Out of 115 fleets questioned by MIB Data Solutions, which produces the Fleet Data and Fleet Entire industry databases, 23% said that their fleet was today smaller than at the technical end of the recession in autumn/winter 2009.

This contrasts with 17% of fleets who say that they have grown and 60% who say that their fleet numbers have been unchanged over the same period. The companies questioned covered a wide range with between 1-600 cars, vans and trucks.

Nick Boddington, managing director, at MIB Data Solutions, said that the data suggests that the recession was having a marked, negative effect on many UK businesses long after it had technically ended and into a period when there was mild economic growth recorded.

He added: ‘Certainly, our data indicates that the number of fleets who have reduced in size during the last two years outnumber those who have seen an increase by some margin.’

Boddington said that an interesting point from the survey data was that the reductions had been concentrated towards larger fleets, with one respondent reporting a fall in size from 450 to 300 vehicles.

He said: ‘It is difficult to draw exact conclusions from this trend but perhaps suggests that smaller, more nimble companies had already downsized their fleets to the minimum level at the time when the recession ended while larger organisations were still in the process of making changes to their fleets at that point.

‘However, the research is not all bad news. 17% of companies did say to us that their fleet size had increased, which is perhaps an indication that the economic growth seen in 2010-2011, while subdued, still had a positive effect.’