Cost saving is still very much on the menu for fleet managers this year as businesses look to save costs from every conceivable angle. As such, Interactive Fleet Management kicked off 2012 with a management seminar inviting managers from fleet services and those within their organisations who actually make the key decisions in an attempt to prove to them that savings of 12% are achievable with a combination of technology, planning and the right resources.

Ran as a workshop to provide a hands on session in Surrey’s Mercedes Benz World the select group focused on a broad range of cost saving techniques to assess their suitability for their organisations to see if they were compatible with their existing framework.

There is still room for improvement across much of the UK business sector when it comes to fleet management. Many of the huge conglomerates have their fingers on the pulse of their logistics network but, below that level a company’s light commercial vehicle fleet is still budgeted on the basics: vehicle cost, fuel cost, mileage, staff and van insurance with a kitty set aside for breakdown. This workshop was to highlight the next step up and how integrated fleets, incorporating the latest software and communication technologies, have been proven to deliver huge savings.

Jayne Pett, IFM’s operations director, said that their management firm decided to put on the show not only to demonstrate the physical aspects that have changed but to bring the thought processes to the table that had instigated the efficiency drive over recent years.

She went on to add that the innovations on show deliver greater control over the costs of fuel, a dynamic that can never be truly accurately budgeted for. But, by implementing the tighter controls that are now becoming available and implementable across UK fleets, there were opportunities to cut 25% from the fuel bill, alone.

There were other aspects considered and this is probably only applicable to the larger fleet, but multi-bid contract hire can also deliver cost-savings on a huge sale. But, you do have to have a considerable amount of vehicles to generate interest in your contract in the first instance and then significantly lower the contract hire rate to make it worth their while.

Another cost that is flexible throughout the year is maintenance and reparation costs – which the seminar covered in their accident management techniques module. The better you can handle an accident once it’s happened, the closer you can work with your fleet van insurance broker to bring it to a swifter resolution. Accompanying our article van insurance – what to do in the event of an accident there is a handy little download that you can keep on your clipboard if your mind goes blank and you forget what to do immediately after an incident, courtesy of cheapvaninsurance.co.uk.

One of the best ways of keeping your van insurance premium at an affordable rate is by keeping hold of your no claims bonus. If you’re a van driver, the good news is that you are statistically more likely to do this, as commercial vehicle drivers make far fewer claims on their insurance than others covered on UK roads.

As a van driver you are afforded a more receptive experience dealing with insurance brokers than those in the domestic market for several reasons. In the main, by buying a van in the first instance, an insurance broker may assume that you have made a considered purchase and not simply that you’ve bought a set of wheels because all of your mates are driving. You have made a decision that affects your entire livelihood and your van insurance company will respect that decision.

But more than that, if driving is your livelihood and you’re not a tradesman who uses his van to transport his tools and enable him to work on site, it is very liable that you have racked up experience in a few years that domestic drivers may never do. There is also the very real possibility that the company for whom you’re working has put you through advanced driver training to meet their own organisational goals, therefore even more in line for cheap van insurance quotes.

There are two ways that you can protect your current no claims bonus (PNCB) and your subsequent van insurance premium. The first is, if you’ve built up enough of a history of claim-free driving, you can pay an ancillary premium on top of your base van insurance policy. The cost will depend upon how many years you are claim free and the value of the bonus you are trying to protect.

The second way is, quite obviously, by not claiming against your van insurance. Using your experience to steer clear of incidents on the road and protect your van from theft will certainly help deliver the savings you’re looking for. This service, being discounted for full years of claim free driving, can roll over for up to nine years, where it will remain at the maximum discount until you make a claim, which you will not have to if you take out PNCB, as per option one.

The ulterior motive for offering discount in this manner for your van insurance provider is retention of your business. Many insurance firms will offer you an introductory discount equivalent to any no claims up to a point, but nine years continual discount is a lot to compete against. Hence, it’s win-win: you only pay for the cheap van insurance you deserve; they retain your business as you may struggle to find cheaper van cover anywhere else.

It’s not impossible, though; see if you could save using your no claims on your next van insurance quote from over 60 brokers and direct insurers using our bespoke online form.

