Issue - meetings

FULL BUSINESS CASE FOR THE 'INTRODUCTION OF CATEGORY MANAGEMENT - FLEET SERVICES PROJECT

 

 

Meeting: 02/09/2014 - Cabinet (Item 46)

46 FULL BUSINESS CASE FOR THE INTRODUCTION OF CATEGORY MANAGEMENT - FLEET SERVICES PROJECT pdf icon PDF 1 MB

Anthony Payne (Strategic Director for Place) will submit a report on the business case for the introduction of category management for fleet services which will better utilise the Council’s fleet services, reduce the number of vehicles and improve the procurement of them to deliver significant financial savings.

 

The report will also propose investments in fleet systems including control and tracker systems and the development of the fleet management and maintenance teams.

 

Background papers to this report can be accessed at the Council’s website Council and Democracy/Councillors and Committees/Library/Cabinet background papers or using the following hyperlink –

http://tinyurl.com/q3d6bmh

 

The outcome of the consideration by members of the Working and Your Plymouth Scrutiny Panels on 28 August 2014 will also be submitted

Additional documents:

Minutes:

Anthony Payne (Strategic Director for Place) submitted a report on the business case, including an options appraisal, for the fleet services project and proposing the introduction of category management which would better utilise the Council’s fleet services, reduce the number of vehicles and improve the procurement of them to deliver significant financial savings.

 

The report also indicated that the preferred option, option 2, –

 

(a)

would require investments in fleet systems including control and tracker systems; 

(b)

would involve the development of the fleet management and maintenance teams;

(c)

would result in the further efficiency of the workshop by improvements to the productivity of the workshop and garage function;

(d) 

would require an investment in IT amounting to £118k over a three year period and aimed to provide a total cumulative financial benefit of £2.05m by the end of the financial year 2016/17;

(e) 

was the most cost effective and beneficial option.

 

Councillor Vincent (Cabinet Member for Environment) introduced the proposals and referred to the three proposed work streams associated with option 2, as follows –

 

(f)

Fleet Management IT (FMIT) - the procurement and installation of both a FMIT system and a vehicle tracking system;

 

(g)

Finance Management: the monitoring of the procurement and commissioning of vehicular assets amongst the Council;

(h)

Commercialisation: exploration and consideration of additional commercial opportunities that were available to fleet and garage services including examining the potential to work with partner organisations, as well as reviewing the current taxi MOT and licensing policy.

 

Simon Dale (Interim Assistant Director for Street Services) and Stuart Cooper (Project Manager) attended the meeting for this item and Simon Dale advised that category management was a new initiative for the Council and referred to the benefits from the four way camera system which had already been installed in refuse collection vehicles. 

 

Councillor Evans (Council Leader) referred to the draft minute following the joint scrutiny review that had been held by the Working and Your Plymouth Panels on 28 August 2014 which supported the recommendations within the proposed business case in relation to this item.

 

Alternative options considered and reasons for the decision –

 

As set out in the report.

 

Agreed the business case for the introduction of category management for Fleet Services, together with option 2 of the option’s appraisal and the associated three work streams.

Meeting: 28/08/2014 - Scrutiny - Cooperative Scrutiny Reviews (Item 9)

9 CATEGORY MANAGEMENT FLEET SERVICES PROJECT BUSINESS CASE - TO FOLLOW pdf icon PDF 1 MB

Members will be provided with a copy of the Category Management Fleet Services Project Business Case for scrutiny.

 

Minutes:

The Chair advised Members that three business cases were attached to the agenda for consideration in which Simon Dale (Interim Assistant Director for Street Services), Lee Pundsack (Project Manager – Transformation) and Councillor Vincent (Cabinet Member for Environment) would provide a brief overview and answer questions. To facilitate good meeting management the Chair confirmed that each business case would be discussed individually and final recommendations, if any, would be discussed at the end of the meeting.

 

Simon Dale, Lee Pundsack and Councillor Vincent informed Members that –

 

(a)

the Council’s Fleet and Garage service currently controls most of, and maintains efficiently, the Council’s fleet; with such a large Fleet having many users, controls and standards of procurement the service requires review;

 

(b)

the project aimed to address the service through three work-streams including an IT vehicle tracking system, commissioning of vehicles and the exploration of additional commercial opportunities;

 

(c)

the proposed solution includes the fleet management and maintenance function taking control of all fleet matters, allowing a holistic view and central support and challenge across the Council;

 

(d)

the category management approach to fleet services would realise some significant financial benefits including fewer vehicles, reduced vehicles downtime, improved fuel control and better value procurement;

 

(e)

the projected was targeted to deliver at least £300k per annum in savings in the first year and a further £500k in the second year; this would result in an annual revenue reduction of £800k per annum by 2016/17. To deliver this there was a need for a one off total investment of £118k;

 

(f)

by developing the fleet management and maintenance teams and making the service financially viable, the service would be better able to compete in the market place;

 

(g)

this business case linked to other transformation business cases such as the Waste Collection Reorganisation and Street Services.

 

In response to questions raised it was reported that –

 

(h)

the Council would purchase the market leader in Fleet Management IT systems, to track vehicles and monitor the usage of each vehicle within the fleet;

 

(i)

the initial outlay of £91k for software development would count as a capital cost through the transformation programme;

 

(j)

since April/ May 2014 the Council had encouraged staff to take advantage of the Council’s MOT service at Princerock as the facility was underutilised;

 

(k)

the Council was talking to licensing officers as to whether the MOT taxi licensing arrangements could be provided by the Council other than several different providers;

 

(l)

the Council was in talks with other authorities to discuss the feasibility of extending the offer of some workshop space for their use;

 

(m)

the Council’s fleet vehicles which were previously parked in the Civic Centre car park had been moved to the top floor of the Theatre Royal car park as their usage could be monitored by the automatic number plate recognition system and pay and display spaces in the Civic Centre could be freed up for paying customers;

 

(n)

the current IT fleet  ...  view the full minutes text for item 9