The AA is working hard to shake off its 'breakdown-only' image

The AA aims to provide more than breakdown cover for its fleet customers and is investing heavily in Prestige – its service, maintenance, and repair (SMR) offering.

Gavin Franks, director of business services at the AA, says he sees an “exciting opportunity” to join up the roadside and SMR elements of the organisation’s services.

“The exciting thing we are trying to do is provide that end-to-end solution support for fleets, looking at how we manage an incident from start-to-finish, rather than just being the breakdown provider,” Franks says.

“So, if anything goes wrong, whether it’s planned or unplanned maintenance or an accident, we can quickly get the vehicle through whatever repair network it needs or fixed at the side of the road if it’s just roadside, then back into the fleet as quickly as possible.

“We’re also growing our accident management business – our existing accident management business has been subscale, but we’ve invested in a new platform.”

Two key areas the AA continues to invest in are electric vehicles (EVs) and connected vehicles.

“We believe we are at a point where we have the best trained workforce out there - so we’ve trained all our patrols to a Level 2 capability in terms of EV,” says Franks.