For fleet managers and independent owner-operators everywhere, effectively managing fuel costs will be critical to profitability in 2012. Luckily, companies have a few options on the table to help coping with the rise in fuel prices. Here are three strategies that companies can use to minimize the impact of high fuel prices on their bottom line.

Improve Fuel Purchasing - In addition to the price of oil rising, the market has also become increasingly volatile. Swings of five cents per gallon in a day are fairly common these days. Building some predictability into fuel procurement can help fleets make smarter buying decisions. There are a number of options to accomplish this but one that can help smaller fleets is the 360 Small Business Fleet Card. This card offers a 1% savings at the fuel pump at over 19,000 stations nationwide. If you are looking to lock in fuel prices, 360 offers a fuel price protection program that can also help you save thousands at the pump.

Better Manage Your Fleet - While there are some very impressive new technologies (e.g. eco-friendly engines and aerodynamic trailers) on the market, these can be pricey investments. Where companies get a far better bang for their buck is in smaller operational changes. For instance, employing highly-skilled drivers that are versed in fuel saving technique such as smooth acceleration and momentum control can save anywhere from five to 20 percent in fuel efficiency. Another boon is keeping tire pressures at proper inflation levels as a three percent variance in air pressure impacts fuel efficiency by one percent. These are just a couple of ideas. For a list of best practices, visit the EPA SmartWay website that aggregates best practices.

Plan Routes More Intelligently - A final way to save on fuel costs is to better plan the way that shipments are delivered. This boils down to delivering along more efficient manner routes as well as shipping loads more efficiently. There are a variety of route planning technologies available in transportation management systems. One of my favorite examples of how effective route planning technologies can be is how UPS saved on fuel costs by minimizing the number of left-hand turns drivers make. While this was just a minor change in the way UPS delivered their packages, it ultimately wound up saving them more than 10 million gallons of gas.

These are just a couple of ideas on how to save on fuel costs. What strategies are you seeing work. Please feel free to leave me a comment over at Software Advice – a website that reviews distribution management software. The original post can be viewed at: Three Strategies for Reducing Fuel Costs in 2012.

Please watch our video below and let us know what questions you may have!

Video Transcript:

Hey everyone, Jesse from 360Fuelcard here. Normally I handle the social media, such as our Facebook, Twitter and blogging. Today we are actually releasing our first ever video blog.  We are going to try and do one of these a week, just to give you some answers to questions that we have been asked, about our platform, about the different programs that we have. So please leave any comments and questions that you have down below and we will answer them in upcoming video blogs or just through email.

To get right into it, today I want to talk about 5 ways that a fleet card is going to save you money.  We have all kinds of ways that we came up with when putting this together, but really we just wanted to list our top 5 that we see can really help our customers and our clients. This will cover all of our programs not just one, so if you have questions about a particular program, please leave a comment below so we can answer it for you.

The first way that we see our fleet cards saving you money is through the discount network that we have set up. We are a discount program, so with our programs we have different discount networks designed to help our customers.  We also set up custom discount networks depending on where you are and where you fuel and what is going to best benefit you.

For our small business fleet card, which is for most of our customers, is going to allow you 20,000 discounted sites across the us with a 1% discount there. At today’s pricing that is averaging $0.035 per gallon.  Now our over the road program, has about 1,500 discounted sites ranging anywhere from a few pennies to $0.40 per gallon I’ve seen at times.  It has really helped out a lot of customers, we’ve actually had customers come back to us and say, “You are saving us thousands of dollars every month, why didn’t we sign up for this sooner?” So we’ve had a lot of good feedback on our programs there.

Another great way that a fleet card will help save you money is through administrative costs.  It’s proven that you can save up to 15% through a fleet card due to the fact that you don’t have to go through every receipt and figure out “was this actually purchased? Are these my drivers? Was this a personal vehicle?”. It really helps consolidate everything by having an online account, and this is true for both our small business fleet card and our over the road fuel card, in having the online account and really cutting down your costs.  Also a great benefit to this is, in this time of year – we are in December now – with tax season around the corner and this is really going to help prevent you bringing that shoe box of receipts to your tax preparer and having them look at you with a blank stare on their face. So it is really going to cut down on that, help them, help your company and really allow you to be more productive.

Another great way is through theft and slippage.  You may know your drivers, they may be buddy, they may be your best man at your wedding, but you don’t realize, and sometimes they don’t even realize how many times they will add on just a little thing such as a coffee.  They go in to pay for fuel, add on a coffee or a soda, whatever it is.  They think nothing of it, but those things add up. If they are getting a coffee a day for a year, you are looking at another $350 for the year that you just added on.

