Technological and legislative developments are changing and challenging traditional roles
With ever-increasing cost pressures and legislative and technological developments, the conventional model of fleet management has changed over the recent past.
Coupled with these new changes, the responsibilities of fleet managers have expanded beyond traditional realms of corporate objectives, fleet size, nature of operation and geographical spread.
TomTom Telematics’ Australia and New Zealand sales manager Christopher Chisman-Duffy says the role of fleet managers has become increasingly demanding, strategic and integral to the company’s wider performance.
He highlights five key areas that will continue to impact fleet managers – digital transformation, reducing costs, duty of care, green fleet, and business mobility.
“Unprecedented growth in technological development over past years has resulted in big changes in how businesses operate, monitor and control their company vehicles,” he says.
“Telematics, as an example, delivers a wealth of fleet data, enabling managers and drivers to optimise efficiency and performance.”
Fleet managers must utilise the tools at their disposal and harness the fleet data generated to improve companywide performance, he says.
Reducing costs is one of the key responsibilities of fleet managers and they must carry out fleet data analysis to review all the factors that affect the company’s finance.
“After payroll, fleet costs are often the biggest expense for businesses.
“Fleet data analysis has emerged as the result of a closer relationship between finance and fleet management – incorporating purchasing models, cost-benefit analysis, risk profiling and whole life costs – factors key to the business bottom line.”
Another important duty is to devise and implement road safety measures using new fleet management systems .
“The advent of fleet management solutions has meant that all necessary data can be relayed from mobile workers and their vehicles to back office PCs.
“This data can be systematically logged, electronically, with management reports automatically generated.
“Notifications can even be triggered to remind managers when a vehicle needs to be serviced.”
With more and more businesses keen on becoming more sustainable and efficient, it is the job of fleet managers to procure low emission vehicles with lower company car tax and fuel saving technology.
“The strong business case for green fleet management has resulted in fleet managers procuring low emission vehicles with lower company car tax and incorporating innovative fuel saving technology, which can also reduce road risk and vehicle maintenance costs.”
Today, fleet managers are also responsible for not only company vehicle fleet but also other means of employee travel taking account of factors such as accommodation, parking and taxi fares, he says.
“With so many synergies between fleet and travel, an amalgamation of roles under the umbrella of mobility is inevitable in many quarters.”
Christopher Chisman-Duffy is the Australia and New Zealand sales manager for TomTom Telematics.
E: sales-au.business@tomtom.com
T: +61 (0) 2 8023 8554
Check out the full feature in the July issue of ATN.