Category: Fleet News

Drivers on UK roads are likely to have encountered a toll road at some point. In fact, there are 23 toll roads in the UK, and 18 of those are river crossing. This means that they are often unavoidable.

But why do we have toll roads in the first place, and why do drivers sometimes opt to use them despite the charges?

What is a toll road?

A toll road is a stretch of road that requires drivers to pay a fee for driving on it. The charge per use can vary from 40p to £6 depending on which toll road you are using, what vehicle you are driving and the time of day.

You will encounter toll roads across the UK, but Scotland abolished their toll roads in 2008, so Scottish drivers need not worry about having to pay to drive on their own roads.

To pay a toll, vehicles have to come to a stop at toll booths, or “plazas”. At the booth, drivers are able to pay the charge. They can use debit or credit card – often with contactless payment available. Mobile options such as Apple Pay are being accepted at more UK tolls nowadays, but not all.

Many toll roads are no longer accepting cash as payment, so drivers must ensure they have an accepted payment method ready before starting their journey.

In fact, holders of Shell fuel cards can now use their card to pay the M6 toll, which is one of the busiest, most used toll roads in the UK.

Benefits of toll roads

Given that most UK roads are free to use, you might be asking yourself why anyone would be inclined to use a road that requires a payment.

However, toll roads do have certain benefits that, for some, makes paying a fee worthwhile.

In theory, using toll roads will save time. This is great for businesses needing to deliver goods across the country in a hurry. It also means vehicles spend less time burning fuel. It could work out that paying for the toll is cheaper overall than continuously driving on another route and burning a few pounds worth of fuel.

When the M6 toll was in it’s infancy, it was estimated that drivers would save 45 minutes driving near Birmingham if they used the road. However, the amount of time saved is closer to 25 minutes when compared with the non-toll road. The original M6 is well known for build ups of traffic and long delays, however, so you can see why a business might want their vehicles using the toll.

The money from the tolls is used to maintain the rods themselves. This tends to mean that toll roads are very well maintained and smooth to drive on. Compared to a back road that may be covered in potholes that could damage your vehicle and its cargo, this makes a toll road seem like a desirable option.

Can UK toll roads be avoided?

For drivers who are adamant that they don’t want to pay the toll, there are often alternatives. The obvious example of this is the M6 toll, which can be avoided by continuing on the M6 when travelling through Birmingham.

However, the Mersey tunnel tolls near Liverpool are considered to be fairly unavoidable. Other tolls such as the Tyne tunnel are avoidable, but require fairly time consuming details.

As there is no set rule as to whether a toll road can be avoided, it is vital the you plan your routes beforehand. This is especially true if you are sending one of your drivers on a new, unfamiliar route.

Your satnav will probably direct you to a toll road as it is usually the fastest option. If you want to avoid them, make sure you adjust the settings on your satnav. Otherwise, you might find yourself approaching a toll road with no viable alternative.

Don’t let toll roads drain your finances

Sometimes, you can’t avoid going through a toll. For businesses, it might be the difference between getting a delivery to it’s destination on time.

However, this doesn’t mean you need to just sit and watch the money draining from your account. There are things fleet managers can do to negate the toll costs!

We mentioned a fuel card earlier, but they do a lot more than help drivers pay for toll roads! With the right fuel card, you can save up to 10p per litre on fuel. Consolidated HMRC approved invoices also mean you can save a great deal of time on admin too!

You can also improved MPG by 20% with a tracking system such as TeleGence! Consistent reporting and real-time tracking mean you can help to improve the way your drivers control your vehicles. Say goodbye to aggressive steering and braking!

Get in touch with Fuel Card Services today and see how we can help to save those precious pennies for your business!

The first congestion charge was introduced to London in 2003 by its first mayor, Ken Livingstone. It sought to charge drivers within a designated zone at a fixed daily rate for using the busy London streets between 7am and 6pm.

Since then, various UK cities have begun introducing congestion zones of their own, using the existing London model as a blueprint. For businesses operating within these zones, having a full understanding of what charges are likely to be incurred could be crucial to saving costs and making routes more efficient.

