Recent residual values have been kind to Crow, even with such high mileages.

He says: “We’re always conscious of residuals, but when we send a vehicle to auction we will balance the value of any repairs against what we can expect to achieve.

“For example, we used to spend about eight hours simply taking the glue off a car and polishing it up once the livery had been removed.

“But when you totted up the time spent rectifying the problem, you realised you just weren’t going to get it back at auction.”

Replacement vehicles are purchased through the Home Office and National Association of Police Fleet Managers (NAPFM) procurement framework, which was introduced in 2010 and is due for renewal in October 2014.

“When it was first agreed we were informed that we had to go into a mini-tender competition,” says Crow.

“The rule was you had to go into the process with a minimum of one other force.”

Northamptonshire is part of the East Midlands region, which includes the forces from Derbyshire, Nottinghamshire, Lincolnshire and Leicestershire.

Crow says the group had already been looking at standardisation of certain roles of vehicle and that was feeding into a national standard specification.

But, when new procurement rules came into play, they recognised an even greater advantage was to be had by joining forces with another region to increase their collective buying power.

He continues: “We went to the West Midlands region, which includes West Midlands Police, West Mercia, Warwickshire and Staffs.”

The nine forces immediately started looking at their bulk purchases and the volumes they were likely to achieve.

Their combined approach has helped drive down costs for Northamptonshire Police, saving it on average £40,000 per year.

The framework agreement contains stringent specifications for each vehicle and manufacturers are invited to put a model forward and name their price.

They are then assessed before being whittled down to ‘preferred’ bidders that then tender for the business.

The process will begin again in October next year, but procurement frameworks haven’t been without their critics and Crow suggests they may be tweaked to improve the process.

He says: “It may be slightly different; it could be completely different in the next round, but the principle will remain the same.

"It’s just the way it’s going to be run is going to be slightly different.”