Tackle Year-End Fleet Expenses Sooner Rather Than Later

With Thanksgiving newly in the rearview mirror, the country is already preparing to put 2019 behind it— and that goes for the trucking industry as well. While folks are squirreling away holiday surprises and thinking about the guest list for New Year’s, many fleet managers are coordinating fleet expenses and preparing to wrap up financials by the end of the year. It is a stressful time of year for all businesses but especially for an industry that is constantly on the move. However, if owner/operators, carriers, and even contract drivers were smart, they adopted technology to help at the beginning of the year that allowed them to stay up to date through the end.

Industry Partners Can Make Fleet Expenses a Breeze

Large and government fleets often rely on knowledgeable partners to handle the bulk of their fleet financials. Payment leader EFS/WEX provides electronic payment solutions to help optimize and simplify the financial supply chain while managing expenses all year long. Regardless of the size or complexity of the business, they can help reduce manual processes and enhance control over and visibility of fleet payment, in turn streamlining the expense management process.

With EFS/WEX, you too can:

• Replace paper-based payments and remittances with seamless electronic transactions
• Increase customization and control to better manage and restrict timing, recipient, and amount of each payment
• Improve margins
• Enhance data capture to reduce the burden of manual reconciliation
• Support core business strategies with our industry expertise and knowledge of best practices

Fuel Cards That Manage Fleet Expenses for You

When it comes to fleet expenses, collecting receipts does not have to be the headache it once was. Fleet and fuel cards can help to manage expenses for you by tracking costs automatically. Whether you are a driver or a fleet manager, you can find the right fuel card to help you control expenses and manage receipts while also providing savings on fuel expenses with special rebates and discounts at your favorite fueling locations, wherever the job takes you. EFS/WEX provides fleet cards designed for small business, large fleets, and government fleets—because not all fleets are the same.

For larger fleets, a more robust card is required to capture and manage all fleet expenses, especially at the end of the year. The WEX Fleet Card experience is driven by the industry’s largest proprietary fuel payment network—more than 160,000 retailers nationwide, which means unparalleled data capture, more robust reporting, more effective controls, and analytics to help you make smarter cost-saving decisions. Some of the benefits include:

Data & Analytics

A closed-loop network captures more data for every transaction, including driver ID, job number, and odometer reading. This provides the increased security, administrative flexibility, and detailed custom reporting needed to streamline operations. WEX’s ClearView data analytics platform provides quick, actionable insights into a fleet’s fueling in a simple and easy-to-use interface.

EFS/WEX can help to enforce the company spending policy with custom limits on WEX Fleet Cards—any attempted purchase that falls outside specified limits will be declined. Email alerts can be executed based on specific spending behaviors such as out-of-state purchases, off-hours fueling, and incorrect fuel grade. Set controls based on:

• Hours of the day
• Days of the week
• Dollars per day, week, or transaction
• Number of transactions in a given time period

Service & Support

There is always a U.S.-based customer support team available and ready to help 24/7 from January 1 through December 31.

• 35 years of world-class service
• 75% of calls answered within 20 seconds
• Industry-leading customer retention
• Consistently ranked in the Top 100 customer call centers

Smaller businesses can also benefit from using the right fleet card to help manage year-end financial reporting. The WEX Fleet Card is the fastest way for a growing business to access funds while driving savings and managing expenses.

The card provides automatic accounting and reports, controls employee spending, sends purchase alerts, and scouts available rewards while delivering financial information throughout the year, not just at the end. These benefits include:

Security & Control

Driver IDs are entered for every transaction, to indicate who spends what, where, and when—and help prevent unauthorized use. The WEX fleet card can also provide the flexibility to set the purchase controls that work best for your business, putting guardrails on employee spending based on product type, dollar amount, time of day, and more.

Accounting & Reports

Details like driver ID, fuel grade, sales tax, and more are captured for every purchase—so collecting fuel receipts is not necessary. View spending in real time or in one-click reports:

• Purchase activity reports
• Exception, transaction summary, and transaction deal reports
• Financial summary, site summary, and exception summary reports
• Tax exemption reports (for qualified fleets)

Mobile Account Access

A reliable mobile control center for the fleet card account is also a vital resource for tracking fleet expenses. With the Fleet SmartHub app, the account is always just a tap away.

• Look up driver IDs
• View and filter transactions
• Check your fuel card credit limit
• Cancel lost or stolen cards
• Spot potential misuse

So even though we’re still in early December, deadlines are looming large. Hopefully technology is on your side, limiting stress to just the holiday shopping rush and getting home for family celebrations.

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