As fleet decision-makers at Company Car In Action 2018 were given the privilege of being amongst the first in the UK to drive the new A-Class, Rob East, head of fleet for Mercedes-Benz, told Fleet News his continued priority was end-users.

What has been the most popular model with fleets this year?

We have the all-new A-Class here fresh from its press launch, giving fleet operators the first chance to get behind the wheel of this new model in the UK.

What is your priority this year?

We want to continue focusing on end-user fleets, there are still lots of opportunity for us there and we will continue to develop and find opportunities with new business that we have not seen before.

With the WLTP changes causing a lot of confusion we have to help customers navigate the complexities of that and provide consultation and advice to fleet managers and end users.

The customer experience piece is really important to us, we will continue to offer our 48-hour test drives as they have been really successful with more than 3000 demos provided since we launched it.

What are your fleet sales expectations this year and in the longer term?

Clearly the market is stagnant at the moment and still negative so we are focused on maintaining our channel mix.

Petrol sales have increased but not in a particularly significant way. We still sell more in diesel and expect that to continue.

We have room to be optimistic as we have lots of new product this year including the facelifted C-Class. Next year we will introduce our new range of hybrids, plus the EQC, our first pure electric vehicle.