Link a tracker to a vehicle and follow it on the map

Introduction

Some vehicles carry a small tracking box that reports where the vehicle is and, with some suppliers, its mileage and other readings. RentVisie lists the boxes on the screen headed Device, opens each box on its own screen, and plots them on the screen headed Device map.

The Device screen has a View on map button and three tabs, one per tracking supplier: Traci, Conneqtech and RentalTracker, each with its own fetch button. A box's own screen has Back to devices, a header with the box's name and labels, a strip of readings, and cards: Vehicle, Location, Settings, and, depending on the supplier, Sensors, Commands and Technical.

You would come here when:

• a new box has been fitted and RentVisie needs to know which vehicle it is in;
• you want to see where the fleet is right now, with nothing wrong;
• a customer says the app will not open the car;
• a vehicle is overdue and nobody can reach the driver.

Terms used on this screen

Every way to reach this

Use this page once the box is fitted, or when you need to find a vehicle.

How to use

Configuration

Each supplier is connected once for your company, on the Integrations screen. From the main menu open Admin, then Settings, and click the Integrations tile. The trackers sit in the card headed Fleet & telematics, one row each for Traci, Conneqtech and RentalTracker. Each row has a switch. A change is saved the moment you flip it; there is no Save button on this screen. See Turn an integration on or off for the screen as a whole.

Switching a supplier on opens its settings window straight away. Once it is on, a Settings button appears on the row, so you can change the details later. Switching it off stops the connection: the fetch buttons and the map stop getting anything from that supplier.

Set up Traci

1. Switch Traci on. The settings window opens.
2. Fill in Token with the key Traci gave you, and set is active to Yes.
3. Click Save.

Set up Conneqtech

1. Switch Conneqtech on. The settings window, headed Edit Conneqtech Connector, opens.
2. Set Active to Yes. Under API Settings, fill in Base url, Application id and Group id.
3. Under Authenticate, fill in Username and Password, then click Retrieve auth key. Auth key fills in by itself.
4. Click Save.
5. Fetch the trackers: open the window again with Settings on the Conneqtech row and click Get all group devices under Retrieve data, or use Sync devices (Conneqtech) on the Device screen — both do the same. RentVisie fetches every tracker in that group and opens the Device screen. If Active is not Yes you get Connector not active and nothing is fetched.

Set up RentalTracker

1. Switch RentalTracker on. The settings window opens.
2. Set Active to Yes, and fill in Base URL and API token with the details RentalTracker gave you.
3. Click Save. The Devices button at the top of the same window takes you straight to the tracker list.

Before you start: the Integrations screen, the Devices tile and every fetch button except Sync devices (RentalTracker) need a Company admin account. The Assets screen on the main menu has Track and Trace but no Devices tile, so an ordinary staff account can open the map, open a tracker from a map marker, and use Refresh location and Get sensor data, but cannot change a tracker. If you need a tracker linked, ask your Company admin.

Using the tracker list and the tracker screen

From the main menu, open Admin, then Assets, then click the Devices tile. The screen headed Device opens on the Traci tab.

1. Click the tab of the box's supplier. Each tab lists Registration number, Name, IMEI, Status and Last update, with search boxes on the first three.

2. Fetch the latest boxes from the supplier with the button on that tab:

   Tab	Button	What it does
   Traci	Get devices (traci)	Adds new Traci boxes and refreshes known ones
   Traci	Get devices (3rd party)	Fetches nothing; only shows Please follow the instructions from the relevant integration page.
   Conneqtech	Sync devices (Conneqtech)	Adds new Conneqtech boxes and updates their names
   RentalTracker	Sync devices (RentalTracker)	Adds and updates boxes with their last position and mileage, and links new ones to a vehicle (see Key details)

3. Find the box by Name or IMEI, as written on the fitter's paperwork. Registration number is empty on a box not yet linked.

4. Click the pencil icon at the end of the row. The tracker's own screen opens.

5. In the Vehicle card, pick the vehicle in Linked asset by its registration number, then click Save in that card. The label in the header changes from Not linked to Linked to asset.

