Skoda, which will rebrand itself next year as more “modern, self-confident, enjoyable and dynamic” marque, is recruiting major dealer groups to its network to ensure fleets’ experience of the brand continues to improve.

It says these heavyweight retailers will ensure high standards demanded by fleet customers.

The move is part of Skoda’s strategy to continue to grow marketshare – of which fleet sales will be an important part.  

Skoda will need its dealers to invest in premises, systems, processes and people.

“We have an order bank in place of 13,000 cars and we’re on track for a record year. I’m confident that we’ll do well over 41,000 cars this year. In market share terms we’ve got 1.99% but we’ll probably achieve 2% plus for the first time ever in the brand’s history,” said UK director Robert Hazelwood.

“Typically the Skoda partner has been single site, single owner family businesses. They have been typically focused on doing a fantastic job of looking after local retail business, but for the most part have resisted in the past to get into scale fleet business. But we’ve been making a lot of progress. We’ve changed our partner selection profile. We now don’t just look to be the franchise of choice for owner drivers but we’re engaging many groups and some of the major plcs.”

These are attractive to Skoda as they can offer scale and financial strength, have proven systems and process and are already proactive in the fleet market.

For fleet customers, Skoda is working with its retail business development group on a fleet pricing package, which will make it simple for fleets to know the cost of servicing or certain repairs within the network. A guide to Skoda aftersales will be published for fleets soon.

The Skoda Customer Promise

All Skoda dealers have committed to delivering a minimum standard of service to retail and fleet after-sales customers. Elements include:

• To endeavour to diagnose a vehicle defect within 24 hours of its arrival
• To offer free collection and delivery within a 10-mile radius
• To provide a courtesy car if the vehicle is kept overnight
• To complete a free vehicle health check and wash the car
• To ensure the invoice matches the booking price, and provide a full explanation of work completed, avoiding jargon
• To complete a walkaround of the vehicle with the customer where possible

To check out the latest Skoda car reviews, come to the Fleet News car reviews section.