WHEN it comes to long term rental, Northgate offers a comprehensive range of support packages for SMEs, with a wide range of fleet solutions to meet the diverse needs of our business customers at every stage of their journey.

Importantly with Northgate, highly commended in this year’s Business Motoring Awards, additional support packages can be built into its long-term rental contracts, cutting down the need for multiple supplier agreements to be signed and multiple accounts to be managed.

Set up times are minimised for the customer as turn-key solutions are ready to go, but also, thanks to a drive for simplification, administration and reporting times are minimised for fleet managers.

Risk management and compliance, accident management, telematics, fuel cards and even vehicle inspection apps can all be included in the same contract, and these diverse functions can all be supported by a single Northgate account manager.

In simplifying processes and relieving the burden of administration from hard working SMEs, Northgate believes that its service proposition supports companies with more than just the provision of vehicles to meet their fleet needs, it allows them to concentrate on achieving their business goals.

Northgate’s Accident Management package can proactively assist with every aspect of incidents, from the First Notification of Loss (FNOL) to repairs, the provision of replacement vehicles and legal services. With vehicle recovery, damage assessment and repair, downtime management, third party intervention and even loss recovery all included, it is a complete solution for all businesses.

Fleets of any size benefit from knowing that even in the event of multiple incidents occurring at once, their drivers will be helped back on the road efficiently and that with every stage of the process being recorded in detail by Northgate’s 24h assistance team, all resolutions will be fully accounted for at every stage.

For hire customers, Northgate’s updated Fleet Management package is included as standard. As a flexible account-managed solution, it takes away yet more administration from fleet managers, as our systems monitor the servicing, MOT, tax, insurance renewals and the repair needs of all vehicles.

By communicating directly with drivers, Northgate can let them know where they need to be and when for vehicle servicing, relieving the fleet manager of the booking process. Better still, because Northgate has a large network of nationwide workshops, drivers are never too far from a garage, and our team are never too far away to get a vehicle back on the road.

Best of all, Northgate’s Fleet Management package saves businesses money. Over the past year it has saved larger fleet customers an average of £63,000 that would have been spent on their vehicles SMR needs.

Northgate’s Telematics solutions packages can transform the way that fleet operators deliver cost savings, improve their driver safety and maximise customer service across their fleets. With two package levels on offer, Control, and Control+, Northgate customers can choose a service level which best fits their needs.

Control offers live vehicle tracking, journey histories, vehicle status and even monitors out-of-hours vehicle use, while Control+ offers the additions of driver behaviour monitoring and reporting, provided in real time by SMS if desired. Of huge benefit to fleets of all sizes, our telematics solutions can be integrated with the other packages that it offers, including fuel card connectivity. By enabling customers to view fill up locations alongside vehicle MPG stats, businesses can minimise the potential of fraudulent fuel use.

When combined with Northgate’s Safe Driver training provision, the Telematics Solutions ensure ultimate safety and compliance for fleets, in an easy to administer format for businesses.

Northgate Safe Driver is a training, compliance, and driver support package, which can be included in a rental package either in conjunction with, or separately to the telematics package. More than just a rapid licence validation service for fleet managers, Safe Driver offers bespoke training for managers and drivers on how to reduce risks on the road, and even helps the traditionally problematic area of grey fleet management.

By ensuring that all employee-owned vehicles in business use are correctly insured, have up to date MOT and tax, Safe Driver removes a further pain-point for fleets of all sizes. Within a month of launching Safe Driver, five companies had registered over 200 drivers in total for the service.

Finally, having listened to customers on their desire for a more frictionless method of vehicle inspection and reporting, the company has introduced the Northgate Vehicle Inspection App. This mobile app allows drivers to complete inspections quickly and submit the results in real-time. With an option of supplementing recorded damage with photographs, the app is 100% paperless, and makes this key stage of vehicle inspections quicker and easier for users, while meeting all relevant compliance standards.

Northgate’s exceptional customer service team, which provides SMEs with a single point of contact for all queries, is a true support for all operators. With a review service for customers which includes a ‘review pack’ with all transactional and charging data, customers have complete transparency over their spending with us, and Northgate will always highlight areas in which a customer could benefit from cost savings, or additional services in the future.

As a true one-stop-shop, mobility solutions provider, Northgate’s flexible and long term rental packages for up to 48 months is ideal for SMEs.