17 minute read
Seminar for Fleet Managers
Interactive Fleet Management’s seminar offers advice to fleet managers
Diesels sales down as CO2 goes up!
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The team from Interactive Fleet Management put on a seminar in January, with fleet decision-makers hearing about a wide range of topics throughout the day.
Hosted by Volvo at its training centre in Daventry, the day was a huge success with experts from Interactive Fleet Management, and its supplier network, talking about green issues, driver profiling and training, accident management, WLTP, taxation, fuel management, and maintenance management, plus a presentation by our hosts on the latest Volvo range.
A big thank you to everyone who attended, and to register for future events please email editor@grosvenor-magazine.co.uk.
Members of the Interactive Fleet Management team pose for a photo at the seminar.
The Society of Motor manufacturers and Traders (SMMT) has reported a 0.8% increase in CO2, to 121 grams per kilometre. This is the first rise since the SMMT began reporting levels in 2000.
The reason behind the increase may surprise many who have been promoting dirty diesels, because its largely down to drivers shunning diesel cars due to bad publicity.
Diesels typically emit up to 20% less CO2 than petrol cars and are more fuel-efficient.
As well as slowing diesel sales, the SMMT said the popularity of SUVs contributed to the rise. SUVs produce about a quarter more CO2 than the smallest vehicles.
Despite the small increase in carbon emissions last year, new cars now produce a third less CO2 in total than they did in 2000.
Clean air zones – what is the latest?
A clean air zone (CAZ) is defined as an area where targeted action is being taken to improve air quality. It can be confined to a single road or part of a city and can include an area where vehicles are charged or fined for entering.
Most diesel drivers will have to pay £12.50 to drive into the centre of London from this April, and Birmingham, Derby and Newcastle are planning their own schemes to target older, more polluting cars. Number plate recognition cameras will ensure that fees are paid, with the threat of £120 fines if drivers fail to do so.
Diesel owners will be worst-affected, as most diesel cars sold before September 2015 don’t meet the latest emissions standard, known as Euro 6, making them subject to the charges. These account for around 9.5 million of the 12.9 million diesel cars on British roads.
The majority of diesel vans sold before September 2016 will need to pay too. Petrol models built since 2006 will be unaffected, as these are cleaner than older diesels, along with all electric cars and most hybrids.
Need further advice or have a question to ask? Mark Gallagher, the Grosvenor Group’s green fleet specialist, can be contacted on 01536 536 536 or via email
mark.gallagher@grosvenor-leasing.co.uk
RDE2: Real Driving Emissions Step 2
No, it’s not a robot in the Star Wars Movies! RDE2 stands for Real Driving Emissions Step 2, which imposes stricter limits for toxic compounds in exhaust fumes.
The measure was announced in the November 2017 budget when the Chancellor declared that any new diesel cars registered from 1 April 2018 that do not meet the standard will move into a higher road tax band, attracting a 4% diesel surcharge in the vehicle’s first year.
Anyone choosing a new diesel car is likely to have to pay more because new cars won’t have to meet the standard until January 2020 at the earliest, so most manufacturers have not yet introduced compliant cars.
Currently, only the Mercedes A 220 d and B 200 d have been officially tested and approved under the regulations. Jaguar has confirmed that the XF range will feature RDE2 approved engines by the end of the year.
Croyland Car Megastore Donates Cash to Help Local Pupils
Hundreds of Northamptonshire schoolchildren are set to benefit from a £1,000 donation from Croyland Car Megastore made to the Rotary Club of Rushden.
Mark Swindells, general manager at Croyland Car Megastore, officially presented the cash windfall to the local rotary club, which is one of the longest established in the UK.
Rotary Club of Rushden treasurer, Mark Darnell and president, Ian Smith, visited the Rushden dealership where they were officially presented with the £1,000 cheque by Croyland’s Mark Swindells and James Wigglesworth from Enterprise Rent-A-Car, who were also involved with the charity collaboration.
