fleetmag.com |

With today’s ever-rising prices, for many fleet managers—particularly those in charge of government vehicles—squeezing every last mile from each vehicle is not only a priority, it is a necessity.

Yet, running vehicles on the road longer than usual can have its drawbacks—more work for technicians, more risk of costly accidents, increased downtime and lost revenues. And above all, you have to make sure that you’re using the correct numbers and formulas to figure the best time to replace vehicles, or you might end costing your fleet dearly.

It’s not an easy task, and with all the variables in play these days, it seems far easier to screw it up than do it right.

Having worked for 20 years on replacement costs for a large fleet, Bob Johnson, director of fleet relations for the NTEA, has seen it all, including countless life-cycle replacement cost formulas. While they can be helpful at times, he says none of them have been proven one way or the other and can often end up doing more harm than good.

“Probably every fleet out there has their own formula figured out, (but) the problem is while it’s a very good tool for comparing—especially in a non-government fleet—it will almost always show it’s cheaper to repair a vehicle to replace it,” Johnson says. “But the vehicle may be in such bad condition; there is nothing left to attach the replacement parts to, and if you’re not extremely careful in the way you do your life cycle cost analysis, that will get you false numbers.”

Johnson says in many cases, keeping things simple is the best approach.

“We had all sorts of studies and numbers we did, and we came up with some that said, depending on the class of the vehicles, you add ‘x’ years or ‘y’ miles,” he says. “And that seemed to work about as good as anything; the only trick is how you establish your years and miles.”

The main thing to remember is every fleet is different, and what numbers work for one could lead to financial disaster for another.