We use cookies to ensure that we give you the best experience on our website. If you continue without changing your settings, we will assume that you are happy to receive all cookies on the Business Car website. However, if you would like to, you can change your cookies at any time
The start point for the best source of fleet information |
Controlling cost is the key issue facing businesses right now, but is spending hard cash on fleet software the answer? Paul Barker speaks to the top names in the software industry to see how they can help operators
How is the market coping with the recession?
Technology of the kind we provide in many ways benefits from the recession. For example, we saw record numbers of transactions pass through our 1Link Service Network at the start of this year.
How can you help fleet managers justify the cost?
Our fleet e-commerce platforms replace largely manual systems relying on phone, fax and paper, with fast, accurate and cost-effective online mechanisms. Cost and efficiency improvements easily justify the relatively small cost charged for each transaction.
What are the benefits of using fleet software?
Fleet technology allows everyday fleet processes to be completed faster, more accurately, more efficiently and at a lower cost than through any other means.
What developments are you working on for your system?
A new development is an automatic allocation engine added to 1Link Hire Platform. This allows fleets to send daily rental bookings directly to a selected supplier chosen through a set of predetermined rules. For example, bookings for small hatchbacks could be automatically sent to one supplier and those for larger vehicles to another.
What is your key message for 2009?
Our message is one of guarded optimism. Economic conditions are tough but every day we see firms that, through thorough application of our technology, are controlling their costs, improving service levels and finding new business opportunities. Many are either profitable or well on their way to being so.
How is the market coping with the recession?
Demand for fleet software solutions is mixed and is related to how individual business sectors are coping with the recession. For example, demand for software in the public sector and among businesses operating in the food sector and some specialist markets remains strong. However, the economic impact on many areas including housing and construction has been significant and they are, in some cases, adopting a 'wait and see' approach to future investment.
How can you help fleet managers justify the cost?
The biggest justification for using our systems comes from our customers. We obtain most of our leads through referrals from existing companies.
What are the benefits of using fleet software?
Our existing customers justify their employers' investment in our systems by the amount of administration time they save coupled with the ability to deliver huge operating cost savings through the increasingly efficient management of their fleet and 'grey' fleet vehicles and associated duty of care responsibility.
What developments are you working on for your system?
We are working to ensure our systems integrate with more Government departments. Already, our customers are submitting reports and receiving information from the likes of HM Revenue and Customs, the DVLA and VOSA. We expect that list to increase in the future.
What is your key message for 2009?
Cost control is the single biggest issue facing business and fleets this year.
How is the market coping with the recession?
The fleet software industry is very well placed to help fleet managers take on the recession because its emphasis is on the measurement and management of the fleet and instilling tight cost control - attributes that come to the fore in times of economic downturn.
How can you help fleet managers justify the cost?
Fleet managers should always ask how they can afford not to have management software systems in place. If you can't measure it, you can't manage.
What are the benefits of using fleet software?
Tight cost control is perhaps more important now than it has ever been and fleet management software allows the user to measure, manage and control the vehicle fleet. At the same time, it provides the means to meet duty of care compliance and reduce environmental impact.
What developments are you working on for your system?
Our development emphasis is on refining our main fleet management system, FleetHR, to ensure it exactly meets the requirements of modern fleet management. That means development work on the unique dashboard presentation and exception reporting suite, which allows managers to see at a glance the business areas where they need to take immediate action.
What is your key message for 2009?
Work smarter! Too many systems provide managers with data overload and too little management information. What managers need is the wheat sorting from the chaff.
How is the market coping with the recession?
Most companies are looking more deeply at fleet arrangements, rather than just the traditional 'let's hit the suppliers around the head' approach to reducing monthly rentals. Fleet software enables the unlocking of working efficiencies not achievable elsewhere and we have noted a significant increase in corporate enquiries.
How can you help fleet managers justify the cost?
The ideal way is to show how software-driven efficiencies can outweigh the cost of implementation by proving the results through full-life cost analysis.
What are the benefits of using fleet software?
Aside from the obvious reduction in required administration, good software will help increase efficiencies across tax and NI management costs, fuel expenditure, SMR etc. But if it can also add real value to the scheme from a driver's perspective, then the company is in a win/win position.
What developments are you working on for your system?
We are looking at how we can make our full-life cost modelling simpler and more accessible to company decision makers who perhaps don't fully appreciate the full extent of the costs associated with running a car policy.
What is your key message for 2009?
Any company serious about cost reductions should be looking at a strategic review of all operations, including fleet as both a significant business cost and a key employee benefit tool.
BusinessCar magazine ©2019
Business Car Magazine © 2020 | Business Car is part of NS Media Group.