What’s more, congested traffic can prove to be a hindrance for fleets, even before additional charges are considered – as the time taken to complete journeys lengthens for each affected driver.

In this article, we’ll explain congestion charges using London as an example, before exploring the types of exemptions that may benefit of commercial fleet operators. We’ll also look at congestion more broadly, and suggest how commercial fleets could combat it.

What is a congestion charge?

When introduced, the congestion charge in London stood at around £5 per vehicle. It has increased considerably over the years to £15 in 2021, and is always visible on the Transport for London website.

The charge applies to any vehicle driving in the congestion zone between designed hours, which have also changed with time. As of 2021, the charge applies to drivers operating between 07:00-22:00 on any day – except from Christmas day.

The zone itself covers 3.8 million people. Naturally, many businesses operate in this area for a range of different purposes – from delivering commercial goods to local sellers, to providing food delivery and taxi services to residents – so this cost shouldn’t be taken lightly by fleet operators.

Congestion charges for fleets

If operators of commercial fleets plan to have their drivers operate within the congestion zone, one tip from us would be to consider exploring advance payments. That’s because failing to pay the congestion charge on the day it’s due can result in the daily fee increasing to £17.50; a slight increase that could have a significant impact for an SME that has many vehicles operating in the area.

Automatic payment options are available via the TfL website which could prove helpful, and there’s even an app that enables drivers to pay conveniently. Read more around payment.

Not all drivers have to pay the congestion charges, however. Let’s take a look at which exemptions apply.

Congestion charge exemptions

If you’re asking yourself ‘do I need to pay congestion charge?’ – or at least whether your drivers do, first read this list of exemptions, which apply if the vehicle in question is recorded at the DVLA as falling into one of the following categories:

• Two-wheeled motorbikes, sidecars, and mopeds. Particularly for last mile deliveries, commercial fleets may choose to use these vehicles within the congestion zone without running the risk of incurring additional daily charges.
• Taxis licensed by the London Taxi and Private Hire (TPH). Fleet operators that are actively registered with this taxi body are exempt from congestion charges, however this does not apply to private hire vehicles – although some may qualify for congestion charge discounts.

Fleet News reported that recent changes to congestion zone restrictions could cost commercial fleets up to £54m, and so first checking for exemptions, then calculating how the congestion charges impact the cost of your routes seems a sensible place to start for fleet managers. More broadly speaking, it’s also important to consider the impact congestion could have upon your delivery times – and the knock-on costs this may result in.

Why is congestion so costly to businesses?

Obviously, the more time your drivers spend on the road, the more productive your business will be. However, what happens to the productivity of your fleet when your drivers are stuck in congestion?

Unfortunately, the average delivery driver for example spends up to 16% of their drive time sat in congestion. Assuming your drivers are on the road for 8 hours a day, they’ll spend an entire 37 days a year sat in traffic. Your business is paying the drivers, but their productivity is being stunted by congestion.

With fuel costs rising steadily over the last few months, you want to make sure every penny of fuel is being utilised to its maximum potential. Sending drivers out on deliveries for them to be sat in traffic for almost a fifth of their entire day certainly isn’t making the most of your fuel.

What can be done to combat congestion?

The most obvious solution to avoid the worst congestion in the UK is to examine your route. Is there an alternative way your drivers could be going? A route that takes you around the edge of a city, for example, would of course take longer in terms of mileage, but would it actually save time by avoiding the heavy congestion? After all, you’ll burn more fuel stopping and starting your vehicle than moving continuously at a steady speed.

If you are caught in traffic, remember that gentle acceleration in the highest safe gear will keep your fuel consumption low – and it may be wise to remind your drivers of simple tips like these that can promote good fuel-economy.

Unfortunately, there sometimes isn’t too much you can do to avoid heavy traffic jams. If your route requires that you drive through an area prone to heavy congestion, could your route be driven at a different time? Driving outside of rush hour will of course reduce your chances of getting caught in heavy traffic.

