Manufacturers and dealers are costing the fleet millions of pounds a year by delivering about 30,000 new fleet cars every year with the wrong specification, often because of basic administrative errors.

Research by motor industry software specialist Epyx has found that some leasing companies have more than half of their vehicle acquisition team working on problem solving.

Errors ranged from the simplest wrongly supplied item such as type of alloy wheels, up to completely incorrect models arriving. The firm believes the errors, which occur in 3% of the annual new fleet orders in the UK, are happening because faxes are completed wrongly or the information is incorrectly typed into systems during the ordering process.

Epyx managing director Greg Connell said: “If dealers are lucky, the customer will accept the wrong colour or wrong alloy wheels providing they make a goodwill gesture. But they will still be dissatisfied. At the other end of the scale, the customer can refuse to accept the vehicle. You then have an unwanted car that needs to be disposed of.

“There is also the cost of providing a hire car while the correct re-order is processed by the factory and that will probably take a minimum of four weeks. The total can run into thousands of pounds.'”

The research supports the view expressed by British Vehicle Rental and Leasing Association director-general John Lewis, who claimed that administrative inefficiencies in dealerships that do not invest in state-of-the-art e-commerce systems costs the fleet industry millions. (December 4, 2001)