Financial freedom through flexible fleets

The purchase of a business fleet is often hampered by various challenges, long-term contracts, and a significant cash outlay that can hurt liquidity. Thankfully, buying isn’t the only option.

The demand from companies opting for traditional vehicle financing has decreased and fleet purchasing decisions have been deferred by many businesses, due to the break in business continuity caused by various lockdowns, weak economic growth, and the uncertainties associated with operating in a post-pandemic world. Consequently, vehicle subscription services for businesses are gaining popularity worldwide.

FlexClub is a local player in this field. It offers businesses easy access to a flexible business fleet solution and monthly vehicle subscriptions, reducing the burden on cash flow and, quite simply, helping businesses maintain control of their fleet costs.

“The FlexClub marketplace provides companies with a range of easy access, flexible, all-inclusive, and fixed monthly subscription offers to build their fleet with low-mileage vehicles (under six months old) that meet all of their business requirements, while liberating them from the need to carry long-term fleet commitments. This is especially useful if their business faces demand seasonality,” says Tinashe Ruzane, CEO and co-founder of FlexClub.

An array of additional benefits 

Vehicle subscriptions are tax-deductible and companies can avoid having to carry the risk of higher wear and tear costs. Over and above this, structured monthly subscription fees allow capital that would otherwise be spent on a purchase to be better used as working capital for the business.

Businesses in the early stages of development can also use FlexClub to access the fleet capacity they need, even if they have less than three years of operating history and audited financials (a typical requirement for business fleet financing). The flexibility to scale the fleet up or down, as well as swap or cancel the service at any time, makes this a perfect solution for businesses seeking more control and resilience.

Spoiled for choice

FlexClub has a diverse range of vehicles available – everything from sedans and luxury cars to commercial vehicles such as transporters and utility vehicles.

“What’s exciting for us is the great feedback we’re receiving from our early business customers,” says Ruzane. “Several customers now cite saving 75% of the time they used to spend on fleet management, enabling them to focus on their core business.

“Our vehicle subscription marketplace helps businesses stay in control of their fleet expenses, giving them the freedom to increase or decrease their fleet at will and easily upgrade their fleet whenever they need to.”

Business subscriptions on FlexClub also cater for companies that need temporary corporate branding across their fleet, which is often a priority for SMEs looking to raise brand awareness and customer demand.

Renting a vehicle for a load

Empty Trips, Africa’s first fully digital end-to-end logistics marketplace, was designed to address one of the biggest inefficiencies in the traditional logistics space: trucks returning empty from deliveries.

It does this by making those trips available to customers (shippers) directly, via a smart freight-matching platform. Besides helping to turn wasted road miles into income for hauliers, the platform gives shippers access to the best deals from a large fleet of reputable transporters, who bid for cargo on an open exchange.

“For a country like South Africa, where roads are relied upon to transport goods, higher logistics costs ultimately translate into higher prices of goods for the end customer,” says Andrew Crafford, Empty Trips managing executive. “The Empty Trips platform will bring efficiencies and greater transparency to the sector, make shipping more cost-effective, increase the availability of reliable haulier options for shippers, and improve supply chain visibility.”

A boost in efficiency

Supply chain visibility is increasingly important for logistics managers, driven by a rise in disruptions, changing customer requirements, and the need for better operational efficiency. A key benefit of Empty Trips is that it allows shippers to monitor deliveries in real-time and manage their contracts seamlessly and transparently. The platform provides instant proof of delivery, while invoices and payments are consolidated automatically, enabling the administration to be concluded timeously and efficiently.

According to Crafford, the Empty Trips platform makes a fleet of over 3 600 trucks available to shippers.

Based on their available transport space and route at a given time, the platform’s algorithms match available capacity to loads to be moved. Carriers can then bid securely and anonymously, with payment secured through the platform.

“Empty Trips is an innovative partnership between carriers and shippers that has the potential to change the logistics industry for the better, establishing greater transparency and more effective delivery while creating a more sustainable future – for business and the environment,” he says.

With flexible fleet solutions like Empty Trips and FlexClub, transporters can gain more financial freedom if they follow the rental route.