A fuel card is about to offer SME fleets savings on tyres, roadside assistance and windscreens that are normally only available to larger fleets.

Red Liquidcard confirmed to Fleet News that it will sign up five market-leading service providers within weeks.

It will then offer SME fleets reduced prices on services such as tyre replacements through its card.

The news follows the company signing its largest single deal with a fuel retailer, after Chevron agreed to accept its cards.

It means the Red Liquidcard is now accepted at 2,000 fuel stations, including Texaco, Chevron and Morrison’s supermarkets, although this still only represents 20% coverage.

Red confirmed that it is in negotiations with other supermarket fuel retailers – who offer the cheapest fuel on the market - to try to increase its appeal further with SME fleets.

The Liquidcard, which was launched 15 months ago, offers the typical advantages of a fuel card – credit, mileage and fuel use reporting and better control of a fleet’s fuel costs.

Fleets pay the advertised fuel price on the day a driver uses the no-cost card to fill up. However, when the new service providers sign-up drivers will also be able to use the card to have tyres replaced, windscreens repaired and get access to 24-hour roadside assistance at a preferential rate.

Paul Holland, Retail Decisions’ managing director, said he is using his SME fleet customer base – up to 5,000 companies typically operating 10 vehicles or less – to secure deals with “market leading” service providers.

SME fleet business is one of the most difficult sectors for large-scale service providers to capture.

“There has been a lot of interest from our suppliers in our customers,” explained Holland.

“We know that small and medium companies with a few vehicles cannot channel all their energies into saving money – they have a business to run. Through this card, we are giving them the benefit of cost savings that are normally only available to larger fleets.

“They will pay a reduced fleet rate, so even if they have only five vans they will be paying the same price for these services as a fleet of 75 vehicles or more. We have been very hard in our negotiations to get these deals.”