Housing association LiveWest has chosen Fleet Service Great Britain for a sole supply outsourcing contract covering its 325-vehicle van fleet
The fast-growing housing association, based in Exeter, has around 36,000 homes and operates a fleet of 325 diesel vans, acquired via outright purchase and run on a five-year/100,000-mile replacement cycle.
The two-year fleet management contract, with a one-year option, was awarded following a tender as well as nine-month pilot scheme involving 40 vans located at LiveWest’s Taunton depot. The deal places significant focus on Fleet Service GB’s Achieve-branded programme of services including Achieve Driver Management, Achieve Crash Management, Achieve Maintenance Management, Achieve Fleet Manager, Achieve Management Services, as well as its garage network, Achieve Fleet Service Partnership,.
Within an unprecedented four weeks of the contract going live, all drivers – the housing association operates on a ‘one van, one employee’ basis – had enrolled on the Achieve Driver Management programme that pro-actively measures a driver’s performance and awards points against a wide range of parameters including points on driving licences and number and type of crashes.
The driver app was pre-loaded on to each driver’s tablet to make enrolment straightforward. It embraces a wide range of features including notifications, prompts, reminders and alerts; the ability to arrange bookings for servicing, maintenance and repairs, including tyres; a facility to report an incident or breakdown; a facility to upload images, capturing incident and/or vehicle condition; and the ability to update vehicle mileage in real-time. Additionally, LiveWest’s bespoke check sheet for vehicle condition reporting was uploaded.
Paul Ayris, LiveWest’s fleet manager, said: “The transparency of the Achieve Driver Management programme means that points gained by a driver for a misdemeanour can be removed by completing e-learner programmes. Drivers are rewarded for good performance under the initiative, which is very well accepted by drivers.”
He added: “Some of our employees spend up to 25% of their working day driving because of the size of the area that LiveWest covers, but they are not professional drivers. However, they now recognise that driving is a major and potentially risky part of their job and accept that it is important for the business to implement processes to manage that risk.”
All LiveWest vans are equipped with telematics and the next stage of the programme will see data collected via the in-vehicle devices fed into the Achieve Driver Management programme to further improve vehicle and driver performance management.
Ayris added: “The business partnership between LiveWest and Fleet Service GB has started very well and builds on a successful pilot. The new initiatives that have been introduced have been well received across the business – by management and drivers.”
