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Arval in digital overhaul
Date: 10 July 2015 | Author: Tristan Young
Arval, soon to be the UK's second-largest leasing firm with the acquisition of GE's leasing division, has completed a total overhaul of its digital offering including a move into telematics.
The new and enhanced interlinked services are aimed at giving Arval's customers an advantage when it comes to fleet management.
Arval has also launched a new website that has the focus of growing the leasing company's SME business.
As part of the new digital strategy, from this month, Arval will start fitting its own telematics black box to newly supplied vehicles. Fleets will not have to pay an increased lease rate for either the telematics hardware or for the basic level of functionality that it will offer. The new service will be called Arval Active Link.
Arval will, however, offer optional modules including journey monitoring, live route planning and pool car management.
The firm has opted to develop its own telematics system for two main reasons rather than rely on a third party or car makers' systems. It ensures all the cars it leases will use the same system - which is not the case even between different models from the same car brand - and also allows the lease firm to integrate the telematics information in with everything else it does.
Arval also claims that by rolling the telematics units out across all the cars it leases in Europe it can significantly cut the cost of running the system and also the cost to those fleets wishing to use the enhanced services.
The lease company says that it will charge £2.25 per car per month for the first level of Active Link, which it claims would costs fleets £10 per month per car from a dedicated telematics supplier.
Alongside, and taking information from, the Active Link telematics package Arval has also launched a new Fleet View fleet management system and a new Mobile+ app.
The app works on both Apple and Android operating systems and can be used by drivers to provide and receive information about their vehicle. Drivers can enter fuel information, and the app, together with the Active Link system, will also track journeys and work out which are business and which are personal. It also includes mapping, weather and contact information.
The new Fleet View system takes all the information gathered by the telematics system, app and any other information, such as fuel card data, and provides an operational fleet management system allowing fleet managers to take action.
