Fleet
Fuel management 101: A guide for fleet managers
Ask a fleet manager what fuel management means and they’ll likely give you multiple versions of the same answer: track fuel spend, cut waste, and save money.
Fuel management is the practice of monitoring, controlling, and improving how much fuel a fleet buys and uses. What most fleets miss is that fuel costs split into two categories: what you can influence and what you can not.
The price of fuel is out of your hands. But how much gets wasted through driver behaviour, poor routing, fraud or poorly maintained vehicles is controllable.
This blog walks through what a fuel management system is, how it holds up with electric vehicles, and where the savings come from.
What is a fuel management system?
A fuel management system is the hardware and software that works together to collect, analyse, and report on fuel-related data across a fleet. It turns individual transactions and vehicle data into actionable decisions about costs, efficiency, and compliance.
An effective fuel management system will consist of the following elements:
- Fuel tanks with monitoring sensors
- Fleet cards for secure fuel purchases
- Fuel management software for data analysis and regular reporting
- Integration with tracking technologies such as telematics and GPS
These systems work by cross-referencing the two sets of data on what should have happened (expected consumption, authorised purchases, planned routes) against what actually happened. When two data points have discrepancies, the system flags it for review.
How to manage fuel for mixed fleets
Managing fuel costs becomes more complex as fleets introduce electric vehicles alongside existing petrol and diesel vehicles. This transition is accelerating as the UK moves towards its zero-emission targets, with the Zero Emission Vehicle (ZEV) Mandate, manufacturers must ensure that 70% of all new vans and 80% of new cars sold in the country must be zero-emission by 2030.
This changes fuel management in three ways:
- The unit of measurement changes
Litres and pence-per-litre do not translate directly to kWh and pence-per-kWh, particularly when charging happens at depots, public networks, and drivers’ homes at different rates.
- The fraud and misuse vectors change
Fuel card fraud detection is built around pump transactions and tank-level checks. Home charging reimbursement introduces a different verification problem, matching claimed charging costs to actual usage without a centralised point of sale.
- Reporting has to hold two systems at once
A single dashboard needs to show total energy cost and consumption regardless of source, or emissions and cost-per-mile comparisons between diesel and electric vehicles become guesswork.
How much can fuel management save your fleet?
There is not a single number that can be tied to savings from an effective fuel management system. Savings come from several different places across the fleet and knowing which is which is key.
Driver behaviour: Idling, harsh acceleration, and harsh braking all end up costing the same thing: fuel burnt without a matching mile driven. It is usually the fastest lever to pull, since a telematics feed is often already collecting the data needed to spot the pattern.
Misuse: Fuel misuse is not uncommon for fleets. Research for Fleet News found that 64% of UK fleets have been the victims of fuel theft or fraud. Comparing fuel purchases with vehicle activity can help identify issues such as unexpected fuel use or transactions that do not match actual usage.
Regular maintenance: Neglected maintenance can have a negative impact on fuel economy. Tyres, for example, account for around 20–30% of a vehicle’s fuel consumption due to rolling resistance, so regular checks and maintenance can help prevent avoidable fuel costs.
Better routing: Unnecessary mileage quickly adds up across a fleet. The Department for Transport data shows that around 30% of HGV kilometres in Great Britain are travelled empty, highlighting the opportunity to reduce avoidable mileage through better planning and route management.
What is the environmental impact of fuel management?
Managing fleet fuel is not just good for your business’s efficiency. By optimising fuel consumption, you are also helping to cut down on greenhouse gas emissions.
The UK’s commitment to net-zero emissions by 2050 is driving stricter regulations on fleet emissions, with similar legislation in place in the EU. As regulations around carbon emissions continue to tighten, comprehensive fuel management practices can help ensure your company remains compliant and avoids penalties, making fuel management an even more essential tool of a your operations.
How to choose the right fuel management solution
Every fleet’s operations are unique, so choosing the right fuel management setup depends on your fleet’s size and operations, not which system has the longest list of features.
- Small fleets (roughly 5–40 vehicles) often do not have enough staff for this, so ease of use takes priority over depth. A fuel card with clear transaction reporting and insight is often the fastest way to get visibility without adding administrative work.
- Growing fleets are typically ready to connect that fuel data to how vehicles are actually driven, which is where telematics earns its place alongside the fuel card.
- Larger or mixed-energy fleets need the fuller picture: fuel cards, telematics, and vehicle tank sensors together, ideally in one system built to handle all fuel types and electric vehicle (EV) charging side by side rather than as separate reports.
Whether you’re a small fleet with straightforward data needs or a large fleet overseeing hundreds of vehicles, WEX has a suite of fuel management tools built to support you at every stage. As your visibility needs grow, including for fleets running a mix of fuel and electric vehicles, WEX grows with you.
Visit wexinc.com to learn more about fuel management solutions for fleets of all sizes.
