Published on March 18th, 2020
Managing a fleet of vehicles can be a costly business model, with a seemingly endless list of additional costs.
There are obvious considerations of direct costs such as insurance and fuel, but traffic issues and break downs can heavily impact your productivity and efficacy levels.
You don’t have to persist with an unsustainable model though. There are plenty of ways you can keep your vehicles out on the road in a way that is both efficient and profitable, from technology to changing attitudes, and it doesn’t require half the work you’d expect.
Use Fuel Cards
Fuel cards are the best way for your fleet to directly save you money on the road. They’re an incredibly cost-effective fuel option that doesn’t require any substantial change in the way your business manages its day-to-day driving.
Fuel cards allow you to purchase fuel, often at a discount, from most major providers across the country using one universal card.
This is a time-effective way of making payments that gives you a financial boost at the tail end of the process.
Fuel cards also help to streamline the processes of your account department. Paying with one provides you with an accurate record of how much it costs your business to refuel each day, helping you to eliminate any overspending.
This helps avoid discrepancies within the process and eliminates the hassle of lost receipts. You can learn more about the benefits of fuel cards here.
Automate Admin Processes
Your business is about more than just your drivers and vehicles. There are hundreds of hours of admin work happening in the background each week just to keep vehicles on the road and operations running smoothly.
Streamlining this part of the process is the first step to a more efficient business model, both in terms of work and cost.
Major admin costs can hide in plain sight. If you’re still persisting with a paper-based system, technology can be implemented to make everyday tasks more efficient and free up room for value-adding tasks.
Tech advancements and streamlining come hand in hand in the modern world, so your business needs to make best use of the services available.
Communication between your admin team can be re-worked into an online system, where they can be updated with tasks, send over invoices and billing information and monitor vehicles from the comfort of their desks without ever having to contact the drivers.
Using a telematics system gives your in-house team a real-time overview of exactly how every driver is performing.
From here you can identify patterns of issues from their performance indicators and work backward to create a more streamlined and efficient business.
Technology creates room for more informed decision making and effectiveness.
To start making this kind of change you need to have a holistic view of your business and fully understand where there are flaws.
The flaws may be coming from the drivers, but what part does the admin procedure play in creating these conditions?
Drive More Economically
All of this is not to say there isn’t more you can do to make the actual journeys your drivers make more economically efficient.
A proficient fleet can save your business a huge amount of money, and transforming your team into one only requires minimal changes.
Asking your drivers to reduce their speed is a simple tactic that can have a lasting impact economically.
While the idea of getting their faster suggests you’ll be able to get the job done faster, you’re actually costing yourself in the additional fuel that driving faster uses up.
Dropping your speed from 80mph to 70mph alone can save you up to 25% in gas.
Making sure this doesn’t contradict with other messages you’re sending out around speed of services and efficiency in work is important so as not to confuse drivers and actually see substantial results.
Cutting out the amount of time spent idling is another way to make sure your fuel budget goes further.
Sitting in stationary traffic with the engine running is one of the quickest ways to waste fuel and lose money.
Rectifying this doesn’t just mean cutting the engine when you’re waiting in a standstill, but making sure you don’t have the engine running while you pull over to make a phone call or quickly do a bit of admin.
It’s a simple waste of fuel you can’t afford to miss out on as a business. Get your drivers into these good habits.
Throughout history, the success of huge fleets has often been dictated by little changes. These implements seem insignificant, but can massively impact how much you’re saving.
Seeing words like streamlining and efficiency as a business owner can make your head spin and spawn visions of huge company-wide changes. In reality, these sorts of solutions require minuscule effort that brings about big results.
