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Is your reputation at risk of breakdown?
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You would expect every journey undertaken for your organisation to have
a business justification. People have to travel from place to place and
materials and goods have to be delivered or collected. Timing is invariably
a critical factor:
− Meetings have to start on time.
− Processes depend upon availability of materials.
− Customers demand prompt delivery.
Vehicle reliability is critical to your business success: you can only afford
one vehicle breakdown en route to any customer. Anybody can suffer a
single problem; rightly or wrongly, more than one vehicle failure will be
interpreted as neglect and your reputation will suffer.
Most breakdowns are preventable. A planned service and maintenance
regime can not prevent a driver using the wrong fuel, but it can pre-empt
many commonplace problems. According to th
he most frequently
causes of breakdowns include:
− flat or faulty battery
− alternator faults
− starter motor problems
− clutch cables
− spark plugs
− HT leads
Ensuring that your own vehicles are correctly maintained is straightforward.
Applying the same discipline to ‘grey fleet’ vehicles used for your business
need not be problematic, especially if scheduling is automated.
Action point:
Insist upon checking every MOT certificate for every
vehicle driven on your behalf, taking note of any advisory
comments. Ensure that the annual re-test is booked well
in advance to prevent any gap between certificate expiry
and available test appointment. Be sure that you have
immediate access to any certificate in the event of any
queries following accidents or routine police checks.
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Best practice in fleet management - Issue 02