The UK’s freight haulage industry has well and truly accepted the gauntlet, by all accounts, as it strives to reduce CO2 emission levels by eight percent in the next four years. Following publication of the second yearly analysis report, the sector are bang on target to achieve their aim showing a 2.6% reduction after the two years to date, with almost four full years remaining until the end of 2015, when the figure has to be realised.

It is imperative that haulage companies do not rest on these laurels and that the reduction retains impetus, which it shows signs of doing as more and more industries of all sizes pledge their support to reducing emission levels.

As more businesses address their own fleets of van, box vans and larger commercial vehicles’ carbon footprints they are realising that steps in this direction not only help save the environment but can actually help towards their own ongoing cost savings. Van insurance brokers are re-evaluating their approaches to fleet cover, often offering cheaper alternatives if you’re showing your business is capable of turning the green corner. Initial indications are that the cleaner the emissions are the more efficient the components under the hood have to be to deliver. Therefore there is less opportunity of off-road time in garages for reparation and engine failure whilst on the road leadning to less breakdown time and a reduced propensity for accidents derived from component malfunction.

Not only that, but more efficient engines are leading to smaller cubic capacity requirements as demonstrated by the new Transit which, for its leaner, greener range it has dropped the option of 2.4l, now offering a 2.2l version only. It goes without saying that the smaller the engine the greater the opportunity of finding a cheap van insurance quote online.

This sentiment was backed up by Simon Chapman, chief economist of the Freight Transport Association. He commented that, as SMEs from the haulage sector improve their output through the technology on offer and better planning, they are discovering these cost savings in other areas of their business.

To see how much your van insurance could benefit from going greener, compare over 60 insurance companies using our online form

One of the key factors to saving money on your van insurance is actually getting the right van for the job in the first place. Many companies and individuals simply do not do enough research into what their businesses need from their commercial vehicle fleet and throw huge wads of money at vans that, for their collection and delivery needs at least, do not do the investment justice.

In the main, this is where the belief that ‘bigger is better‘ overrides any commercially derived decision when deciding on such an investment. Either that or businesses that have been established a while with similar customer bases buy like-for-like before assessing whether either their or their customers’ businesses have changed in a manner that would allow for smaller vans to otherwise suffice.

And I do not just refer to the outlay for the fleet in the first instance. There is the ongoing cost of fuel and van insurance which continually demand more from your budget than smaller capacity vans, both in volume for carriage and payload and the engines under the hood.

This is never more true than in the world of distribution, especially where companies have been drawn into the automotive sector because of the proficiency in supplying in other areas. A prime example is when I used to work in the fastener and associated product industry and we were very good at we did.

So much so that, where we were supplying large items such as cable tray for electrical enclosures or stanchions for stair lifts we were asked to supply the smaller, bespoke components that were designed specifically for the applications and were difficult to get hold of in small volumes at reasonable prices and lead times in the UK.

Not to go into too much detail as this is not business blog but about finding cheap van insurance, but, because of how lucrative supplying these smaller components were our business dynamic shifted. Not so much a conscious decision but, within any industry where you supply exceptional service, you soon attract a reputation, which is your marketing dealt with, if nothing else – you can’t beat recommendation as a tool to promote your service or product.

One aspect of our business that never changed, even long after the large components had been ditched and we were all about small, special screws, was the fleet of vans. We still kept buying the ‘good old Transit‘ and, nine times out of ten, they’d go out with components that you could have put on the passenger seat of Berlingo or some other city- or mini-van.

Because of how lucrative our business was on paper, the question of the size of the fleet, their capacities, the extra fuel and over-the-odds van insurance premiums we were paying not only didn’t get addressed but never even get posed.

When you’re making deliveries to line-side two and three times a day to facilitate a just-in-time system or the like, those savings can really start to stack up. The added fuel, wear and tear and the mileage – van insurance providers take your miles into account, too; the more miles your van travels, the higher the propensity of an accident (therefore the higher the risk) and accompanying van insurance quote.

So, when next you consider the purchase of your new fleet, ask yourself if your business model or direction has changed – you could make your business even more profitable, simply by downsizing your vans to suit your service.