Duane Fullwood, financial director of Lyreco, explains:

“Prior to working with TMC our salespeople used a fuel card and paid tax for the “free fuel” benefit in kind (Fuel BIK). For Lyreco, providing this benefit meant an annual tax and NI charge. This was a significant cost, which increased each year.”

Lyreco decided to move its drivers on to a system that kept a record of their business mileage so that private mileage could be reimbursed to Lyreco on a monthly basis. The business looked for a provider that could offer the convenience of a fuel card while also enabling the drivers to record their mileage with the minimum of administrative effort.

Five potential providers made presentations and the company selected Fuel+ as its preferred solution.

• Lyreco liked the integrated offer of the mileage capture system together with the fuel card.
• Lyreco needed a fuel card that would be accepted at as big a network of fuel stations as possible.
• TMC’s mileage capture system is tried and tested in the market place and was proven to work for large fleets.
• TMC takes data on client’s fleet inventories, new orders, reallocations, etc. from leasing companies. TMC works closely with Alphabet, which is Lyreco’s preferred contract hire supplier.
• The fleet team at Lyreco really liked the TMC smartphone and tablet app, which greatly reduces the admin burden of recording business mileage trip by trip.
• Duane Fullwood wanted a provider with an inbound and outbound call centre as he did not want his Fleet Administration team to have to deal with drivers’ mileage queries or to have to chase drivers at month end if they had not logged their mileage
• “And of course cost was a key factor in our decision,” adds Mr Fullwood. “We felt that TMC provided the most cost effective solution for what we required.”

Before Lyreco took the final decision, its board met at TMC’s Cheshire head office. This allowed senior management to see the TMC set-up first hand, particularly the TMC Call Centre.

“We were extremely impressed by how professional the set-up was and how polite, efficient and friendly all of the team are,” said Mr Fullwood.

“We decided to roll the new solution out over a four-month period, with the first trial group of drivers going live from August 2015.”

To ensure the implementation went smoothly, TMC attended regional sales meetings to explain why Lyreco was moving to the new process and train users to use the mileage capture system and Fuel+ card. As well as providing all drivers with a welcome pack, TMC recorded a webinar for those unable to attend one of the road show events.

“These initiatives made the roll out so easy and seamless for us, with only minimal effort required on our part.” comments Mr Fullwood.

Implementation was timed to give drivers several months to get used to the system before Lyreco moved away from Fuel BIK at the start of the 2016/2017 tax year. It also allowed the business to build up a large amount of trip data in the TMC system.

With this data, TMC were then able to run a personal illustration for each driver to show them how their tax would be affected under the new scheme.

Lyreco’s intention was that no driver would be worse off under the new scheme. TMC’s data showed that over 90 per cent of the drivers would be better off, tax-wise, under the new reimbursement scheme. The data also highlighted the minority who would be worse off due to their high proportion of private mileage. TMC advised Lyreco what was needed to ensure that these drivers were properly compensated for their loss of benefit.

The new mileage capture and private mileage reimbursement scheme has proven to be very much a win-win for both Lyreco and its drivers, says Mr Fullwood, who says the total annual saving from the project runs into six figures. He made special mention of Lyreco’s account director at TMC.

“He managed the whole process for us brilliantly well and ensured that we achieved everything that we intended from the project, with minimum involvement and allowing us to continue to focus on our core business activities.”

“Lyreco’s annual savings from this project represent a six-figure sum. TMC made the whole process seamless and easy for us from start to finish and the project has been a huge success.”

Duane Fullwood, Financial Director