New analysis from Enterprise Rent-A-Car shows a significant increase in the use of car hire among UK public sector organisations including local authorities, health trusts and central government. This includes daily rental services as well as hourly car hire through car sharing schemes.

The growth demonstrates the success of the partnership with Government Procurement Services, designed to address entrenched attitudes to “grey fleet” use in the public sector. Growth in the number of rental days indicates public sector employees are responding positively to the call for a switch from mileage reimbursement to the use of a hire car.

Customer feedback from public sector bodies indicates that car rental achieves several aims. It helps reduce the cost and administrative burden of self-regulated mileage reclaim schemes resulting from “grey fleet” usage, as well as cutting down on carbon footprint by encouraging employees to use smaller, more environmentally vehicles available on car sharing schemes.

In addition, Enterprise’s online platform used to book rental vehicles can prompt employees to think whether alternative transport or car sharing may be more suitable, or whether the trip is even necessary in the first place. This is helping to re-educate employees on their transport choices.

Oz Choudri, head of public sector at Enterprise Rent-A-Car, said: “The public sector is at the cutting edge of pushing through better, more economical and sustainable solutions for keeping employees mobile. Public sector workers are very much in a service sector and many are required to travel as part of their work, so mobility is key.

“Public sector bodies are using cars in a variety of ways - by the hour, by the day, or for longer periods of a month or more - to provide flexibility and convenience for employees while increasing compliance and cost efficiencies for organisations. It’s helping to change some entrenched behaviours, such as mileage reimbursement, by offering a viable and easy to use alternative.”

Geoff Derham, head of waste and fleet services at City of York Council, said: “Car sharing schemes are now providing a much wider range of solutions and these give our employees much greater choice around how they travel for work.

“In addition to branches in the community, located close to our offices, the opportunity to have car sharing vehicles onsite for hourly use means car hire is available for even very short trips.

“We’ve found that rental is much safer and more convenient than relying on employees to use their own vehicles - or indeed running our own pool cars, which involved a lot of administration. Car hire has become a default option for a significant portion of travel at City of York Council.”

Enterprise hosted a Westminster reception for local authority officials on 7th May 2013 with Government Procurement Services to showcase the value which strong partnerships brings in lowering cost and increasing the sustainability of services.

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