Short answer
Choose fleet maintenance software that keeps the records the regulations expect, schedules PM by miles and time, handles driver inspections, work orders and parts, and reads odometers from your ELD. Look at it with your own units, ask how the price scales as you grow, and plan the data you will move before you sign anything.
Key points
- Start from your obligations: 49 CFR 396.3 and NSC Standard 11 both expect a systematic maintenance program and a dated record of every inspection, repair and service.
- Must-haves for most fleets: PM by miles and time, driver inspections, work orders, a service history per unit, document renewals and a full export.
- Ask every vendor the same questions, and insist on seeing your own trucks in the software before you decide.
- Plan the move: a clean unit list, current odometers, PM due points, open defects and recent history come first.
What fleet maintenance software does
Fleet maintenance software keeps one record per truck and trailer and everything that happens to it: odometer readings, PM schedules, driver inspections, repairs, parts, tires, costs and documents. Its job is to tell you what is due, what is broken and what it all cost, and to produce a clean file when someone asks for one.
That last part is not optional. In the US, 49 CFR 396.3 requires every motor carrier to systematically inspect, repair and maintain the vehicles it controls, and to keep for each one a record that identifies the vehicle, a means to show the nature and due date of upcoming inspections and maintenance, and a record of inspections, repairs and maintenance with their date and nature. Those records stay for one year, and for six months after the vehicle leaves your control.
Other US rules add more records to the same file:
- 49 CFR 396.11: driver vehicle inspection reports (DVIRs), the carrier’s certification that each listed defect was repaired or needs no repair, kept for three months. The rule allows the report to be created and kept electronically.
- 49 CFR 396.17: an annual inspection of every commercial motor vehicle, with each component passing at least once in the preceding 12 months and documentation of it on the vehicle.
- 49 CFR 396.21: the annual inspection report, kept for fourteen months where the vehicle is housed or maintained.
In Canada, the National Safety Code sets the standards the provinces and territories adopt or mirror. NSC Standard 11 requires a system to inspect, maintain and repair each vehicle at regular intervals, and a file for each vehicle that includes its identification and tire size, the nature and due date of upcoming work, every inspection and repair with its date and nature, a lubrication record and any axle or suspension modification. Records are kept for at least two years. Standard 11 sets no fixed interval: it calls the manufacturer’s service schedule the single best piece of advice for designing a program, and notes that some jurisdictions set a maximum distance or time between services. NSC Standard 13 adds daily trip inspections every 24 hours, with reports kept for at least six months, and allows them in written or equivalent electronic format.
Software does not make a fleet compliant on its own. What it does is make the right records easy to create at the moment the work happens, and easy to find when an auditor picks a truck from your list.
Must-have and nice-to-have features
Every fleet’s list is a little different. A ten-truck carrier that sends all its repairs out needs different tools from a fleet with its own shop and parts room. Use this table as a starting point and mark each line for your operation.
| Capability | Why it matters | For most fleets |
|---|---|---|
| PM schedules by miles and by time | The record has to show the nature and due date of upcoming work (396.3, NSC Standard 11) | Must-have |
| PM by engine hours | Units that idle or run equipment wear by hours, not miles | Must-have for those units, nice-to-have otherwise |
| Odometer readings from your ELD | Mileage-based PM is only as good as the odometer behind it | Must-have if you have ELDs |
| Driver inspections on a phone | DVIRs and trip inspections are required, and paper gets lost | Must-have |
| Work orders with statuses, labour and parts | The record of repairs and their date and nature | Must-have with an in-house shop |
| Out-of-service handling | An unsafe truck has to stay off dispatch until it is fixed | Must-have |
| Service history per unit, with export | What an auditor or a buyer of the truck asks for | Must-have |
| Documents and renewal reminders | Registration, insurance, permits and annual or periodic inspections expire | Must-have |
| Cost per vehicle | Shows which units cost more to keep than they earn | Must-have for owners |
| Mechanic access with limited rights | Mechanics see their jobs without seeing the whole business | Must-have with in-house mechanics |
| Parts stock | Knowing what is on the shelf saves trips and downtime | Nice-to-have unless you stock parts |
| Tires by position | Tread readings, retreads and cost per mile for each tire | Nice-to-have; important for fleets that retread |
| Warranties | Repairs under warranty should not be paid twice | Nice-to-have |
Questions to ask every vendor
Send the same list to every vendor and compare the answers side by side. Vague answers to specific questions are themselves an answer.
- How is a PM due date worked out? By days, miles, engine hours or a mix? Does a completed service roll the schedule forward by itself?
- Where do odometer readings come from? Which ELDs connect, how often readings arrive, and what happens for units without an ELD?
- How do drivers inspect? On which app, against which checklist (Canada’s Schedule 1, the US DVIR items, or both), and what happens when a driver marks a major defect?
- How does a repair get recorded? Walk through one work order from opening to close, including labour, parts and the out-of-service flag.
- What do mechanics see? Can you keep costs away from mechanics? Do they need a separate app or a browser?
- Which documents and renewals are tracked? Registration, IRP cab cards, insurance, permits, annual or CVIP inspections?
- Can I export everything? Service history, documents, inspections and costs, in formats you can open without the vendor.
- Who sets up the account and moves our data? What do you need from us, and who checks the result?
- How is the price worked out, and what changes it? Vehicles, users, modules, billing period, and any setup charge.
- What does the product not do today? A plain answer here is a good sign for the rest.
Pricing models in plain terms
Vendors price fleet maintenance software in a few common ways. None is better in itself; what matters is how the bill moves as your fleet and your team change.
- Priced by vehicle, billed monthly or annually. The bill follows the size of the fleet. Ask whether trailers count as vehicles, whether parked or sold units stop counting, and how quickly a new truck is added.
