Daily rental companies are working hard to reduce maintenance costs as they learn to deal with the demands of running older fleets, says epyx.
The fleet e-commerce specialist says that pre-recession, many daily rental companies gave little thought to service and maintenance because they often ran vehicles for six months or less.
However, manufacturer unwillingness to enter into fast cycle, buy back business during the last two years has forced them to run cars and vans into a year or more of ownership.
Ken Trinder, head of business development, said that epyx been able to see this trend because a number of rental companies had signed up to its 1link Service Network service network e-commerce platform with the aim of taking greater control over SMR costs.
He explained: "Before the recession, even some very large daily rental companies had limited in-house knowledge of handling fleet maintenance because they often returned buy back to the manufacturer before the first service was needed. Their skill base was limited to minor repairs and safety checks.
"However, we now see many daily rental companies running vehicles into a second year of fleet life and they are coming to grips with controlling maintenance costs very quickly. Certainly, a number of them are coming to grips with SMR e-commerce."
Trinder said that the daily rental industry of 2010 was very different to that seen just a few years earlier, with a much greater accent on proactive management of cars and vans.
He said: "Rental companies have traditionally been very good at two things - renting out vehicles and doing deals with manufacturers. Now, the picture has changed and they have very quickly got up to speed when it comes to everyday fleet issues such as maintenance and disposal, often turning to e-commerce technology."