Collaboration is a theme that runs across Richard Flint’s fleet policy: collaboration with other bluelight fleets, with staff, his management, manufacturers and the media.

The North Yorkshire Police transport manager draws on experience gained from roles with two other police fleets during a 15-year career.

He started as fleet manager for Durham Constabulary in 1995.

Five years later he joined Strathclyde, the UK’s second largest police fleet with 1,200 vehicles. He joined North Yorkshire Police 18 months ago.

At both Durham and Strathclyde, Flint was a Fleet News award winner, praised for his groundbreaking initiatives.

He’s waiting for his changes at North Yorkshire to take effect before attempting the hat-trick.

“It takes six months to get a good feel for the operation and then to start implementing change,” Flint says. “By the time you’ve done the planning, it’s a year before that makes an impact.”

Many of those changes are based on initiatives he implemented at Strathclyde, including setting up joint ventures with other emergency service fleets in the local region to reduce workshop overheads.

Estimated savings can run into thousands of pounds by pooling resources.

Flint also hopes to co-ordinate purchasing with neighbouring police forces. This will include vehicle standardisation to boost purchasing power.

His opinions arguably carry greater weight due to his chairmanship of the National Association of Police Fleet Managers. He’s one year into a three-year term.

“It’s very forward-thinking and is way ahead of the rest of the force on standardisation,” says Flint.

All public bodies face scrutiny by the media and that has intensified with the economic downturn.

Large expenditure is questioned – and there’s not much that eats more into public finances than buying vehicles.

Last year North Yorkshire Police spent £2.6 million buying vehicles; this year it will spend £2.4 million.
Flint takes a proactive approach to public relations.

The local press spot police cars brandishing 59 plates and conclude that the public sector is awash with money while private companies tighten their belts.

“That’s not the case – if we didn’t renew the fleet we would be losing money through higher wholelife costs,” Flint says.

“I told the force I wanted the opportunity to respond to press comment and not leave it to the press office or ‘no comment’. We have to defend our decisions.”

However, he also accepts that the force has to take action to reduce its overheads – not all the criticism is unfounded.

“We have had some negative publicity with superintendents driving around in large cars, such as Volvo V70s,” he says. “So we took the decision to downgrade them into Ford Focus 1.6 TDCIs for beat vehicles. If they can’t justify why they need the larger vehicle, they go into the Focus.”

This has brought other benefits. Emissions have fallen and the fleet is getting better fuel consumption. It is saving thousands of pounds.

Flint has also moved the road policing team from petrol into diesel.

The figures are headline grabbing. Replacing three Imprezas with 3.0-litre diesel Audi A4 Avant Quattros will save £30,000 on fuel over the lifecycle.

Switching from Volvo V70 T6 to BMW 530d for standard road cars will notch up a further £5,000 fuel saving per vehicle. With 40 vehicles, that’s a £200,000 cut from expenditure over the lifetime.

Flint has embraced wholelife cost wherever he has worked, usually changing an existing strategy. At North Yorkshire Police, it replaces a policy of buying on the P11D price and will bring significant benefits, particularly as its 516 vehicles are bought outright.

“There are now two criteria when we are choosing vehicles – the wholelife cost and whether it is fit for purpose,” Flint says.

Outright purchase is his funding method of choice due to the complexities of the blue light fleet.

“It’s hard to manage contract hire within the police due to the amount of damage to vehicles. It takes a lot of time to de-commission so it’s easier to outright purchase – we don’t face additional de-fleet charges.”

Flint keeps a close eye on overheads by benchmarking against contract hire wholelife costs in the private sector. National buying power helps to make his model competitive.

Psychology plays a major role in the fleet team’s communication with drivers. It has enabled Flint to introduce many changes to the fleet vehicle profile without unduly upsetting drivers.

For instance, instead of asking them whether the vehicle will do the job, he asks why it won’t do the job. “It’s a subtle change but they have to accept that the car will do the job even if there are things about it they don’t like,” he says.

He took a similar approach with the move from petrol to diesel. “It’s not a question of which car they want, it’s which diesel car they want. They still have a choice but we limit it, taking the focus off petrol.”

He adds: “We have to convince front-line officers that if the force saves money, it can be used elsewhere, such as on overtime or better offices. We have to make them aware of why we make changes.

“And we have to make sure the message gets out there so we get good press.” 


 

Focus moves on to grey fleet drivers

North Yorkshire Police is in the process of signing up to the Energy Saving Trust Motorvate initiative after undertaking a green fleet review last year.

It highlighted the need for a new fleet management system – currently out to tender – that would enable Flint to better monitor accident statistics, CO2 emissions and costs.

He also wants to take control of the force’s 1,100 grey fleet drivers, responsible for one million miles a year at a cost of £500,000.

“We are looking at training our grey fleet drivers and we have to encourage them to do their own vehicle checks,” he says.

“We also need to look at reducing their mileage by introducing travel plans.”

Flint has strong views about the rates some local authorities pay their grey fleets. His response to the Fleet News article (November 19): “Government should set one rate for all and not allow people to pay what they like.”

Cash and emission saving innovations

Multi Fleet News award winner Richard Flint has introduced a number of initiatives to North Yorkshire Police

They include:

  • Removable cells that can be transferred from an old vehicle to a new one.
  • Working with emergency services on joint purchasing strategies and pooling workshop resources to cut costs.
  • Working with other forces within the ACPO region – North, South and West Yorkshire, and Humberside – to agree standardisation on vehicle purchases to boost volume discounts.
  • Introduction of wholelife cost model to replace P11D purchasing policy.
  • Stopped drilling holes for lightbars – now strapped to the roof with wiring running through the trim. Improves residuals by £400-500.
  • Replacement of petrol with diesel – £200,000-plus savings on fuel over vehicle lifetime.
  • Fitting of reversing sensors on cars and cameras on vans to reduce high incidence of reversing collisions.
  • Introduction of vehicle user group to discuss topics such as health and safety, driver training, unions and fleet strategy – improves communication and gives the fleet team feedback on vehicle, fleet and workshop performance.

North Yorkshire Police facts

Transport manager Richard Flint

Time in role 18 months

Number of vehicles 516, which includes 200 vans and 12 motorcycles (BMW/Yamaha). Also has around 200 pedal cycles

Replacement cycles Three to four years, up to 120,000 miles

Funding option Outright purchase