- Priced by user. The bill follows headcount. Ask whether drivers who only do inspections count as users, and whether mechanics, dispatchers and office staff are each charged.
- Plans or tiers. A base plan with more features at each level. Check which tier the features you marked as must-have actually sit in.
- Add-on modules. Parts, tires or integrations charged separately. Add them to the comparison before you compare totals.
- One-time charges. Setup, data migration or training. Ask for them in writing.
Ask whether paying annually instead of monthly changes the price, and what commitment comes with it. Then work out a full year’s cost for your real fleet under each offer, including trailers and any add-ons, before you compare.
Implementation in six steps
- Name an owner. One person, usually the safety manager or shop lead, owns the setup and has the final say on how units, schedules and forms are named.
- Clean the unit list. Unit number, VIN, plate, year, make, model and tire size for every truck and trailer, plus the owner for any leased unit. That covers the identification 396.3 and NSC Standard 11 ask for.
- Load the PM schedules. For each unit, the services you do, their intervals and the date and odometer of the last one, so the first due dates are right.
- Connect odometers. Link your ELD account, or enter current readings by hand for units without one.
- Set up people. Drivers for inspections, mechanics for work orders, office staff for records and renewals. Train each group on the two or three screens they will actually use.
- Switch over on a date. Pick a day when new inspections, work orders and renewals go into the new system only, and keep the old records readable for as long as the retention rules require.
Data to move, and what can stay archived
You do not have to move everything. Move what the new system needs to schedule and warn correctly, and keep the rest where you can still produce it for an audit.
| Data | Move it? | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Unit list with identification | Yes | Everything else hangs off it |
| Current odometer per unit | Yes | Mileage-based PM starts from it |
| PM schedules and the last service of each | Yes | Sets the first due dates correctly |
| Open defects and open repairs | Yes | Nothing unsafe should fall between systems |
| Documents with expiry dates | Yes | Registration, insurance, permits and inspection certificates renew on time |
| Service history | At least the retention period | 396.3 keeps one year in the US; NSC Standard 11 keeps at least two years in Canada |
| DVIRs and trip inspection reports | Keep accessible | Three months under 396.11; at least six months under NSC Standard 13 |
| Annual inspection reports | Keep accessible | Fourteen months under 396.21 |
| Parts on hand, tires by position, active warranties | If you use those features | Starts the new counts and limits from today |
Older history can stay as an archive file attached to each unit, as long as you can produce it when asked.
What RigMD does, plan by plan
RigMD is the fleet maintenance side of the TruckerPro TMS, sold under its own name. Here is what each plan covers today.
Starter
- Maintenance covers trucks and trailers, with a service history per vehicle that exports to Excel and a document hub per vehicle with archive and restore, ZIP download and print-all. Vehicle documents can carry expiry dates.
- Daily renewal alerts for vehicle registration, IRP cab cards, insurance, permits and periodic CVIP or annual inspections.
- One current odometer reading per truck, updated from the ELD, when a work order closes, and by hand. Readings from a connected Motive, Samsara or Radical ELD account feed PM due dates.
- PM schedules run on days and miles: by days, by miles or both, per truck or per trailer type, with trailer schedules by days. A daily job marks each PM due soon (within 14 days or 500 miles by default) or overdue, and reminders arrive as a daily email digest and an in-app notice.
- Driver inspections in the TruckerPro Driver app, on a checklist based on Canada’s Schedule 1 items, each item marked OK, minor or major, with notes, the odometer and the GPS location. An optional rule requires a pre-trip before pickup and a post-trip before delivery. With out-of-service blocking turned on, a major defect puts the truck out of service until a supervisor clears it, and inspection defects show on each vehicle’s risk register.
On Pro
- Work orders for PM, repair, inspection and breakdown jobs, with lead mechanics and assistants, labour timers, parts and labour totals, and out-of-service downtime. PM work orders open by themselves when a schedule comes due and roll the schedule forward when they close.
- A Mechanic role that sees only work-order pages. Mechanics work in the web app from a phone or desktop browser, and they do not see costs.
- Cost per vehicle, counting shop invoices and work orders once each, and outside-shop invoices read by an AI receipt scan and then approved.
On Premium
- Parts stock with part numbers, shelf or bin locations and reorder points; picking a part onto a work order lowers stock.
- Tires by position with tread depth readings, retreads and cost per mile for each tire, and warranties with a date and mileage limit and an email 30 days before one expires.
- PM inspections recorded on the Quebec SAAQ forms (form 6609A for trucks, 6648A for trailers) and printed as a PDF.
Accounts are set up by the TruckerPro team: tell us about your fleet and we will set yours up and switch maintenance on. Compare the plans, and see TruckerPro’s fleet maintenance software and the TruckerPro trucking TMS it runs on.
Sources
- 49 CFR 396.3: Inspection, repair, and maintenance, eCFR (FMCSA regulations)
- 49 CFR 396.11: Driver vehicle inspection report(s), eCFR (FMCSA regulations)
- 49 CFR 396.17: Periodic inspection, eCFR (FMCSA regulations)
- 49 CFR 396.21: Periodic inspection recordkeeping requirements, eCFR (FMCSA regulations)
- National Safety Code, Canadian Council of Motor Transport Administrators
- NSC Standard 11: Maintenance and Periodic Inspection Standards (January 2020), Canadian Council of Motor Transport Administrators
- NSC Standard 13: Daily Vehicle Trip Inspection, Canadian Council of Motor Transport Administrators
This guide is general information, not legal or engineering advice. Rules change and differ by jurisdiction; check the regulation or the agency named above, and your equipment maker’s service manual.