How the odometer works
Every vehicle carries one odometer reading. Fleetola uses it for one job - knowing when a service falls due - and never to bill anybody. Four things can move it, and every change is recorded behind the scenes with a note of where it came from.
Where the number comes from
The reading you type on the vehicle form, a GPS tracker where one is fitted, the odometer on each service you log, and the handover and return readings on contracts. A tracker adds the distance driven to whatever the odometer says; everything else writes a reading in.
The Live badge
Live beside the number means a tracker is moving it: the car has one linked and it has reported within the last 6 hours. When a tracker goes quiet - parked underground, a flat battery - the badge drops off but the number stays. Tracking is an optional paid module, switched on per account; without it the odometer is simply the last reading entered.
Fixing a wrong reading
- Open Vehicles, open the car and click the edit pencil.
- Type what the dash says into Odometer. A lower number is allowed - GPS distance runs 2-3% high, so tracked cars drift upward and correcting them down is routine.
- Save. The correction sticks: the tracker counts on from whatever you save, and it never overwrites a typed reading.
Where to find it: Vehicles → the vehicle → Edit vehicle
Contracts: type the reading, always
The tracker never fills in a contract's start or end kilometres, and nothing can make it. A contract with kilometre terms will not save without a typed handover reading - the wizard asks for it on the Handover step and refuses to finish without it. Take the number off the dash.
Tip: Never charge excess kilometres from GPS. A tracker reads 2-3% high - close enough to schedule a service, wrong enough to overcharge every renter. Fleetola bills excess kilometres only from the readings you typed at handover and return.
Services and older readings
Logging a service updates the vehicle too: a service recorded at 152,000 km lifts a car showing 149,000. But service and contract readings only ever raise the odometer. Services are often backdated - an August entry for a June visit carries June's reading - and letting an old number rewind the odometer would wipe every kilometre driven since. A lower reading is still recorded behind the scenes, with a note that it did not move the number. To wind the odometer back on purpose, use the vehicle form - that is the one place a lower value is taken at its word.
Related guides
- Add your first vehicle - Get a car into Fleetola with its rego, rates and photos.
- Service and rego reminders - Log a service, set when the next one falls due, and record a registration renewal.