Fleet costs spiral amidst fuel shortage

Fuel shortages in recent weeks have caused a rapid loss of control over fleet running costs.

This is according to FleetCheck, a fleet management software company, which said the rising costs were a result of company car and van drivers being forced to buy fuel where they could get it at whatever prices were being asked.

Peter Golding, managing director, said: “Petrol and diesel prices had already been rising rapidly before the onset of the fuel crisis and, since then, have only increased further. There have been some reports that prices are at an eight-year high.

“Most well-managed fleets have fuel policies that are designed to minimise costs, for example by specifying certain types of outlet or using a fuel card, but those measures have very much gone out of the window and there has been a rapid loss of control.

“We can see, for example, that company car and van drivers at some of our software users have been buying fuel from motorway services, which would generally be almost unknown. Presumably, they’ve been unable to get petrol and diesel anywhere else.

“It’s probably not an exaggeration to say that some fleets will have seen their pence per mile fuel costs increase by a 25% over the last year.”