This is the first manufacturer-sponsored trial of its kind in the UK and runs until the end of March, involving leasing companies Hitachi Capital Vehicle Solutions, GE Capital Fleet Services, ING Car Lease and Volkswagen Group Leasing. If it successful, Volkswagen Fleet Services plans to roll the system out to its entire fleet retailer network.  

MoDel is a new online solution which has been developed as a joint venture between Oxford-based online solutions Ebbon-Dacs and motor accessories supplier, VGroup International.  It fully automates the new vehicle delivery handover and collection process and allows customer satisfaction information to be fed back instantly into Ebbon-Dacs’ market-leading Leaselink e-procurement platform, which is used by the majority of UK leasing companies.

This reduces the time taken to record delivery and handover information, verify the condition of vehicles and collect and analyse customer feedback, as well as speeding up the invoicing and payment process. 

Iker Lazzari (Inset), National Contract Hire and Leasing manager at Volkswagen Fleet Services, said that the trial was expected to deliver around 500 new vehicles over the next three months to end-user fleet customers of the leasing companies involved.

'We are really committed to improving levels of customer service to both leasing companies and end user fleets and see MoDel as the ideal software solution to help us achieve this objective,' he said.

'We are working with a mix of small, medium and large sized dealers within our fleet business partners’ network to test the quality of the service and collect customer feedback information at the point of handover.

'At that point, we will ask the customer five service questions to rate the overall experience and capture their responses.  This anonymously gathered information will allow us to make any necessary improvements, and will help achieve our objective to be in the top five manufacturers in terms of customer service by the end of 2013.

'We are confident of a successful outcome to the project as we have employed a stringent and rigorous assessment of the system, its security, its compliance with data protection and its overall capabilities before embarking on the trial,' he added.

A series of review meetings will be held over the next three months between the various stakeholders to review progress of the trial before a final decision in March.

Every year, leasing companies deliver up to 500,000 vehicles to fleet customers via networks of preferred dealers, utilising a variety of methods, usually paper-based, of capturing vital feedback on vehicle condition, handover completion and customer experience.

By automating and standardising this process, MoDel allows CRM processes to be carried out far more quickly and efficiently, including capturing important customer satisfaction information, vehicle condition reporting, delivery confirmation and helping identify and remove errors from the delivery procedure.

Customer information is uploaded by PDA directly into Leaselink, which is used by dealers and leasing companies around the UK to electronically source and manage more than 100,000 new vehicles per annum. 

'We are delighted that Volkswagen Fleet Services has embarked on this pioneering trial with its fleet business partners and a selection of leasing companies to fully evaluate the MoDel system, said Robert Pilkington, managing director of the Leaselink International division of Ebbon-Dacs.

'Making the MoDel system the solution of choice for all their vehicle delivery and collection requirements will bring huge benefits in capturing customer feedback, eradicating errors and speeding up the vehicle delivery and invoicing process,'  he said.