6. In the Settings card, check Tracker type: Vehicle for a car or van, Trailer for a trailer, Other for anything else. Check Fuel tank (litres). Click Save in that card.

7. Click Back to devices to return to the list.

Nothing is stored until you click a Save. Each card has one, and each saves the whole tracker.

To see where the vehicles are, open Assets and click Track and Trace, or click View on map on the Device screen. The screen headed Device map shows a marker per tracker that has a position. Click a Traci or RentalTracker marker to open that tracker's screen. Refresh positions fetches the latest positions; the map does not move on its own. Back returns to where you came from.

To see where one vehicle is, open its tracker and click Refresh location in the Location card: the Position, when it was Checked, and a small map. A RentalTracker box also shows the Address and Parked since a time (in UTC, universal time) or On the move.

A worked example. A RentalTracker box RT-0142 is fitted to a Clio, plate 12-ABC-3. You click Sync devices (RentalTracker) and get 1 device(s) synchronised. RentalTracker holds plate 12ABC3 for the box, so RentVisie links it to 12-ABC-3 by itself. Its row now shows 12-ABC-3, and its screen shows Linked to asset and Odometer 42 050 km.

Key details

What the tracker screen shows depends on the supplier. Skim this once:

RentalTracker links boxes to vehicles by itself. On each sync, an unlinked box is matched to an active vehicle by registration number (only letters and digits count), or failing that by vehicle identification number (VIN). A sync never moves a box that is already linked. Traci and Conneqtech boxes are only ever linked by hand.

What the fetch buttons leave alone. No fetch removes a box the supplier has dropped, or changes a link you made by hand.

Get sensor data shows and forgets. It shows RentalTracker's live readings (fuel, battery, odometer and more). Nothing is stored. The mileage a RentalTracker box reports stays on its own screen; it does not change the vehicle's odometer.

The four command boxes. Lock doors, Open doors, Lock engine and Unlock engine hold the codes the box understands. New Traci boxes start with lvcanclosealldoors, lvcanopenalldoors, setdigout 11 and setdigout 00; Conneqtech boxes arrive with Dout1 and Dout2, as Trailer. No button here sends a command. A wrong code is silent — you find out when a customer cannot get in.

The Disabled switch. The Settings card's Disabled switch says A disabled tracker is not used for bookings or commands, and shows a Disabled label in the header. In this version the self-service steps in the Q&A below do not check it. To stop a tracker being used, clear Linked asset instead.

The link is what everything else looks up. Once linked, the customer's self-service app can lock and unlock that vehicle, and for a Traci box pickup and return can read the mileage from it.

What to do next. If a customer is waiting on the phone, open Track and Trace first. If you have just linked a tracker, check the vehicle's Self service switch next, because the app refuses to unlock a vehicle without it. Then read Mileage and fuel readings for what a tracker does at pickup and return.

Q&A

A customer says the app will not unlock the car. What do I check? Four things, in this order, because each one produces its own message in the customer's app. The booking must be at status PickedUp — if it is not, the app says Please update booking status first; put the booking through pickup on the Run the pickup inspection screen. The vehicle's Self service switch must be on, or the app says Self service not supported. A tracker must be linked to that exact vehicle, or the app says No linked Tracker found — open Admin, Assets, Devices, and look for the plate in Registration number on each tab. And the Traci connection must be set up, or the app says No traci connection: lock and unlock instructions always go through Traci, so ask your Company admin to check the Traci row under Admin, Settings, Integrations.

A self-service pickup or return fails with "Unsupported platform". What went wrong? Self-service pickup and return only work with a Traci or Conneqtech tracker. A RentalTracker box gives this message, and so does a tracker set to an unknown supplier. Take the vehicle back yourself on the Take a vehicle back at the end of a rental screen, or hand it over on the Run the pickup inspection screen.

A self-service return is refused with "Not all required images have been taken". The customer has not taken every photo the inspection asks for. Only the customer can fix that, in the app. If they cannot, take the vehicle back yourself.