Additionally, consider whether you could remove any unnecessary weight from your vehicle. The heavier your vehicle, the more fuel you will burn when stopping and starting in traffic. Remember that more fuel will be burned if you are using your car’s other systems such as air conditioning or heating. If you get stuck in traffic, open a window instead.

As a fleet manager, it’s wise to ensure your drivers are aware of these tips. They may also have handy tips of their own that you could share around by opening up an internal discussion on handling congestion.

Which UK cities have the worst congestion?

The amount of congestion that a city experiences is measured in a percentage. For example, if a journey should take 10 minutes (judging by the distance and speed limits) but the city in question has a congestion level of 50%, the journey is more likely to take 15 minutes to complete.

The five most congested cities in the UK are:

Edinburgh – 41%
(Global rank – 33)

London – 38%
(Global rank – 45)

Brighton & Hove – 35%
(Global rank – 63)

Bournemouth – 34%
(Global rank – 69)

Hull – 34%
(Global rank – 73)

Belfast, Southampton, Bristol, Manchester and Reading are also not far behind with congestion levels between 32% – 33%.

Hull, Brighton and Bournemouth being so high is particularly interesting. None of them are within the top 15 largest UK cities by population. London and Edinburgh being the two most congested cities is not so surprising on the other hand, since they are both capital cities of their respective countries.

How can Fuel Card Services help?

At Fuel Card Services, we specialise in helping businesses save money on their fuel costs. With a fuel card from our range of branded cards, you could be making a real impact to your bottom line for every mile driven by your team.

Additionally, it’s important that you’re able to properly track your driver’s routes, and plan routes efficiently. Our Tele-Gence technology can be used to empower your drivers with this information. Live traffic updates can notify them of long traffic queues, enabling them to steer clear, and you’ll be given updates on their driving habits to understand whether they’re burning unnecessary fuel.

Tele-Gence also syncs seamlessly with your fuel card account, making them the perfect pairing for keeping your fuel costs and consumption as low as possible. Get in touch today and see how we could help you.

The ultra-low emission zone (ULEZ) has continued to grow in recent years, and the initiative aims to bring cleaner air to millions of people living in and out of London. So, what is ULEZ and who does it affect?

What is ULEZ?

ULEZ stands for ‘ultra-low emission zone’ and has been in London has been in operation since 2019. It’s a legally binding initiative which dictates that drivers of vehicles emitting a certain level of pollution must pay a charge for driving in the area.

This charge is separate to the London Congestion Charge, and drivers operating with high emission within the ultra-low emission zone are likely to find themselves paying both daily charges.

What is ‘ULEZ compliant’?

Whether vehicles need to pay a charge depends on whether they meet certain emission standards, measured from Euro 1 to Euro 6. The charge particularly impacts older vehicles that have a high carbon impact – and the charge naturally applies to diesel and petrol engines rather than purely electric vehicles.

How much is the ULEZ charge?

For cars, motorcycles and vans that do not meet the emission standard, the daily charge for driving in this area is £12.50. Failure to pay the charge can result in a penalty as high as £180.

The daily charge for HGVs over 3.5 tonnes is much higher at £100. The penalty for lack of payment can be as high as £1,000.

This does mean that businesses operating in the ULEZ with HGVs are paying hefty charges to operate in this area, especially considering any additional costs put towards acquiring an HGV Safety Permit and complying with the Direct Vision Standard.

Which areas are now in the ULEZ?

In 2023, the ultra-low emission zone was expanded to cover all of London’s boroughs, including those in Outer London.

When first introduced in 2019, the ULEZ only covered central London, and then expanded to all areas within the North and South Circular roads in 2021.

Who is affected?

The ultra-low emission zone applies to drivers of most vehicles, including cars, motorcycles, and special vehicles (up to and including 3.5 tonnes) and minibuses (up to and including five tonnes) that don’t meet emissions standards.

However, according to the Department of Transport, as many as 12.7million of the 18.3million petrol cars on the road at the time ULEZ was introduced were already compliant.

