A Taxing Approach to Recovering Dollars, and What Else is on the 2012 Docket?

By Elisa Durand, January 31st, 2012 @ 8:21 pm

Now that 2012 is full swing, some of us may have already broken our personal, well-intentioned New Year resolutions.  But it’s never too late to make a fresh list of what we’d like to accomplish this year! So why not start with your fleet?

Many of you are most likely way ahead of me. You’re probably already in the process of taking a step back and looking for possible areas to cut cost from your fleet operation without throwing the proverbial baby out with the bathwater. But once you’ve exhausted the key best-practice areas, what’s left?

It’s time to get serious about ancillary opportunities.

For example, instead of just trying to cut fuel spend, look at creative ways to recover some of it! For certain fleets, much-needed monies can be recouped through fuel tax refunds. Fleets that utilize off-road vehicles, machinery such as lift-trucks,  operate PTOs, or drive on-road vehicles off-road occasionally can apply for a refund of the highway use portion of fuel taxes. There are a handful of other activities that qualify as tax exempt. If an organization has enough off-road fuel usage, this effort can translate into substantial returns.

This is just one example of how to look beyond the core opportunity areas of acquisition, maintenance, fuel, et al. Other examples could include fuel price hedging, driver incentive programs,  and new technologies to track fleet usage.

What creative ways are you looking at your fleet spend in 2012?

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