Grey fleet travel refers to mileage in employee-owned vehicles – a grey area, where millions of hidden miles are travelled each year and often overlooked by employers and employees alike.

In the public sector, evidence indicates that grey fleet makes up around 57% of total road
mileage. Across the whole sector, this could add up to as much as 1.4 billion miles every year!

The management of grey fleet travel plays an important part in supporting three key policy areas of health and safety, environmental sustainability and financial efficiency. It is about removing unnecessary mileage and transferring travel to more environmentally efficient and cost effective alternatives like public transport and hire cars, as well as minimising the risk where employees do use grey fleet for work.

The Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) embarked on a programme to reduce its
business mileage in 2007. This study charts the progress up to May 2008 and documents some of the of policy changes, implementation activities and lessons learned along the way.

How you can tackle grey fleet
Any department or authority can take some steps to addressing grey fleet through:
• Presenting the impacts of grey fleet travel to senior managers and highlighting potential
benefits, including cost savings, to encourage their support for action;
• Setting Travel Policy to restrict unnecessary grey fleet usage and promote other forms of transport where these are offer better value for money or lower environmental impact;
• Gathering management information on travel in private vehicles to help comply with duty of care legislation and prompt employees to justify the requirement to use their own car.

The OGC has produced a paper on Grey Fleet Best Practice and a Sample Business Case that may be useful in presenting the issues to senior managers. There are also several other Case Studies explaining what has already been done in this area and providing suggestions for other organisations. If you wish to register your interest in the work being done on grey fleet, please contact the OGC Service Desk on 0845 000 4999.

How the DWP tackled grey fleet
The DWP is a large central government department, with offices across the UK and a total of around 120,000 employees. In 2006/07, the Department travelled:
o Almost 70 million business miles annually, including mileage in official vehicles, lease, hire and private vehicles
o 45 million business miles annually in employee-owned vehicles Evidence gathered as part of a staff survey indicated that DWP travel policy was seen by many managers and employees as optional guidance, rather than a firm policy and set of rules with which to comply.

Action timeline

Travel review
In 2007, the Permanent Secretary at DWP commissioned an independent review of business mileage. The resultant review was entitled ‘Around the World in 40 minutes’ (referring to the fact that DWP staff were travelling enough miles to go around the world once every 40 minutes) and made recommendations including:
• New policy: the DWP travel policy would be re-written, with a clear journey planning
hierarchy that prioritises the different methods of transport in the following order:
o audio or video conference
o walking or cycling
o public transport (excluding air)
o official pool car or lease car
o hire car
o own car (grey fleet)
o air travel
• Restrictions on grey fleet: a total daily limit for journeys in grey fleet vehicles would be set at 100 miles, and an annual limit at 1,000 miles, to emphasise the expectation that employee owned vehicles should be used as a last resort and for short journeys only
• Targets for reducing mileage: the DWP would adopt the target of a 20% reduction in its
business mileage in the first full year of implementation.

Implementation of new policy
At the end of 2007, the DWP Travel Team held a number of roadshows for staff across the
country. At these meetings they presented the new travel policies and announced a phasing in of the restrictions on grey fleet up until April 08, when they would be fully implemented within the department. Key enablers for the successful implementation would be:
• Journey authorisation: any journeys in the grey fleet that exceed the daily and annual
mileage limits would need to be pre-approved by a senior manager and justifications copied to the Travel Team for review
• Alternatives to grey fleet: the DWP would remove the minimum mileage threshold for lease cars on the private user scheme, allowing staff to apply for a lease car on the basis of need and frequency of travel. Focused campaigns would also be used to encourage use of videoconferencing, public transport and pool or hire cars.

Benefits achieved to date
DWP achieved an impressive 20% reduction in grey fleet mileage in 07/08, in spite of the fact that the phased implementation of new policies was initiated only towards the end of the year.

This meant that the Department cut over nine million miles, as compared with the previous year’s grey fleet mileage. While half a million of these grey fleet miles were transferred to hire cars, the other 95% were simply not driven at all. In fact, even DWP’s lease car mileage went down in 07/08, as compared with the previous year!
Emissions Reduction The environmental impact of DWP’s 20% reduction in grey fleet mileage is significant. Annual carbon emissions from grey fleet have been reduced by around 3,000 tonnes on 2001/02 levels (based on Defra guidance 2006).

Health & Safety Benefit
DWP has also achieved health and safety benefits in reducing overall road mileage and time spent by employees on the road. Similarly, the movement of employees from their own vehicles to newer pool, lease and hire cars will help ensure employees are driving for work in vehicles with up-to-date safety features (air bags, ABS) and managed service history.

Direct Cost Saving
The reduction in grey fleet miles in 07/08 generated direct cost savings of £3.6 million.
DWP believes that this is coupled with significant indirect cost savings, relating to a reduction in mileage claims processed and reduced work time lost through unnecessary travel.

Key success criteria – how DWP is making it work

Communication
DWP has taken a number of steps to communicate the new travel policies to its staff and to embed them into business as usual:
o Travel Policy document was rewritten and launched with firm statements regarding
expectations on compliance from all areas of the organisation and on continuing
improvement.
o An awareness campaign was launched alongside the new policy, including presentations at roadshows around the country and updates on the DWP intranet.

Control measures
The Department has also used a number of control measures to ensure adherence to the new policies:
o With the 100 mile daily limit and 1,000 mile annual limit on grey fleet travel, the onus is now on staff to justify their need to use their own vehicle as opposed to public transport or a pool or hire car
o As all grey fleet journeys over the mileage limits have to be signed off in advance by a senior manager and copied to the DWP Travel Team, there is now visibility on staff travel and an ability to challenge poor practice (even down to an individual level).
Senior-level support

The initial travel review at DWP was commissioned by the Permanent Secretary and this
immediately sent a message to the organisation about the level of importance being attached to the issue of business mileage.

All recommendations in the review were then signed off by the Executive Directors and fed down to staff throughout the organisation. Importantly, the new policies do not carry any exemptions for senior management, meaning that all levels of the organisation are equally responsible for improving the ways they travel.