Previously there was a 100% discount in place for residents of the Congestion Charge area, but this discount has now ended, and residents will now also have to pay the £12.50.

Ultra Low Emission Zone exemptions

Drivers of EVs will of course be exempt from any charges. They do not emit harmful greenhouse gases, and therefore do not contribute to the problem that the ULEZ is hoping to tackle.

Most petrol cars and newer diesel cars are also safe from the charge. As a rule, if your diesel car was first registered after September 2015, it is likely to be compliant with the emissions standards. The same goes for petrol cars registered from 2005 onwards.

However, it is estimated that about one in five cars will need to pay. 100,000 cars, 35,000 vans and 3,000 lorries are expected to be affected and subject to the charges.

To be exempt from the charges, your vehicle must not exceed a certain level of nitrogen dioxide emissions. Nitrogen dioxide is a harmful gas that damages lungs and makes life harder for sufferers of asthma and lung and heart disease.

What are the benefits of expanding the zone?

The expected result of the expansion is that people will find alternative methods of travel. Instead of driving, they might opt for public transport or simply to walk or cycle.

As a result, Mayor of London Sadiq Khan states that the city will reduce the amount of carbon being emitted. He explained in 2023 that there are 4,000 premature deaths per year in London linked directly to air pollution.

Given that 60% of residents of this area don’t even own a car, the mayor claims it is fair that the air quality of this area is improved. Whilst the environmental benefits are obvious, Khan suggests that this is “an issue of social justice”, as it is the poorest of Londoners who suffer the most because of toxic air conditions.

The continued expansion of the zone has been met with some criticism, however, mainly due to timing. With many businesses still recovering from the pandemic, their finances may take additional hits due to these new rules. Paying the charge for each of their vehicles every day may prove difficult.

Will your business be impacted by the ULEZ expansion?

If your business operates within the expanded zone, you may find yourself paying the charges if your vehicles are not compliant.

In this case, it’s important to consider what else you can do to save money.

Fuel Card Services is on hand to help any business that aims to transition to electric vehicles to reduce their emissions. We’ve got a selection of EV Charge Cards, and our EV Solutions can help businesses install charging infrastructure in homes and workplaces.

To further reduce costs, we offer a comprehensive suite of commercial fleet services that are designed to save your business time and money through becoming more efficient and cost-effective.

If you think your fleet could be doing more to save on costs, get in touch with our dedicated team today.

The UK is in the midst of a HGV driver shortage which is having a severe impact on a number of different industries. From insufficient delivery services to supply chain disruption, the whole economy could suffer from a lack of drivers – meaning it is more important than ever that fleet operators remain competitive and able to attract new drivers.

We have covered why the shortage of HGV drivers might be happening in a previous article, so let’s now take a look at what practical steps fleet operators can take to navigate these challenges.

How to attract HGV drivers

There are many different elements to consider in the process of attracting new drivers. Here are our tips:

1. Update your website

It’s important to consider how an aspiring or experienced driver perceives your company. Consequently, you should be looking to take every step possible to ensure they have a positive experience when exposed to the most important channel you have – your website.

It could be wise to dedicate a page on your website to explaining exactly what support you offer both to new and existing drivers. Give them a flavour of what it is like to be a driver within your fleet, showcase the unique benefits you offer to employees, and underline this with the values you teach your managers and leaders – and you could find drivers aligning quickly with your company.

2. Use positive reviews as much as possible

Word of mouth is a fantastic way of expanding your workforce, however it sadly isn’t practical to use this as a mass recruitment tool. The next best thing, then, is likely acquiring written reviews via a popular and trusted reviews platform.

For example, Trustpilot, Google Reviews, and Glass Door are all highly reputable platforms that enable current and previous employees to leave honest reviews of your business. You should always work toward improving the experience of your current driver-base to influence these reviews, but it’s also worth taking this one step further by showcasing these reviews properly.

You could look to use the built-in sharing functionality within these platforms to share reviews via your social media channels, incorporate them into your email marketing, and even feature them on jobs boards alongside your listings. Speaking of which, perhaps our most important tip is to:

3. Create good advertisements

Ask yourself, where are potential drivers likely to spend time during their job search – and what material of yours will they be exposed to while doing so?

