What's Your Real Fuel Bill?

14th May 2006

Employees could be exaggerating fuel bills by as much as 25 percent and UK bosses need to stop turning a blind eye. The warning comes from AA Business Services as petrol prices reach their highest level yet and the company launches Fleet Advantage, a new payment card to help businesses get more control over their fuel expenditure.

Adrian Waters, head of commercial sales at AA Business Services, explains: "With petrol prices reaching an all-time high, businesses need to get a much better understanding of what their 'real' fuel bill is and cut the risks of mileage fraud. There is still a surprisingly high opportunity for employees to exaggerate fuel claims, whether that is through dishonesty or forgetfulness, about how many miles they have travelled.

"This seems to have become an acceptable part of company culture but is costing UK business millions of pounds every year. Escalating fuel costs have really drawn attention to the cost of running company vehicles and businesses need to keep better track of all fleet expenditure."

The AA has developed Fleet Advantage with Arval to help cut the hassle of managing small to medium fleets by providing monthly payment and reporting on fleet expenditure. A single card is provided for fleet drivers to pay for fuel, breakdown assistance, servicing, maintenance, tyres, batteries and exhausts, windscreen replacements and short term hire.

The reports that Fleet Advantage generates include details of all fuel that is purchased, where and what price the driver paid for it. This allows the company to implement and monitor fuel purchasing policies, such as only buying from supermarkets to ensure lower fuel bills, as well as combating expenses fraud.

Waters adds: "The card allows the businesses to help control the amount of money a driver spends on all vehicle running costs, not just fuel, by setting a pre-agreed limit. This also helps to take away the administrative burden from the fleet manager of constantly having to approve costs for tyre replacements etc and helps to keep drivers on the road out of business hours. Rather than having to ring for approval to get a tyre replaced on an evening, the card already has a pre-agreed authorisation."

See the AA web site at www.theaa.com