News - Page 2336

VOLKSWAGEN has boosted its Sharan MPV line-up with a VR6 Syncro version featuring full-time four-wheel drive. Powered by Volkswagen's well-known 174 bhp VR6 engine, two versions are available - a GL costing £25,172 on the road and Carat priced at £26,258.

HARPUR Forecourt Services, which delivers back office software solutions for the retail petroleum industry, has undergone a management buyout for an undisclosed sum from the Harpur Group. The move follows Harpur UK's decision to concentrate on its core business. In January it took back responsibility for sales and marketing for Overdrive and Dialcard fuel cards.

MOTOR vehicle group Appleyard has reported 1996 pre-tax profits down 59% to £3.2 million following a poor performance by its dealership division. However, the reduction in pre-tax profits - down from £7.8 million in 1995 - on turnover of £783 million (1995: £694.37 million) was partially offset by a record-breaking performance by Appleyard Vehicle Contracts, which saw its fleet size reach 17,500 vehicles (1995: 16,000).

MILTON Keynes-based Volvo dealer Pilling Motor Group has won a contract worth more than £250,000 to supply local company, Merchants Group, experts in communications centres and business growth, with eight S40 TD SEs and seven V40 TD SEs.

DAEWOO has furnished upholstery retailer Uno with a fleet of cars - marking the expanding Liverpool-based company's first foray into fleet. The Espero 2.0 CDXis will be driven by the company's regional executives with eight delivered already and a total of 13 expected to be on the fleet by mid-year.

THE average size of the UK's car rental fleet will increase by 25,000 vehicles by 2001 and local firms will continue to lose market share to the multi-national companies, according to a new report. All of the major car rental companies in the UK, with the exception of Europcar, increased the size of their fleets last year, underlining both the strength of the car rental market and the continuing consolidation within the rental industry.

RANDOM roadside eye tests for drivers have been introduced by Devon and Cornwall police, following reports that up to 5.28 million British drivers may not meet the legal eye-sight standard. Drivers are being stopped at roadside checkpoints and given a statutory test of reading a number plate from a distance of 20.5 metres.

FORD has undertaken a U-turn and looks likely to retain the Escort name when it produces a replacement for its top-selling model next year. Earlier this month it looked as though the Escort name was to be replaced when Ford launched its next new lower medium model range next year. But after detailed research on a possible change of badgework for the new car, the company has been provided with a substantial answer to the old question: What's in a name?

MOBILE fleet servicing operators Auto Service Group has become the latest company to sign up to the AT&T TransLease electronic trading scheme. The Bristol-based company operates a fleet of 100 mobile servicing vehicles and performs more than 3,000 regular services on fleet vehicles each month.

MERCEDES-Benz is in negotiations with leading daily rental and leasing companies to offer its radical micro car with a range of flexible rental options. Developed in conjunction with the Swiss makers of Swatch watches SMH, the Micro Compact Car (MCC) will be launched in continental Europe next year.

THE prison service has captured Car Fleet Control's Workshop Manager system to aid efficiency and service in its day-to-day fleet operation. In addition to vehicle and mechanical equipment handling maintenance, HM Prison Service's Fleet Engineering workshops handle research and development for specialised secure vehicles, including those used to transport prisoners.

THE RAC and the British Vehicle Rental and Leasing Association have joined forces to produce a second Fair Wear & Tear Guide aimed at the car rental industry. The new guide is a follow-up to last year's Fair Wear and Tear Guide for the contract hire industry and will be available from the BVRLA stand at the Fleet Motor Show at Silverstone from April 29-May 2 costing £1.25 a copy with bulk order discounts.

LEASE Plan has won a multi-million pound sale and leaseback contract with information technology giant NCR. The deal involves 750 cars from the company's 800-vehicle fleet. The cars are now being leased back to NCR as part of a package which includes open calculation funding, full fleet management and on-going new vehicle supply.

ROYAL Bank of Scotland, which operates a 1,900-strong fleet, has benefited to the tune of £2 million over three years from Leasecontracts' fixed cost fleet management scheme.

A THIRD of fleets have had a vehicle stolen within the past three months, according to a new fleet vehicle theft survey by Securicor TrakBak.

COMPANY car drivers using Kwik-Fit Fleet's Business Drive Card are seeing cost savings on their business motoring of up to £450 per car, per year, the company claimed this week.

MASTERDRIVE has become the sole supplier of fleet vehicles for telephone paging technology suppliers PageOne Communications.

NATIONWIDE Network Services, the accident management subsidiary of the Perry Group, has won a contract covering accident damage repair for the Royal Mail national fleet of 3,000 cars. Computerised estimating system Audatex played a major role in securing the three-year contract, which makes the Royal Mail Nationwide Network Service's largest fleet customer.

TWO of Lex Vehicle Leasing's largest fleet customers have signed new solus contract hire agreements with the Marlow-based company.

EMPLOYERS are being urged to offer bicycles instead of company cars in order to cut congestion and save money. The London Cycling Campaign's new report 'The Best Way To Work' calls on companies to promote cycling as a means of commuting by introducing a range of steps including offering bikes plus cash incentives instead of cars and introducing mileage allowances for cyclists.

FLEETS can save up to 50% on air conditioning parts and maintenance by using the latest preferred supplier initiative in Fleet Cost Management's Select network. This network has now been completed, and numbers some 700 franchised dealers, 400 independents and 200 mobile agents around the country.

LEASECONTRACTS, the specialist contract hire and leasing supplier to the City, is gearing up for rapid expansion 18 months after being bought by GE Capital Fleet Services. Leasecontracts has retained its 13,000-strong fleet, which it had when bought by GE but, following the appointment of Tom Stephenson as general manager, the company has been charged with growing assets and profit by 20% a year.

A RECORD 21,336 fleet managers and fleet decision makers have registered to attend the Fleet Motor Show to be held at Silverstone from April 29-May 2. And with just 10 days to go before Europe's largest fleet show opens pre-registrations have been continuing to pour in at around 1,000 a day.

COMPANY car policies in the UK have changed dramatically in the 1990s with benefit-in-kind tax changes and environmental agendas encouraging companies to build greater flexibility and choice into hitherto rigid structures.

THE Inland Revenue has introduced a pilot fast-cycle fleet replacement scheme - the first of its kind in the public sector - which could reshape the fleets of all government departments. Almost 10% of the Inland Revenue's 1,600-vehicle fleet have been replaced by Ford and Vauxhall cars on a nine-month cycle.

SUBARU has unveiled a surprise contender in the expanding compact sports utility sector. The Impreza-based Forester will provide unexpected competition for Honda's CR-V and Range Rover's recently revealed Freelander in a niche which looks set to get increasingly crowded.

DIESEL car economics have prompted waste water treatment products suppliers Rotamat to convert to an all-diesel fleet. British Car Contracts is to supply eight Citroen Xantias as part of a four-year contract hire deal.

UNIVERSAL Salvage issued a profit warning last week and announced that managing director Richard Bird had left the company.

VAUXHALL chairman and managing director Nick Reilly has become the company's first British chief executive to become a corporate vice-president of parent company General Motors.

AN ambitious plan to take the guesswork out of collecting a new car is to be launched by Audi. In a pioneering move aimed at sparing customers' blushes when they get into new vehicles for the first time, the German firm is putting its entire UK model range on video.