Realistically, jobs boards are perhaps the best way of reaching a large number of candidates without requiring too much effort. It’s essential that you put time into meticulously crafting a good advertisement that sells the benefits of your company in a concise way.

To help position yourself to create the perfect listing, it’s also worth reviewing competitor activity to see what kind of messaging they’re putting out into the world.

4. Consult hiring experts if necessary

While it’s often cheaper to manually handle your business’ recruitment drive and to keep that process solely in-house, you may not always get the exact results you’re looking for. In this instance, it could be wise to talk to recruitment agencies who specialise in the haulage sector to see whether you can strike a mutually beneficial arrangement that solves your driver needs and proves profitable for the agency.

How to retain HGV drivers

Equally as important as attracting new drivers is retaining the loyal employees that currently work for you. It can be disheartening for existing employees to see new job offers being posted by your company that feature attractive joining offers and benefits that they themselves do not have access to.

A balanced approach, then, should split attention between recruitment and retention in a measured way. As we’ve mentioned, retention initiatives can in of themselves serve as a recruitment tool, if HGV drivers decide to share positive reviews of your business within their own social networks to help you bring new people on board.

Some retention tools you could consider rolling out include:

• Increasing wages to reflect your business’ growth. This is absolutely key to remaining competitive in a marketplace whereby virtually all businesses are struggling to recruit HGV drivers.
• Giving your employees a voice. Running regular feedback sessions, planning one-on-one meetings with your drivers and their managers from time to time, and showing that you’re not only listening to but acting on the concerns raised by your drivers is a great way of helping your employees feel connected and respected.
• Define your culture from the top down. Building an inclusive, welcoming, and progressive culture in your business could see employees feeling like they’re truly part of a community – rather than feeling that they’re simply selling their time for money to your organisation. This culture is often the cornerstone of your business’ reputation, and so investing time into working with senior management to define what you want your company to represent could prove beneficial.
• Credit and reward your employees fairly. If some of your drivers put in significantly more effort than others; enhancing the customer experience, proving flexible, and going above and beyond to support the team – does your business have a process in place for flagging this positive behaviour and rewarding those responsible? Putting a proper rewards scheme in place that incentivises good work and team building could positively impact your workforce.

Where do I start with reviewing my business’ recruitment and retention processes?

Ultimately, there are three key areas to consider improving when looking to positively impact retention and recruitment:

1. Your business – including your website, company values, mission statement, and offering.
2. Your messaging – reviewing all messaging across recruitment platforms, jobs boards, social media, and even the internal communications you share with your staff can yield opportunities to improve.
3. Your current and prospective employees – what do they want to see from your company? Are you taking the time to conduct the right market research, fully understand their needs, and then tailor your job offerings to tick the right boxes for these employees? Doing so may help you edge out over your competition.

While there’s no one solution that works for all fleets, we hope the tips we’ve shared today help you to attract and retain HGV drivers moving forward, no matter how difficult it may seem.

How can Fuel Card Services help?

At Fuel Card Services, we know how important it is to put the right technology in place that makes your drivers feel safe and supported. That’s why we have developed a range of professional fleet services that are designed to do everything from automatically record mileage, to facilitate servicing and maintenance – and even help your drivers find their nearest fuel pumps.

If you think our range of fleet services could benefit your operation, why not get in touch with our experts to find out how we can support you?

While there’s currently no global standard speed limit that all countries and organisations can agree on, it’s clear that speed limits exist to minimise the potential danger to life posed by high-speed driving.

What, though, is the best way to go about ensuring speed limits are enforced? Should we trust each individual to abide by the laws of their own accord, or should we be aiming to force people to comply with speed limits through our design of vehicle technology?

This question remains unanswered, however one potential solution has surfaced which, if introduced, is likely to have a serious impact for all drivers in the UK and Europe.

What is a vehicle speed limiter?

