s toll management service to consolidate and more efficiently manage the toll bills the company received.

“With hundreds of trucks operating in the U.S., it became a real burden for us to stay on top of all the bills we were receiving,” said Paul Weatherbie, Challenger Motor Freight marketing communications manager. “It became clear we needed a better solution to not only process tolls but also better understand where and how frequently we were getting tolls. This led us to try Bestpass’ toll management service, and it’s been a must-have service ever since.”

According to Weatherbie, Bestpass reduced the time fleet and safety managers spent processing tolls each month by half. Since many of Challenger’s trucks can be dispatched to the U.S., most company trucks have Bestpass’ Complete Pass transponders, which provide 100% major toll coverage across the entire U.S. All tolls received are consolidated into one account, eliminating the need for administrators to track payments across multiple tolling authorities manually.

Challenger can now access Bestpass’s discounted toll rates and easily track toll activity. “By having one account that we can monitor for all our tolling activity, we’re much more efficient at managing tolls, and that allows us to dedicate more time to other administrative priorities,” said Weatherbie. “Since Bestpass automatically withdraws funds from our account to pay tolls we accrue, we don’t have to worry about missing any toll bills since Bestpass takes care of it all.”

Reducing Driver Downtime and Costs with Drivewyze

For Challenger, time is money. To reduce operating costs and increase driver productivity on the road, the company has relied on using weigh station bypass services for many years.

According to Weatherbie, in 2020, the company switched to Drivewyze for bypass service following the announcement of their PreClear weigh station bypass coverage expansion in Ontario. Since Drivewyze is integrated with Challenger’s ELD provider, ISAAC Instruments, drivers could receive notices of upcoming weigh station sites directly through their ELDs. Drivewyze, the largest weigh station bypass service provider, has more than 900 fixed and mobile weigh station sites in 48 U.S. states and provinces and is the only provider that offers coverage in Ontario.

“Since we’re headquartered in Ontario and many of our trucks travel in the province, switching to Drivewyze meant we could see a significant uptick in the number of bypass opportunities we get each month,” said Weatherbie. “The Drivewyze-ISAAC integration allows our drivers to receive audible and visual notifications on upcoming inspection sites, making it easier for them to tell whether they can bypass the station. Our drivers appreciate the visual ELD alerts.”

According to recent monthly reports from Drivewyze that detail Challenger’s PreClear bypass usage, the company consistently receives more than half of its bypasses in Ontario alone. In one of the company’s monthly reports, Challenger’s trucks with PreClear received 6,851 bypasses—an average of 11 per truck per month—across all Canadian provinces and the U.S. As a result, it reduced the time drivers spent at weigh stations by approximately 571 hours. It’s estimated that the cost savings associated with bypassing those weigh stations helped Challenger Motor Freight save close to $60,000 in that month alone.

“Drivewyze’s PreClear is a service that makes a difference in reducing our operating costs and driver downtime associated with weigh station visits,” said Weatherbie. “And Drivewyze’s monthly reports justify it. Drivewyze has become a service our drivers don’t want to be without on the road, and many of the owner-operators we work with also subscribe to the service.”

Bestpass and Drivewyze by Fleetworthy

With Bestpass and Drivewyze brands now united under one company—Fleetworthy—Challenger is eager to see how future product integrations will enhance their services.

“Our experience using both Fleetworthy’s Bestpass and Drivewyze services have been instrumental in simplifying our operations and reducing costs,” said Weatherbie. “Now that both brands are operating under one company, we look forward to what’s in store for future integrations between these service providers.”