FEATURE
DRIVING FOR GREATER WELLBEING IN THE WORKPLACE
Businesses are increasingly recognising the link between company performance and staff that are healthy, motivated, focused and feel valued.
According to mental health charity, Mind, research consistently shows that when employees feel their work is meaningful and they are valued and supported, they tend to have higher wellbeing levels, be more committed to the organisation’s goals and, importantly, they perform better too. This strong relationship between levels of staff wellbeing, motivation and business performance is often called ‘employee engagement’.
Research shows that FTSE 100 companies that prioritise employee wellbeing outperform the rest of the FTSE 100 by 10 per cent. By supporting staff wellbeing, they reap the benefits through enhanced morale, loyalty, commitment, innovation, productivity and profitability.
Wellbeing and driving at work
When we talk about the workplace, of course, this extends to company vehicles. For many field-based staff, whether they are on the sales team, are field engineers, care workers or delivery drivers, their vehicle is part of their workplace and is where they spend most of their time.
Unsurprisingly, many drivers suffer different forms of stress compared to office-based staff. Examples being, getting from one appointment to another with little time to spare, having to grab food on the go, sitting in endless traffic jams, getting up earlier than others to make it to meetings and getting home later in the evenings. It can also be a lonely existence on the road. Being a lone worker means less bonding with work colleagues and teams, time away from family, missing important events, and the choice between driving more miles and doing longer hours or staying away in faceless hotels.
From a manager’s perspective, field-based staff aren’t visible (making them harder to supervise), more difficult to manage on their outcomes, and they have to be trusted to be filling their time productively. Yet, by adding tracking mechanisms can feel a bit ‘big brother’ and, in some businesses, has been met with resistance.
Employee engagement and discretionary effort
So how do you overcome this? - ensuring that field-based workers in company vehicles feel as much a part of the workplace as everyone else. And how do you maximise their level of engagement and encourage optimum discretionary effort when no-one is watching?
According to Gartner, the world’s leading research and advisory company, highly engaged employees work 50% harder and are 9 times less likely to leave a company. Their research also reveals that 70% of business leaders believe engagement is critical to achieving objectives.
With this being so essential, it’s important that field-based workers are not left feeling forgotten, making your company drivers a key area for applying engagement techniques.
HERE ARE 5 FAVOURITES FROM THE GROSVENOR GROUP
1. A company car is for work and leisure
When setting the company car choice list, offer some flexibility so that drivers can match the vehicle to their lifestyle as well as their work. Your sales manager may be a dog lover (and want an estate), your HR director’s children may have flown the nest and she’s now ready for something more sporty, and your head of finance may be a mountain biker and would prefer an off roader. If the policy is too restricted, you may offer them a car that’s suitable for their job but not their pastimes. Remember that behind every member of staff is a person!
2. Avoid a ‘them and us’ culture
This can emerge in a number of ways. For example, office staff feeling that they are more part of the company than field-based staff, because they are more visible and have physical desks and areas they can make their own. Or, on the flipside, sales managers making their sales team feel like the A team. i.e. the team that brings in the business and so everyone should support their every whim.
Good line management will avoid this, particularly if the manager oversees a team covering both field and office-based personnel, creating a mutual respect for one another. Joint events, meetings and flexible work space in the office are also important - so that when people come in, they feel welcome, part of the team and not an interference.
3. Use pulse and engagement surveys
These can track morale and allow early intervention. By asking for regular feedback (anonymously if necessary) can help identify issues that can either cause a ‘them and us’ culture to grow or highlight a drop in engagement levels. For example, a company car driver commenting that they don’t feel welcome in the office, or office staff feeling that field-based staff don’t understand their work pressures.
4. Encourage timely intervention
There’s a danger with remote workers that you wait until they are in the office before giving feedback. It means either criticism or praise isn’t given ‘in the moment’. As a result, those ‘out on the road’ are left in a vacuum of having very little feedback, but are then hit with everything when they come in. This isn’t just from their line manager but other team members too who say, “I’ll talk to her about that problem when I see her” or “We’ll celebrate that client win when they’re next in.” For the field worker, that means they either feel unappreciated, lonely and not involved, or know that coming into the office could be a negative experience riddled with problems.