So the way a fleet card comes into play there is you are able to set restrictions around your fleet card. What I mean by that, is that you are able to set restrictions such as there can only be so many transactions per day. This particular card is on a Chevy Aveo, and only has a 12 gallon tank. If it’s fueling more than 12 gallons per day, something is wrong. This is all done mathematically and through our third level data capture. With a fuel card we can actually tell how many gallons are being filled, what time of day, are they using the right vehicle, etc. It’s really going to help cut down on that, really keep you on top of it.  We actually send you exceptions reports with our small business fleet card to let you know if something seems out of whack, and you can take care of it from there. It just keeps you right on level, and keeps your eye on the ball.

Along with our other discounts here, the non-fuel discounts on our small business fleet card, has really helped out a lot of companies. Like I said with theft and slippage, you can limit where your fuel card where it’s accepted such as making your drivers only pay at the pump. However, the owner can have a fuel card and open it up so they can purchase things at the postal service, they can buy tires, they could buy furniture if they wanted. The best part about that is they can take advantage of our discount network at the non-fuel locations. Those range from a few percent to ten percent at hotel chains, there’s a whole bunch and check out our website for more on that there, but that can definitely save you some money there as well.

This brings us to our final one today which is monthly billing. You may wonder how is that going to help me save money, well a lot of companies that we deal with run a tight ship.  They get paid once a month from their main clients.  How are they able to float this money if they need to pay weekly, bi-weekly, daily, deposit? We have a monthly billing cycle on our small business fleet card to help those companies get through the month. It allows you to not have to go borrow money, it really helps you keep your cash flow moving and allow you to keep moving as a company.

So that is all for today, just wanted to go over the 5 ways that a fleet card can save you money. Again, we have multiple programs, the small business fleet car and the over the road program. List all your questions below and let’s see how we can help you. Thanks for watching.

What a headline right? I guess by now we’ve all read what is going on, and we all have an opinion on it. I’ve heard reasons from the wars in the middle east all the way to the cries of the masses demanding that the oil companies stop ripping us off. At the end of the day we can’t prevent gas prices from going up, but we can do something to help keep our cost in check!
We are always looking at different ways to help 360 customers save money on their fuel expense, including by using some sort of hedge or fuel price protection program. The problem has been that the programs were too complex and would require a huge upfront cost to the fleet. We had put this on the back burner for awhile until we came across a company called FuelFox. This company allows fleets to purchase fuel at today’s price and lock in against future rising gas prices.
There are a couple different ways the program works within FuelFox, allowing for companies to either lock in at a price no matter what or, if the fuel price drops on the street, you pay the lower price on the fuel. In either option you first go on line and check out the average gas price in your area. When the price looks good go ahead and purchase a set amount of gallons which will be stored in your virtual fuel tank.
The first option means you will always pay whatever price you locked in at regardless of street price. This is great for companies who need to set a budget for their fuel for a given amount of time. Schools and other municipalities love this option because they do not have to worry about the market volatility causing them to go off budget in a time like this.
The second option is great for fleets who want to ensure that they will receive the lowest price at the time of pumping. Now when you go to the fuel station, if the price is above what you paid, you will automatically use those ‘virtual gallons’ saving you the difference between the pump price and what you paid. If, however, you are at the pump and the current retail price is lower than the virtual gallons price, you pay the pump price – saving the virtual gallons for a later time.
One of the main advantages to this program is that it is tied right to your 360 mixed fleet fuel card meaning you can buy fuel wherever you want and all of the tracking is done on-line. The minimum purchase is just 100 gallons at a time, and the gallons do not expire. The only fee associated with the program is 1% of initial purchase per month. In other words, if you bought 100 gallons today, and used them all in one month, your fee would only be 1 gallon. If you kept that 100 gallons for 6 months, the fee would have been 6 gallons over that time. Everything about this program is easy, and made with the fleet in mind.

We will be starting our Fuel Price Protection Webinars regarding our new program soon, and of course check out the FAQ Page for answers to some of the questions you may have.

As I said, we are always looking and would love to hear what others are doing to get ahead as we can all learn from each other. Let us know if you have any questions we can help with and what you doing to help your company save money with these rising fuel prices.

While we work with many companies that have dozens or even a few hundred vehicles, sometimes our fleets can consist of a single heavy truck, who chooses our over-the-road program. Others may contain  three to four vehicles using retail stations who apply for our small business fuel card. Then there are always the companies who have a little of both, but luckily we have a program for that as well!

As a company, you need to be able to track all fuel purchases and expenses as you need to be sure you are receiving the best deal and all of the fuel you are paying for. Paperwork adds up for fleets of all sizes, especially when you are trying to handle more than just what your job title describes! One benefit of a fuel card is that all accounting can be done right online so that you can add & delete cards on the fly or change how your drivers can use the card at a moment’s notice.

So what do you think now? Is your company ‘to small’ for a fuel card? Contact us and see if we can save you some money while helping get your expenses in line!

