Desire to control fleet hire costs powering development of rental system IT, says Epyx

Fleet desire to take greater control over short term hire costs is powering the current development of rental IT systems, says Epyx.

The company says that a large amount of work is going into enhancing the overall capabilities of rental IT as well undertaking a wide range of detail improvements.

Marc Lees, business development manager for Epyx’s 1link Hire Network e-commerce platform, said: “The recession created a fleet mindset where cost control and value for money were very much the mantra of most fleet managers and this has been applied to all kinds of areas of fleet management.

“Massive strides have been made in controlling service and maintenance costs, for example, but managers believe that there are further gains to be made when it comes to their daily rental expenditure and they want to use technology to achieve this.”

Lees explained that this line of thinking had been brought into sharp focus during development for the latest version of 1link Hire Network, which will be launched in the next few months.

He said: “We spoke extensively to our Customer Forum as well as a wide range of other fleet managers and the overall message was simple – we want to take yet greater control and contain costs.

“To do this, we have undertaken changes to 1link Hire Network that allow expenditure on hire to be more closely controlled than ever through better processes and enhanced reporting.

“Also, we have paid close attention to mobile access of the platform, as we expect more and more usage to occur through tablets and smartphones over the next couple of years.”