5. Lead by example
Senior leaders and managers should be role models for healthier work habits and encourage staff by example. For example, don’t send emails late at night to field based staff on the basis that their admin time is limited to evenings and weekends. Talk to them about scheduling in desk time. Also, if you know they are on their way to see a customer, don’t phone them knowing that they will be driving.
Also, appreciate that many company car and van drivers make very early starts and can finish work later than those in the office. If they want to see their son or daughter in the school sports day, tell them to be proud and honest about what they are doing rather than letting them try and hide behind a made up appointment. If they feel valued in this way they will be much happier driving to those early meetings before their office colleagues have even got into work.
Finally, according to guidelines by the mental health charity, Mind, in the short term long hours might seem manageable. But sustained pressure and a poor work/ life balance can quickly lead to stress and burnout, reducing levels of employee productivity, performance, creativity and morale. This can be avoided by encouraging staff to:
• Work sensible hours • Take full lunch breaks • Rest and recuperate after busy periods • Avoid working at weekends – especially from home • Take their full annual leave entitlement • Encourage regular exercise
As a result, employers benefit from increased morale, commitment and productivity and reduced sickness absence, and employees are able to fit their lives around their work, helping them balance busy lives while remaining healthy and focused.
FEATURE
BUSINESS TRAVEL TO DROP BY 25% IN THE NEXT 5 YEARS
Grosvenor recently invested in state of the art video conferencing technology in its main meeting room, in order to reduce its impact on the environment through unnecessary driving, and become more efficient with its time.
It comes at a time when the UK could see a 25% reduction in both business travel and commuting with companies looking to drive down the cost of travel, reduce their green footprint, and minimise the negative impact travel has on staff productivity.
According to ‘The British Business and Mobility Study’ by Sewells:
66% of business have set targets to reduce their volume of internal travel. 60% of businesses have targets to cut trips to suppliers.
66% of businesses have targets to lower the number of journeys to clients.
65% of businesses consider video conferencing as a viable alternative to business travel.
With online meetings, screen sharing and the rise of remote support and diagnostics, the need for travel to external meetings or to meet customers and suppliers is set to drop.
The survey showed that 48% of fleets with more than 250 cars, and 56% of fleets with between 101 to 250 cars, believe a 25% reduction in business travel is achievable within five years.
Mobility as a Service (MaaS)
The findings of the Sewells survey are interesting when you look at the growing interest in Mobility as a Service (MaaS) - a new way of thinking about transport. MaaS has the potential to be the most significant modernisation of how we get from A to B since the automobile was first introduced.
Bringing about a major change in how we view our cars, and how we choose to travel, MaaS combines mobility services from public transport, taxis, car rental and car/bicycle sharing under a single platform - all accessed through your smart phone.
Simply by stating where you are going ‘from’ and ‘to’, the MaaS platform will plan your journey, define the forms of transport to get there and allow you to buy tickets from a range of service providers.
But what’s driving change?
55% of the global population are living in urban areas and by 2050 projections suggest it could reach 68%. Air quality and congestion measures will continue to discourage drivers from using their vehicles in urban areas, while the technology to help make choices about how to travel is coming together rapidly.
MaaS could therefore help reduce pollution, shorten commuting times and make travelling more convenient. It could help shift commuter trips from peak times to low demand times (through demand-responsive pricing of services).
Projections suggest the estimated value of the MaaS market could reach $US600 billion in the United States, European Union and China by 2025. Others have projected that the global market for MaaS will exceed $US1 trillion by 2030.
Interestingly, the Sewells British Business and Mobility Study found that the early adopters of MaaS solutions are more likely to be commuters than drivers who rely on a company vehicle for business journeys.
This is based on a rising tide of pressure on commuting due to wasted time in congestion, a shortage of workplace parking spaces and an anticipated lack of office space encouraging more working from home and hot desking.
