Barloworld Handling Limited has awarded Alphabet a third successive contract to supply and manage its 650-strong fleet of vans and cars.

The renewed contract, which follows a 10-way re-tendering process, will see the supply partnership between the two companies through to its 10th anniversary in 2014.

Alphabet supplies Barloworld Handling with vehicles on full-maintenance contract hire as well as accident management, AlphaRent short term hire, AlphaRisk driver licence checking, and mileage expense management. Barloworld’s strategic goal is to provide the highest levels of service to its customers within the materials handling industry and therefore a reliable, efficient fleet is a key factor in delivering this.

Alan Thackray, vehicle contract and facility manager at Barloworld, said: “We are very pleased to renew our agreement with Alphabet. The tender process demonstrated to us that they offered the best mix of services and continuous improvement to match our needs and to go on delivering long term value. Whether it is driver contact, account management or working with us to solve the issues we encounter as a fleet, we know we can count on Alphabet to deliver on their promises.

“At the moment we are setting our fleet strategy for the next few years and we feel that Alphabet is doing more than others in this area. Their strategic consulting team under Nigel Trotman works with us to move the fleet forward and identify areas for greater efficiency, often in areas that we had not looked at before.”

Richard Schooling, chief executive of Alphabet, said: “It is a terrific endorsement to be reappointed three times in succession, especially by a business such as Barloworld, whose own success rests on a reputation for delivering first-class service. Once again, it demonstrates that Alphabet delivers the sustained competitiveness, capability and commitment our customers look for to enable them to achieve not only cost savings but long term value and improvement in their fleet operations.”

Among the changes introduced by Barloworld in conjunction with Alphabet during the last seven years was a move from choice lists based on rental costs to lists based on Whole Life Costs.

Cars are graded according to their whole life pence-per-mile running cost, which includes NICs, fuel and capital allowances as well as finance, depreciation and maintenance.

 

 

Whole Life Costs highlight the cost advantage enjoyed by low CO2 cars, and the policy has helped Barloworld reduce its fleet’s average emissions from 160g/km a few years ago to 136g/km today. The fall in CO2 is equivalent to cutting fuel consumption by 18%.

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