Government fleets can make various improvements to their operations, the National Conference of State Fleet Administrators (NCSFA) found in its recently completed 2018 Benchmarking Survey. The survey’s purpose was to identify and establish consensus standards of measurement relevant to government fleets; it 44 state and university fleet participants.

Recommendations include institutionalizing robust fleet management policies and procedures, possessing an effective replacement program to guard against the next economic downturn, creating a well-designed cost charge-back system to increase costs transparency, and accelerating the implementation of technology to measure the efficiency and effectiveness of fleet management practices.

Scott Edwards, NCSFA President and Fleet Manager for the State of Colorado stated, “NCSFA continues to create a better understanding of the industry in which our membership severs each day. With the rapidly changing industry disruptors it becomes more important to understand how to gather the correct data to inform our members. This survey represents our most in-depth review of the membership and their needs. We envision this information will continue to be the building blocks of the future for NCSFA training and strategic leadership.”

The survey addressed 10 topics that included utilization management, procurement and disposal, safety, maintenance and repair, fueling, replacement, and technology use. Key observations include: most minimum utilization standards rely on mileage, which may not be entirely accurate; about 50% of fleets do not use cooperative purchasing; 30% fleets report that remarketing funds are returned to the fleet replacement reserve fund; more than 75% do not measure the effectiveness of their safety programs; more than 75% have an in-house maintenance and repair program; most have a minimum purchase requirement for alternative fuel vehicles; and one-third  are not replacing their vehicles in accordance with established guidelines.

The NCSFA partnered with Mercury Associates to conduct the survey. The full report is currently available to NCSFA members. A report sample and summary slide deck are available to nonmembers.