Predictive maintenance has emerged as the technology fleet managers most want from future management systems, allowing them to see what effective fleet maintenance-cost control actually looks like.
Arval research found that 21% of surveyed fleets prioritised automated monitoring capable of identifying likely maintenance problems before a failure occurs.
The potential benefit is significant. Earlier warnings could help fleets schedule repairs around operational demand, reduce roadside failures and prevent minor defects becoming more expensive problems.
However, useful predictive maintenance requires more than generating additional alerts. Not only for avoiding unexpected spend, but also in the bigger picture of understanding why fleet maintenance costs keep rising without a clear explanation.
Fleets should ask suppliers how systems:
- identify genuine mechanical risk;
- integrate with servicing and repair histories;
- prioritise urgent issues;
- direct work to approved suppliers; and
- demonstrate reductions in downtime and cost.
Managers should also establish who reviews alerts and has authority to take vehicles out of service. A warning that is not acted upon provides little operational value.
The strongest systems will combine connected-vehicle data with mileage, fault history and maintenance records to support better decisions.
Fleets reviewing SMR arrangements should ask existing providers what predictive capability is already available before purchasing another standalone platform.
The immediate opportunity is to use vehicle data to move maintenance from reactive repair towards planned intervention.
Find out more with your practical playbook for finding and removing avoidable SMR spend.