• Health, Wealth and Wise
• Take your Financial Blindfold Off
• Networking and a Portland Pirates Hockey game

OK that’s three events I can choose from this month, guess which one I like?  No doubt, I am going for the Hockey game.  There is nothing like a good game with supporting spirits of the local players for a team building activity. Even though this is going to be fun, it’s also going to be a little challenging.  Networking in a stadium may be a little chaotic and I wonder if anyone will have a chance to connect.  How am I going to do it?

I am going with my entrepreneurial mindset and I am setting some goals:

1) Make at least one connection

2) Purse that relationship

3) Stayed connected

I have been to many social events where people gather business cards but do you ever wonder what they do with them?  How many times have you received a phone call or email about your product?  I am going to be proactive, take ownership and stay focused on getting a connection.  I understand fuel-cards are not always the most exciting product to talk about with a Women’s Group but I hope one person has a green company which will allow me to get noticed for our green products.
I remember a story a local realtor told me about putting yourself in front of people.  He was new to the area and wanted business from the community so he decided he would attend the Town’s planning board meetings.  Of course, the meeting are televised and he would stand up and say a few words at each meeting.  He wasn’t associated with any of the projects but what he did do is get noticed. Today he has a leading agency and is recognized and people know his name.  If I can make that same connection with the Women’s group than I may be able to build on my relationship to explain why our green fuel-card is the best option for any business.

I do understand there is a time and place for everything and I will assess my environment.  If the stadium is too noisy than I am not going to ask for a megaphone to talk about our brand. Even though that may be hilarious to watch, it would be getting noticed in all the wrong ways.  In any case, this event should be interesting and you will have to check back here at the 360Fuelcard Blog page to see my results.

In the meantime, check out your local social networking events and tell us about it.  Or do you have an interesting experience about a networking event in your area? If so, share it here.

How many times have you mailed a letter, placed a call, sent a email and received no reply?  Yet, send a text and you get an instant response.  I was recently watching the news and Facebook is the number one visited site on the web – even more than Google.  I think I was in shock it has reached this size, Facebook is now worth more than e-bay and Time Warner!

I than realized with every aching bone in my body there are no more excuses, I have to embrace social networking. I really enjoy socializing and interacting with people in person, but to put that same connection through the web seems simply impersonal. I knew at that moment though, I had to change my antisocial thinking and explore viral marketing.   Understanding our demographics and who fits our products best, especially with our new product coming out Q1 viral marketing may be the best way to announce our newest discounted fuel-card.  So how am I going to keep my goals on track?

I set real timelines of attending networking webinars, seminars and events as I am sure if I take the first step than the second and third will come easier.  I believe taking a class, writing a blog, or attending a women’s social hour will also help me keep socially connected this year and eventually by year-end I will have reached my real goal of advertising success.

So have you made social networking work for your business? If so, please let us know and maybe we can share some ideals this year together.

My real concern about all this is the loss of patience, including my own, when on the road. New Years is known for being a very dangerous day to drive, typically after the bars get out.  I don’t think we pay enough attention to the day before and after as there are countless families on the road.  Although it is sometimes hard to keep our wits end about us, we need to focus on the road and make sure that not only we, but the cars around us, get home safe and sound. We need to remember that a few minutes on the road behind that truck going 10 under isn’t the end of the world.

For me, I just look in the mirror and see my daughter smiling back at me, and suddenly my tensions of driving quickly go away.  Anyways, I’m off for a little trip of my own.

I hope you all had a great holiday season, and drive safe!

There is a new proposal from the US Dept of Transportation for all passenger vehicles under 10,000 lbs (passenger cars, SUV’s, pick-up trucks, minivans, buses and low-speed vehicles) to be equipped with a rear view system, they are proposing this to be completed by 2014.

The Safety Administration wants all drivers to able to see directly behind them when a transmission is put into reverse.  They said, about 140 fatalities from pickup trucks and SUV are the cause of mostly children killed each year by drivers not knowing if someone was behind the vehicle.  They expect that all automobile manufactures will include the rear view system as a standard feature after 2014.  The rule will start to phase in by 10% late 2012, than 40% by 2013 and 100% by 2014.

Will you be ready for this safety act as it comes along?  I think if it saves a life it is worth every penny, but how will it affect your fleet?

As far as a fleet managers stand point, your costs have leveled out for the last year as the price of fuel finally stabilized. Other markets such as tires, fleet maintenance and services have absorbed the inflation during these times as they do not want to lose what business they have.

I am sorry to report then, that these days are about over, and the forecast for the near future is headed back to the way we knew it. It is projected that services and fleet maintenance, which includes oils, parts, labor and shop supplies is expected to increase by 3-5% in 2011. The cost of fuel is expected to be around $2.90 all in for next year which is an added 6-8% over this year’s fuel expense.  At the end of the day, fuel is a real wild card as we all remember to well fall of 2008 when the prices sky rocketed. All of these really goes back to the fact that we have to take control of our fuel management and watch every penny closely while our economy turns back up for the better.

Feel free to share with us the benefits you’ve had with a fuel card for your company!