A customer cannot finish a self-service return. Why? The vehicle is checked before it locks itself. The customer is shown one word naming what is wrong: Ignition (the engine is running), Doors (a door is open), Key (the key is not in its holder) or Geofence (the vehicle is not parked inside a return area). See Help a customer whose self-service return is refused. Only the customer can fix these, standing at the car. If they cannot, take the vehicle back yourself on the Take a vehicle back at the end of a rental screen.

The vehicle is a trailer and the return went through without any of those checks. That is expected. The engine, door and key checks only run on a tracker whose Tracker type is Vehicle. A tracker set to Trailer or Other skips them, so set Tracker type deliberately when you link a box.

I changed a tracker but nothing was saved when I came back. Changes are kept only after a Save in one of the cards. Back to devices leaves without saving. If the boxes cannot be changed at all, you are signed in with an ordinary staff account; ask your Company admin.

I linked the wrong vehicle. How do I undo it? Open the tracker, clear Linked asset in the Vehicle card and click Save. There is no delete button for a tracker, so one you no longer use stays on its tab with an empty Registration number — that empty column is how you spot the ones still waiting to be dealt with.

Two trackers ended up pointing at the same vehicle. Which one wins? Nothing stops it, and nothing warns you. The remote unlock and the mileage each use one of the two, and which one is not something you can predict or see. Clear Linked asset on whichever tracker is no longer fitted.

A tracker I know is fitted is not on any tab. Click the fetch button on the right tab and look again. For Traci use Get devices (traci), not Get devices (3rd party), which fetches nothing. If the box is still missing, RentVisie is only showing what the supplier returns, so the box is not yet in the supplier's own account — that is a call to your tracking supplier.

Get devices (traci) says "Traci is switched off" or "Please set up the Traci connection first." The first means the Traci switch on the Integrations screen is off; switch it on. The second means Traci was never set up; the settings window opens straight after the message so you can enter the Token. Both need a Company admin.

Sync devices (RentalTracker) says "Could not reach RentalTracker. Check the API token". RentVisie could not sign in to RentalTracker. Ask your Company admin to check API token and Base URL under Settings on the RentalTracker row. If it says Set up and activate the RentalTracker connection first, the switch is off or the details were never saved.

A RentalTracker box did not link itself to its vehicle. The automatic link needs the plate or VIN that RentalTracker holds to match an active vehicle. The Vehicle card shows what RentalTracker has; if it says RentalTracker has no plate number, VIN or registration number for this device., nothing can be matched. Pick the vehicle in Linked asset yourself and click Save.

I clicked a marker and got "This device has not been synced from Traci yet". The map shows every box in your Traci account, including ones RentVisie has not fetched yet. Open Devices and click Get devices (traci), then try the marker again. Conneqtech markers do not open anything when clicked.

Why does a vehicle's marker not move? The map draws once when you open it. Click Refresh positions. A RentalTracker box shows its position from the last sync, so its marker only moves after a refresh or a Sync devices (RentalTracker). If a marker still does not move, the box itself has not reported — check Status and Last update (or Last online for RentalTracker) on its screen.

Where can I see whether a vehicle's ignition is on, now the positions list is gone? The Device map replaced the old Asset positions list. It shows markers only, with no ignition, odometer or fuel columns, and the tracker's own screen has no ignition field either. For a RentalTracker box, click Get sensor data on its screen to see the live readings the box sends. For a Traci or Conneqtech box, ask your tracking supplier.

Can I see a vehicle's history of where it has been? No. Every screen here shows the latest position only. For a history, ask your tracking supplier, who keeps the full trail.

Related pages:

• Turn an integration on or off — the Integrations screen where each supplier is switched on.
• Mileage and fuel readings — where the reading a tracker sends ends up at pickup and return.
• Check and correct a vehicle's odometer and fuel readings — the vehicle's own readings, separate from anything the tracker shows.
• Hand over keys through a key box — the other device integration, for sites that use a key safe instead of a tracker.
• Add a vehicle to your fleet — the vehicle record a tracker is linked to, and its Self service switch.