How can fleets avoid early termination charges when using contract hire?

Damion Bennett: When we get a new starter or eligible employee we had let them order a new car and then use a hire car. But we changed our policy earlier in the year, and we had some pool cars available. Now new starters take on a pool car until their company car is delivered. There were one or two difficulties with HR, but so far it’s saved us £90,000 in early termination charges. For many companies I know it’s the norm to drive a pool car. For us it has I can invest that money in other things such as safety.

Craig Warburton: We switched fuel card suppliers and saved £80,000. We introduced BP and Texaco Fast Fuels for HGVs. I took two different deals Platt’s and ‘fixed price less’. There was very little difference between the two. It has made quite a significant saving. It took about three months to complete but the implementation was very slick.  We’re planning to roll out to a number of high mileage business users instead of reclaiming in pilot scheme to take out private mileage from their salary.

Ian Leonard: We were with Allstar but about five years ago we switched to Shell, and now 82% of our locations are within two miles of a filling station. Our rebate is larger and it saved £60,000 a year moving to a fixed deal. We removed free fuel about a year later and the saving in the first year was £1.6million this year £800,000.

How do you monitor occasional private mileage?

Craig Warburton: You can’t. It has to be done on trust.

Damion Bennett:  Midas (mileage capture software) is good at exceptions such as a mileage rounded up, etc.

Jenny Powley: You also need a system that gives drivers flexibility for deviation through road closures and accidents.

Ian Leonard: Our average annual mileage was27,500 when we had free fuel and now it’s about 19,000.

What’s your perception of buying supermarket fuel if you have Platts price, as Tesco is now the biggest fuel provider in the UK?

Ronnie Wilson: We all try to get our drivers to supermarkets but it isn’t always possible.

John Heussi: Most of the emails I get are from fuel card companies. We ran a trial with Key Fuels alongside Allstar. Route deviation is the biggest issue. One particular area wasn’t particularly strong for Key Fuels. You have to balance the costs against buying in bulk, and the margins are nowhere near what they used to be.  The cost is 110p per litre excluding VAT, so not a big difference. Choosing where to go for the fuel is more important than the provider. How many drivers put the wrong mileage in? Could be a high proportion of misreads. Backing it up with telematics is a good idea as there will often be errors.

Jenny Powley: Using supermarket fuel is a required discipline of refuelling at the end of every day on the way home. No one will get through a full tank of fuel in a day.

John Heussi: That’s not the same for us. Motorway vehicles fill up three times a day. These vehicles are doing a huge amount of miles and fill up with the most expensive fuel. There has also been an effect on transport as a result of the estate strategy. Gone are the days where you walk into an inquiries desk. You call the police or even tweet the police. We go to you. Dependency on transport is increasing. It is going to mean further travelling and route deviation. It drives us to get this right even more. We’re looking for ways to become more ordinary in our fuel requirements.