Putting the customer at the heart of innovation has helped Hitachi Capital Vehicles Solutions to launch a number of ground-breaking products.

One of the major reasons the company has been able to do this is because it has started to survey clients on how they feel rather than what they think.

This is a small, but crucial, difference and one which Hitachi says has helped it develop products and services to meet customer needs as a result of changes in the market that will either affect them now or in the future.

One of its significant new launches is the Essential Business-user Mileage Scheme. It says this protects employers and employees from rising costs associated with traditional company cars by giving them the choice to own one.

Cars can be funded using the most suitable product for each employee, giving consideration to their business mileage, tax position and whether an electric vehicle could be used as opposed to a diesel or petrol company car. The tax efficiencies give a significant average saving, says Hitachi.

The leasing company has also launched CarSelect, which is aimed at employers who find it difficult to offer an attractive car scheme to their employees.

As part of this product, the leasing company builds bespoke microsites for customers to navigate a choice of four funding options – salary sacrifice, personal leasing, personal loans and used ex-lease cars.

Hitachi has also taken action to reduce downtime – vehicle availability is now 99.4% – improve customer service and help customers adopt EVs, while it has also launched an app which analyses driver behaviour.

All this innovation is reflected in the growth it has experienced: the 2017 FN50 report found that it had a risk fleet of 52,841 cars and vans. Twelve months later, this figure stood at 59,074, an increase of 12%.

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