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ACFO members have expressed a skepticism over electric vehicles and suggested that the technology is making slow progress for fleets.
BusinessCar attended the organisation's East Anglian regional meeting last month, where delegates discussed the application of electric vehicles fleets, and the opinions were short on positivity for the new technology.
Delegates offered the following comments: "They're going mainly to councils as a 'we've done our bit, we've bought one'. It's the same with big fleets - it seems to be to appease someone. But the thing is, the price needs to come down. Electric vehicles are not a robust fleet proposal.";
"Is there going to be a retail customer who wants to buy a three-year-old Nissan Leaf? Probably not. It's just not practical. Until you have an electric vehicle with a 200-mile range and a proper charging infrastructure, it's not going to happen.";
"The problem is that cities have good public transport, so why would you use an electric vehicle? Also, electric vehicles are much better on the continental market - it's the same as we buy [properties] and the European market rents. There has been no progress from this time last year."
Only one delegate suggested that there was a practical application for electric vehicles within the corporate sector, which was with vans in urban areas: "It makes absolute sense with vans in cities. Harrods have had them since the 1920s. They're in the depot overnight so you can charge them up, and they're used in the city in the day. That makes absolute sense."
The conference also broached the subject of telematics. Delegates suggested that employees and unions have now accepted black boxes after initial teething trouble: "This created a furore among unions, but they then accepted that productivity went up. If you're going to install telematics then you have to be up front and explain why you're putting them in. It's a mutual trust thing."
It was also suggested that the number of telematics providers is expected to shrink and become more palatable: "This industry of telematics is going to rationalise enormously, similarly to the leasing companies and consolidation."
Delegates said it would be beneficial if manufacturers were able to fit vehicles with telematics systems during production and before they are procured by fleets, which is consistent with the aspirations of many telematics providers.
It was highlighted that the problem with such a move would be integrating an industry standard system that would work in any application.
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