Independent garages could get the skills and auditing they need to help them attract fleet customers, thanks to a new venture.
Fleet Guy was set up last year by Tim Guidotti, a workshop owner who wanted to address what he saw as a lack of support for independent garages looking to work with fleet companies.
Guidotti, whose Ferdotti Motor Services mainly serves fleet customers, said the inspiration for Fleet Guy came from having regularly been asked by other independent garages for advice about fleet work, with no recognised training on the subject available to them.
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Fleet Guy, which currently works with around 100 garages – a number which is increasing – provides a training programme with modules ranging from basic differences between fleet and retail work, to detailed guidance on aspects such as using booking portals and navigating service-level agreements.
Fleet Guy also offers a monthly question and answer session with Guidotti, monthly ‘Meet the Fleet’ sessions with fleet company representatives, and the Fleet Guy Community, which provides a further opportunity for garages to have questions answered.
In addition to these, Fleet Guy is launching two new major initiatives. The first of these is the Fleet Guy Certified programme, which has gained accreditation from the Institute of the Motor Industry (IMI), and is designed to create a clear benchmark for independent garage fleet work.
The second new initiative, the Fleet Guy Audit Hub, is designed to make it easier for fleets to ensure garages they use are compliant.
Explaining the benefits Fleet Guy can offer from both a fleet and garage perspective, Guidotti said: “Fleets want really good garages that are investing in equipment, people and capabilities. Garages want to work with really good fleets who recognise that and want to build closer relationships with those garages.”
Training has IMI backing
For a garage to become Fleet Guy Certified, it must complete a 40-question assessment, based on a 12-month training programme, and complete a live audit.
Guidotti explained that as a garage owner, he had found it difficult to demonstrate Ferdotti’s aptitude for fleet work, and that Fleet Guy Certified would allow garages to do this.
He said: “None of us would entertain bringing a heating engineer to fix our boiler unless they were Gas Safe. I wanted to create a standard for fleet SMR for independent garages – that was my mission.
“I’m really pleased that we have become an accredited IMI training centre, and the Fleet Guy training programme is now IMI approved, and we can now certificate garages to the IMI standard.
“I wanted to partner with the IMI to make sure we had that rigour behind what we are doing.”
Audit Hub gives garages streamlined compliance platform
The Fleet Guy Audit Hub platform (pictured above) provides garages with a single place to upload and maintain compliance evidence, which can then be viewed by their fleet customers in real time.
The platform allows fleets to specify customised compliance requirements for garages they want to work with, and check that documentation is supplied and updated accordingly, with automatic alerts if issues come up.
Guidotti said: “Audits are very costly, and they’re not very green. They are a person coming on site. They are static snapshots – a photograph of that business at a moment in time.
“You could have an audit asking for copies of insurance, they take a photo, they go in a file – what happens if that insurance expires in two months?
“Fleet Guy Audit Hub is the next generation of audit, and it’s real-time compliance.”
The Audit Hub platform was initially developed to support the auditing aspect of the Fleet Guy Certified programme, but it was subsequently realised that its functions could also be of use to fleet customers.
Guidotti said: “We realised that we could give fleets a window into this world of garages. And they could see these garages, for the first time, in real time, and live.
“We’ve developed real-time compliance with a large dashboard, automatic alerts – it’s an industry first.”
Fleet industry support for offering
A roundtable event on the subject of the future of fleet SMR was held by Fleet Guy this week in partnership with Castrol and Automechanika Birmingham. It saw Guidotti seeking input from fleet companies on Fleet Guy services, in particular Fleet Guy Certified and the Audit Hub.
Guidotti explained that the Certified programme had the potential to evolve in line with feedback received, as did the Audit Hub.
He said: “When you become IMI approved, it’s not static. You are in regular communication with your assessor, and as your qualification evolves, you’re in a constant to-and-fro with them to let them know how it’s evolving.
“So, it’s a developing, iterative process. And with the way that the industry’s moving so quickly, it has to be.”
Among the roundtable attendees was Debbie Rivers, head of mission critical operations at leasing company Ayvens, who gave a favourable reception to the event and the Fleet Guy offering.
She said: “You can see how excited the industry is by this, and that it’s actually been crying out for something like this, for somebody to kind of lead the independents and say: ‘This is what good fleet looks like. This is the level that is expected. This is the right way to engage. And actually, this is how you put yourself first in those conversations as well’.”
Rivers explained that there was a major role for independent garages to play in fleet maintenance.
She said: “At Ayvens, we really focus on our independent network. We really want to work with independents who have the best lead time, who have the best skill set, who live and breathe the industry, and we notice the benefit of working with them.
“The relentlessness that they bring in problem solving really benefits our customers.”
Rivers said there were also clear benefits for independent garages in getting involved with fleet work.
She said: “I think there’s a huge opportunity for them to do something exciting.
“It will bring different vehicles in, different manufacturers, different issues. It will bring different levels of complexity, and actually, a broader customer base as well.”
Guidotti said that Fleet Guy Certified was expected to launch at the end of June, and the Audit Hub was also set for a beta launch with garages by the end of the month.
He also said he hoped the roundtable could become an annual event, and added: “What I’d love to see is that it starts to promote closer relationships between fleets and garage networks.”