A FLEET manager has come up with a simple solution to tackle the expensive problem of misfuelling.

Sally Weeks, procurement and facilities manager for Maxxium UK, uses a labelling machine to attach the fuel type to every vehicle’s fuel filler cap.

She told members of the Scottish regional meeting of Acfo, the fleet managers’ association, that she planned to stick yellow ‘diesel’ labels on DERV fuel caps and green ‘unleaded’ ones on petrol caps, so the message was in drivers’ eyelines as they filled up.

She said: ‘Many manufacturers put the type of fuel on the back of the fuel filler flap but I don’t think this is obvious enough. A cheap labelling machine can be used to put the fuel type right on the fuel cap.

‘You could send out two to every driver, get the dealer to put the label on at its pre-delivery inspection or simply tell them to do it at the next service.’

As demand for diesel continues to soar, so does the problem of drivers accidentally putting petrol in their cars.

Members heard that one fleet had been hit by five incidents in the past year, with the cost of damage from running the engines with the wrong fuel amounting to about £3,500 for every incident.