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Light Commercial Vehicles Keep the Heart of UK Business Beating as Over Half of Firms Report Using their Vans Every Day
New Europcar Group UK whitepaper gives fleet managers valuable insight into operational challenges.
A new white paper released by Europcar Vans & Trucks, a brand of Europcar Group UK, underlines the huge significance of light commercial vehicles for UK businesses. The research conducted amongst UK businesses before COVID-19 took hold, found that more than 58% of UK businesses use their vans every day of the week, with another 23% using them for between 4 and six days per week. But that dependence also requires high levels of flexibility, as the Europcar data revealed.
As UK businesses contend with a more unsettled economic landscape, the need for flexibility when it comes to accessing vehicles makes commercial sense – freeing up cash that would otherwise have been tied up in an outright purchase. Indeed, the Europcar research identified the evolving trend towards ‘usership’ rather than ‘ownership’. Over a quarter of businesses said they favour long-term rental as a method of accessing commercial vehicles and vehicle ‘usership’, rather than ownership, which is the preferred option for almost 20% who use short term rental solutions.
The Europcar research also identified some of the biggest headaches for commercial fleet managers. After road congestion, next on the list of concerns was vehicle condition, with 42% citing it as their second biggest worry. As fleet managers juggle multiple vehicles, driven by many different drivers, the availability of vehicles was an issue for 40% of the decision makers questioned, with nearly three quarters (71%) admitting to having ‘spare’ vans in order to mitigate the risk of being left without a vehicle. And the bigger the firm, the more likely they were to have ‘just in case’ vehicles: 92% of companies with 500+ employees.
