Teva UK, the largest supplier of prescription packs to the NHS, is part of global pharmaceutical firm Teva Pharmaceutical Industries, and operates a 185-strong UK fleet of Volkswagen, BMW, Mercedes-Benz and Ford-badged cars on a national basis, primarily for its field sales force and management personnel.

The vehicles are supplied under a pan-European funding agreement by a solus international leasing company in an arrangement designed to achieve purchasing efficiencies.

Teva felt, however, that its fleet needed to be run more professionally and decided to bring in fleet management experts, CLM, to professionalise its management to professionalise the management of its fleet, improve driver support, cut costs and cut carbon dioxide emissions, which it felt, at an average of 138g/km per vehicle, were too high.

Since its appointment, CLM has already reduced servicing and maintenance costs by around 20% through careful invoice management and improved service scheduling.

At the same time, CLM introduced an online portal for Teva drivers to help them select and order their new cars from the brands available on the company choice list, while low-carbon emitting Lexus and Toyota hybrid models have been added to the fleet policy to help reduce the corporate carbon footprint.

In addition, a new online mileage capture and authentication system will allow Teva drivers to enter their mileages online, have them authenticated by postcode, and then automatically submitted to the payroll department for processing.

Imtiaz Naqui, head of purchasing at Teva UK, said that CLM’s appointment was already bringing results.

‘Although we use an international leasing company to source our vehicles under a pan-European agreement, we felt that we also needed management expertise to run the fleet more efficiently.

‘Since appointing CLM, we have seen a marked improvement in the way our fleet is managed and our drivers are supported. We can also see that the “green” initiatives we have introduced with CLM will help drive down our carbon footprint,’ he said. 

Simon Cotton, head of account management at CLM, added: 'Our objective for Teva, as with all of our clients, is to ensure the fleet is run efficiently and effectively, and that every driver receives first-rate customer support, regular communications and fantastic service. We are already starting to see positive results emerging.'