The British Business and Mobility Study found:
58% of companies have taken steps, or plan to take steps, to reduce commuting to the workplace.
67% of businesses now see working from home as a viable alternative to the workplace, and 43% of businesses actively encourage it.
69% of large corporates want to see fewer staff commuting to the workplace.
61% of businesses have set a specific target to reduce the commuter journeys.
24% of large corporate businesses and 20% of small businesses anticipate a shortage of parking spaces within the next five years.
Encouraging employees to share lifts for the journey to work and for joint journeys to visit clients is the primary solution to reduce car use, according to the report.
Andy Reed, operations director at Interactive Fleet Management said, “As a specialist fleet management provider, our remit moves with the times and we’re keeping an ever-watchful eye on the MaaS market.
“Companies will always need to get people from A to B, however with MaaS, self-driving vehicles and our ‘connected’ world growing at an incredible pace, we are heading towards offering a mobility solutions service model in the future rather than one that purely focuses on vehicle, driver and supplier management.”
Andy Reed Operations Director Interactive Fleet Management
55%
55% of the global population are living in urban areas and by 2050 projections suggest it could reach 68%.
FEATURE
OUT WITH THE OLD AND IN WITH THE NEW
How technology is changing the face of fleet
Just over 10 years ago the first smart phone was launched.
Back then no-one could have imagined that today’s drivers of cars and light commercial vehicles would be reporting mileage updates, booking services and notifying breakdowns simply by touching their mobile phone screen.
Yet here we are in 2019, and not only has Grosvenor been awarded best fleet management system in the 2018 BusinessCar techie awards, the company’s software and I.T team is now an integral part of its overall proposition.
All drivers of vehicles leased and managed by Grosvenor Leasing and Interactive Fleet Management have access to a free App, and according to Geoff Hall, Grosvenor’s senior software developer, the team is ready to take on the biggest challenge of all.
The millennials!
“By 2025, millennials will make up 75% of the workforce,” said Geoff. “This is the generation that has grown up with the Internet, mobile phones and cable TV, and have never known a life without instant technology.
“This is a generation that finds email quite old fashioned, expecting instant messaging instead. They also expect technology to do far more for them and are intolerant when it doesn’t.
“As developers, we must cater for their needs – and this relates to millennials who are managing fleets, and those that are driving the cars and vans we lease and manage.
2025
By 2025, millennials will make up 75% of the workforce. This is the generation that has grown up with the Internet, mobile phones and cable TV, and have never known a life without instant technology.
“For a start, they are tech-dependent. For them, technology is an integrated part of their everyday life. It means they no longer ask for sufficient technology to do their job - they expect it.
“When the older generation within the UK workforce grew up, there was a sense of wonder with technology. In other words, ‘wow – can the system actually do that for me with regards to my vehicle fleet’. Now, its more a case of, ‘that’s fine, but why can’t it do this – because that’s what I need it to do.’
“Some of the older generation are looking down at the millennials, classing this level of expectancy negatively, as if it’s entitlement, having been spoilt by gadgetry in their youth. “But what millennial workers really want are the tools they need to do their job efficiently.”
By employing its own team of software and App developers, The Grosvenor Group can control the technology to suit the contract hire and fleet management services it provides, and also be more adaptable by not relying on third party systems that are inflexible and costly to tailor.
“The tech-dependent generation will soon represent more than half of the global workforce,” said Geoff. “This is why companies are seeking ever more cutting edge tools to help them manage their fleets and we aim to be at the forefront of that technological breakthrough.
“Research shows that millennials crave feedback and communication, with immediate response time of text messages, instant messengers and group chat applications now becoming as important at work as in people’s personal lives.
“And with connected vehicles adding to the mix, it means we have to listen to the needs of this generation and develop fleet software based on their expectation of what ‘must be in place’, rather than what used to be a ‘nice to have’.”
To see OSCAR365 and Grosvenor’s technology and driver App, please email editor@grosvenor-magazine. co.uk and ask for a member of our team to contact you. Or call us on 01536 536 536.
