Cox Automotive has acquired fleet mobile maintenance provider Dickinson Fleet Services to bolster the capabilities and geographic reach of its nationwide Pivet fleet services marketplace, and focus on powering a fleet future that is dependent on mobile maintenance and repair services.
The forecast of the cost of maintenance and unscheduled repair is anticipated to go up in CY-2021.
Goodyear has launched a new digital portal that allows fleets to buy tires, activate services, and gain deeper insight into their tire programs.
Dickinson Fleet Services has acquired Interstate Truck Center, forming a partnership which will provide fleets with an increased breadth of mobile services across both scheduled and unscheduled fleet maintenance.
Preventive maintenance (PM) expenses in CY-2020 were lower compared to 2019, primarily due to the pandemic-induced economic shutdown resulting in fewer miles driven as many fleet vehicles were idled.
The trend of increased PM costs per service will continue as more and more vehicles requiring conventional oil are taken out of service and replaced with models that require synthetics.
The ultimate outcome of the pandemic and the strength of the economic recovery are driving many predictions on future pricing.
The trend has been to extend PM intervals due to the use of longer-lasting synthetic motor oils, but during the COVID lockdown many fleet vehicles were idled, decreasing miles driven, causing PM compliance to diminish.
A perennial factor exerting upward pressure on replacement tire costs is the adoption of larger diameter tires and unique tire sizes. The increase in OEM automobile wheel diameters has driven up the price of fleet replacement tires, primarily because the larger the tire, the greater the manufacturing expense.
Reduced tire demand and a decrease in overall miles driven have caused tire manufacturing volume to decline in 2020, creating a downstream ripple effect softening commodity prices for natural rubber, but this may change in 2021.
The price of fuel is impacted by many variables making predictions difficult. However, there are certain variables that are in play today, which allows us to extrapolate and extend those trend lines into the next calendar-year and interpret possible outcomes.
Although unscheduled maintenance increased due to extended service lives, prolonged inactivity during the COVID lockdown, and longer downtime due to parts shortages, costs were flat as vendors refrained from price increases.
For the past decade, more OEMs are recommending the use of more expensive synthetic motor oils, which is increasing the cost of each PM service. But the higher quality motor oil also allows the intervals between these services to lengthen, which is offsetting some of the additional per-transaction costs.
One trend that is gaining momentum among commercial fleets during the pandemic is the use of mobile maintenance vendors. There has been a substantial uptick in fleet requests for mobile maintenance solutions as fleet managers look to minimize downtime and the administrative burden of taking their vehicle to a repair shop and having the driver wait.
The Ford 6.2L engine is covered by a nationwide, transferable parts and labor warranty of up to three years, or 100,000 miles.
The following charts detail U.S. passenger tire imports; available tire sizes; replacement medium/heavy truck tire brand shares; U.S. market share for retreaded truck tires; U.S. retreading trends; available passenger car sizes by rim diameter; U.S. truck tire imports; and more.
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