MORE than half of human resource and financial executives involved in fleet management have no idea what an employee car ownership (ECO) scheme is.

And those who are aware of how they work relied on fleet management suppliers and the press to inform them.

A total of 46% answered ‘no’ to the question ‘do you understand what an ECO/structured employee car purchase scheme is?’ while 5% were not sure and 1% did not answer.

The rest, 48%, were aware of how the alternatives to the traditional company car scheme work.

Large fleets were likely already to be offering ECOchemes or had made a decision not to use them.

In total, 19% of organisations used for the survey offer an ECO scheme, 22% are considering offering one, 41% have considered one but decided not to and 17% of respondents were not sure if it had been explored by their company.

For those considering launching such a scheme, 11% believe it is ‘very likely’ to happen, 44% ‘fairly likely’ and 14% ‘not likely’.

The main reason for companies offering such a scheme or considering one, according to the survey, are financial and benefits-led, with the main financial reason given as Eco schemes helping to ease the pressure of tax burdens on the company. The main benefit in terms of motivation was to give employees a better value package.

Companies put off introducing ECOs said they believed the process would be too complicated.