A major decision for every fleet truck manager is whether or not they will structure their fuel card program by vehicle or by driver. With several successful examples for both orientations, it’s one of those decisions that have just as many pros on one side as it does cons on the other. Which is why, at the end of the day the decision needs to come down to what is best for the company. So let’s do the work, explore all of those pros and cons so at the end of it all, an informed decision can be made.
First and foremost, the decision as to whether a fuel card is oriented by vehicle or by driver is determined by how a fleet uses the two. What I mean to say is that it depends on whether or not drivers rotate through a lot of vehicles or use just one.
Vehicle Cards
When you center your fuel card program around your vehicle, what you get is this…
- A fuel card for each vehicle in your fleet, that is to be stored within the vehicle and has the vehicle # printed on it.
- Drivers that assigned personal Pin#’s as a part of a “floating PIN” number system.
A vehicle card system is best suited for companies whose drivers switch trucks a lot, or who have a high truck driver turnover rate. Reason being, that when it comes to spotting misuse it is most important to be able to identify the “who”. So by using a floating pin system, your drivers can use any vehicle card in your fleet to purchase fuel, but with their own personal Pin#. This way, you the manager can know who is buying fuel no matter what truck they are in. To the other point now, it is much easier to set up a Pin # than it is to receive a new card. The former is near instant, the latter can take up to 2-3 days. So as new drivers come in, and old drivers leave the most effective way to over see the turnover is to give us at CNRG Fleet a call and set up one new Pin# as you cancel another.
Driver Cards
When you center your fuel card program around your drivers, what you get is this…
- A fuel card for each driver in your fleet, that is kept on the driver’s person and has the driver’s name printed on it.
- A uniquely assigned Pin# for each driver.
A driver card system then, is best suited for trucking fleets where drivers don’t rotate trucks very often. As a result, a floating Pin system isn’t necessary because drivers will more often than not only being using a single card. Which means, that each card can be accessed by a single Pin# because it is being used by only one driver.
For more articles on fuel card program management click here. For more information on how to set up a Floating Pin# system, see below.
