Maintaining the condition of your fleet of vehicles is important, but so is your bottom line. For businesses that utilize a fleet of vehicles, these vehicles often account for a large chunk of monthly, quarterly or yearly expenses. Naturally, finding ways to reduce or minimize fleet expenses are always appreciated.
While there is no way to completely eliminate fleet expenses, there are several savvy actions and investments you can take to keep expenses at a minimum and save yourself from large expenses down the line.
Here are some places to focus your attention if you want to reduce fleet expenses.
Regular Maintenance
How can spending money save you money, you may ask? Performing regular and preventative maintenance keeps your vehicles running in good shape and also helps you stay on top of any larger issues that may arise. It is a comparably smaller investment that may very well save you from more expensive vehicle repairs and investments. Regular maintenance can also help decrease vehicle depreciation if you plan on selling your vehicle down the road.
Keep Tires Protected
If you want one of the easiest and most effective ways to minimize fleet expenses, look no further than your tires. Regularly check your tires to make sure they are properly inflated and their condition is acceptable for the road and you aren’t at risk of a blowout. Why? Properly inflated tires can actually help improve the fuel economy, helping you save on fill-ups at the gas station.
Cut Miles Traveled
A fleet of vehicles travels a lot of miles. That means extra miles on the odometer (increasing wear and tear on both the vehicle and its tires) and more stops at the gas station. Finding ways to minimize the miles your vehicles travel can pay off big time. One way to do so is investing in technology that can help you identify problems. GPS and tracking systems can help cut unnecessary travel by finding ideal routes your vehicles can take and creating mileage reports to help keep drivers aware of wasted travel.
Fleet Cards
To help save on fleet expenses, you can also consider investing in fleet cards to help reduce costs at an administrative level. Fleet or fuel cards can be issued to drivers to reduce time and administrative efforts to maintain internal reimbursement programs for fuel and maintenance expenses by having them buy with the fleet card rather than their own personal card. Reports can also help track expenses and give administration more control over monitoring.
Raben Tire can help keep your fleet rolling and perform maintenance necessary to help keep your fleet expenses down. We can provide on-site maintenance for mechanical and tire services.