RAKA Rentals is a trusted equipment rental provider serving Nebraska and Iowa, offering a diverse fleet that includes aerial work platforms, material handling machinery, and earthmoving equipment. With over 50 years of Midwest experience, RAKA is known for its extensive inventory and commitment to personalized service. The company supports a wide range of industries, from construction and agriculture to warehousing and utilities, ensuring projects stay on schedule and within budget.
When Heath Jackson joined RAKA Rentals as Manager of Regional Service, he found that the company’s systems couldn’t keep up with the scale and complexity of the operation. There was no GPS tracking in place, and equipment location data was often inaccurate or missing entirely.
“We had machines that weren’t at the jobsites they said they were at,” Jackson says. “Some weren’t with the right customers. Some weren’t even on the right contracts.”
Without real-time visibility, technicians spent hours on the road just trying to find equipment. “It took a lot of time for people to literally get in a truck and go try to find these pieces,” he says. “There were a lot of hours behind that, just to figure out where a unit actually was.”
Adding to the issue was a lack of service tracking. Machines were coming back overdue for maintenance, or worse, never flagged for it at all. “We had equipment that was way out of service,” Jackson says. “Some hadn’t had services in years. And that’s a metric we definitely want to follow.”
Even simple tasks like closing out rentals became inconsistent. Equipment would be returned, but without sensors or a central system in place, it could remain marked as on rent for days.
“A lot of customers were just coming in and dropping equipment and leaving,” Jackson says. “Before Trackunit, we didn’t know they had brought it back.”
RAKA’s service and operations teams were doing their best, but without a unified platform, they were constantly working around the system instead of through it.
When leadership asked Jackson to find a GPS solution, his recommendation was immediate. “I was familiar with ZTR, which had been bought by Trackunit,” he says. “That’s a no-brainer. That’s what we need to use.’”
As the rollout began, visibility started to improve almost immediately. “We had one machine fall off the radar, then it started tracking again,” Jackson says. “The customer swore it wasn’t there. But it was being used: three hours here, four hours there.” Trackunit gave Jackson and his team the evidence they needed to have more accurate, more confident conversations.
“If I thought a piece of equipment wasn’t picked up, I’d check Trackunit first before making that phone call,” he says. “That consistency makes a difference.
Technicians began using Trackunit Go to locate equipment before arriving at job sites. Workflows became smoother and service conversations became more informed.
“Our guys used to be walking jobsites just trying to find equipment. Now they can just go on the app and pull it up. It’s all right there.”
With location, utilization, and machine hours all visible in one platform, internal coordination improved. “If a technician has to go to ten different websites to find a machine, it’s going to be frustrating,” Jackson says. “With Trackunit, it’s just one app.”
Drop-offs and rental closures became easier to track. Service planning improved. “We were finally able to be proactive,” Jackson says. “Not just guesswork.”
After onboarding with Trackunit, Jackson worked with the customer success team to set up service metrics and PM scheduling.
“We built out our service metrics—250-hour intervals, 90-day checks, annual inspections,” he says. “Before that, it was just people reacting. Now we’re actually scheduling PMs.”
Support from the Trackunit team was critical to success. “We started doing weekly calls with our customer success manager,” Jackson says. “She helped us understand how to configure everything, and the videos she created made it easy to train the techs.”
Once technicians saw the value, adoption came naturally. “They said, ‘Oh man, this is awesome.’ They got it.”
Not long after implementation began, RAKA Rentals went through a structural shift, splitting and later re-merging with a sister division. Equipment was reassigned, naming conventions changed, and some devices were removed during the transition. Rather than derail progress, the team used it as an opportunity to realign and reinforce the system they were building.
“There was a point where we discovered a few machines had multiple GPS units installed,” Jackson says. “We thought we had more installed than we did, but in some cases, tracking had paused or the data wasn’t syncing.”
Instead of starting over, Jackson worked closely with Trackunit’s support team to get everything back in sync. “They helped me figure out how to clear duplicates, build the missing APIs, and get the data right,” he says.
The experience confirmed the value of having a partner, not just a platform. Even through changes in structure and equipment ownership, Trackunit gave the team the tools, and the support, they needed to stay on track.
RAKA is preparing to activate the RentalMan integration, allowing Trackunit data to flow directly into internal systems and reporting tools.
“Once that API is in place, it’ll really make sense,” Jackson says. “We’ll be able to run PM reports, track service intervals, and break things down by region.”
The goal is clear: give every technician the tools to succeed and give every customer a better experience. “We’ll know this machine had its 90-day inspection, its annual, its service. Everything’s up to date.”
For anyone facing similar challenges, Jackson offers a practical benchmark.
“Do you want to look at ten websites or do you want to look at one?”
“With Trackunit, you can see your PMs, your utilization, your hours, your error codes. It talks to the manufacturer. That’s all you need.”
The biggest lesson? Integration matters. “The simplicity of it is what I’m trying to get people to understand,” Jackson says. “Once everything talks to each other, it clicks. That’s when it really works.”
The partnership between RAKA Rentals and Trackunit shows what’s possible when technology is built to serve both people and process. From locating equipment in seconds to scheduling preventative maintenance with confidence, RAKA’s team has gained time, clarity, and control. With integration at the core, the company isn’t just reacting faster, it’s building a smarter, more connected rental operation.
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