That proposed solution is vehicle speed limiters, which utilise ‘Intelligent Speed Assistance’ (or ISA) to slow drivers down. This technology comes in two main strands:

• Nagging limiters – which literally slow your vehicle down and reduce your ability to accelerate once sensors have detected that you’re driving over the legal limit.
• Warning systems – which set of a series of warning sounds and visual alerts once a driver has exceeded the speed limit.

The EU is the driving force behind introducing ISA legislation which will legally require that all new cars manufactured from 2022 include some level of vehicle speed limiter technology built in, the European Transport Safety Council announcement suggests. While the UK has departed from the EU via Brexit, there’s a strong indication that we’re likely to mirror any legislation that’s introduced very closely.

Are vehicle speed limiters definitely coming into place?

With that in mind, there can’t be any guarantees as to whether the legislation will come into place, or exactly what it will entail, just yet. We do know that there’s a demand for this legislation, as many speculate that it could assist with the introduction of self-driving cars to UK roads by giving reassurance to road users while improving safety standards.

However, agreeing on the exact terms of the legislation is proving to be problematic. Perhaps the main reason for this is that vehicle speed limiters aren’t 100% effective. With warning systems, for example, drivers will undoubtedly become annoyed by repeated audio and visual alerts – but this simply might just not translate into them actually slowing down.

What’s more, even in the case of nagging limiters, the proposed legislation indicates only that new vehicles must be manufactured with this technology in place, not that it must actively be used on the roads. Drivers would therefore be able to legally disable a nagging or warning limiter system and face no persecution, which means many drivers may still end up speeding and potentially putting lives at risk.

A decision yet to be made

It’s worth noting that the vast majority of UK car manufacturing and driving legislation is an imitation of EU legislation, which is desirable for companies trading in both economic areas given it reduces complexity in the manufacturing and distribution process. Therefore, it’s likely that we’ll abide by this new law.

However, as the legislation requires the visual warning to be placed in the direct field of vision of the driver, some electric vehicle manufacturers such as Tesla are not happy with this, as they would have to change their vehicles’ display.

ISA has many benefits, such as the improvement of fuel efficiency and CO2 emissions, detecting pedestrians, cyclists, and vulnerable users – ultimately making all road users safer.

However, there are still some limitations to the system, such as detecting speed. Temporary road works and out of date GPS mapping can show inaccurate speed signs, increasing chances of surpassing the legal speed limit.

Additionally, the European Transport Safety Council (ETSC) has said that even after the introduction of the system, drivers will still be held responsible. So, if the system detects lower/higher speed limit than allowed and drivers override it – they will be issued speeding tickets.

What does this news mean for commercial fleets?

If the legislation is introduced in the UK, it could have a real-world impact for fleet operators. One potentially negative impact is that the requirements for new vehicles may change, meaning operators around the country would have to ensure that any new lorries or cars purchased come with speed limiter software built in.

This would mean higher expenses, which could be a challenge at a time when fleet operators are already facing a lot of costs such as rising fuel costs due to shortages.

On the positive side though, abiding to the legal speed limits would result in a decrease in speeding tickets, less risk to drivers and less likelihood of incidents if the technology proves effective. All of this could result in less downtime for your fleet, meaning you could maximise your vehicle usage and focus on generating revenue.

We hope this blog has been useful in informing you about speed limiters, what they mean for fleet vehicles and how they’ll help fleet managers and drivers stay safe.

How can Fuel Card Services help?

At Fuel Card Services, we know how important it is to track the performance of your fleet, both to improve driver safety and vehicle security. That’s why we have developed Tele-Gence, our advanced telematics system which enables you to install a range of cameras and trackers on your vehicles before remotely feeding data through to your team; enabling you to get a fuller picture of your operation and spot cost-saving opportunities.

The automated reported system included in our Tele-Gence service can help you flag when your fleet vehicles are being used for fraudulent purposes, monitor dangerous speeding, and gain insights into how improved driver behaviour generates sales. Every good fleet operation could benefit from an advanced telematics system, so why not not get in touch with our experts to find out how we can support you?