9 Secrets Series: Don't accept bad habits

As a fleet owner, your day-to-day costs can quickly add up. Particularly when hidden and unnecessary costs are hurting your bottom line.

The amount of fuel wasted, how efficiently your staff drive, overpaying wages and how you keep track of it all, can make a huge difference when it comes to your ongoing expenses.

When you’re incredibly busy with on-site jobs and managing other areas of your business, it can be hard to identify what things aren’t as cost effective as they could be.

This series of blogs will look at how you can get a grip on such expenses and highlights nine surprising ways to lower your operating costs that you may not have even considered.

Secret 4: Bad driving habits cost more than just money

Do you know how well (or how poorly) your individual drivers perform on the roads? Idling is not the only bad habit that will keep your fuel bills high either. Speeding and sharp acceleration all take their toll as well, all while adding to the significant wear and tear of your vehicles.

Think about this… The company vehicle is parked on the kerb. During your employee’s one-hour lunch break, he sits in the company vehicle and eats his lunch. The engine is running. The radio is playing. The air-con is on full blast. Your fuel is being wasted on needless idling.

But bad habits go further than simply draining the fuel a little quicker, or you having to replace the tires a little sooner.

Driving is a very visible activity. On the last UK Government tally there were 37.5 million vehicles registered for use in Great Britain*. That’s a lot of potential eyes out there that could see one of the vehicles in your fleet each day. If that vehicle is driving erratically, possibly even dangerously, there is another cost that is often overlooked by the finance department, and that is one of reputation.

Businesses of all sizes spend considerable amounts of money building and maintaining a brand image. Customer service is often placed as the number one priority for any business, as a happy customer equals positive brand association. This can be undone rapidly if one of your vehicles, emblazoned with your logo is seen speeding through a residential area, overtaking dangerously on a motorway or screeching to a halt at every junction. Word of mouth is a powerful ally to a business, but it can equally be an unwanted enemy.

Ensure bad habits are not costing your business more than simply lost fuel. GPS vehicle tracking can help to coach those who commonly display undesirable habits, such as idling, speeding, harsh acceleration and breaking. These all add to the physical cost of running your vehicles, but more damaging than that is the potential cost to your company's reputation.

You can read the rest of our 9 Secrets in our eBook. 

*https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/vehicle-licensing-statistics-january-to-march-2017