Sandwell Council 'has no booking system' for workers and vehicles

At a budget and corporate scrutiny meeting on Tuesday, councillors scrutinised a draft annual budget presented by directors of services across the council.

The Labour-led local authority is expected to find £16 million savings into the new financial year. One item on their list of savings involves reviewing contracts for waste and fleet management services.

But Councillor Paul Moore raised the point the council had no booking system in place.

The chair of the economy, skills, transport and environment scrutiny board, said: “I have to say that the [board] has already taken a very dim view of this approach by management.

“I was very surprised to learn that we don’t actually have any sort of working booking system for our employees to hire out vans or cars, even tractors with the council.

“I understand at the moment a lot of our vehicles are allocated to each department. So, for example, there’s two vehicles allocated to the curators department, four with repairs, and so on.

“For the council to be working on a very outdated model, if you’ve got vehicles that are sat around all day, that might be a very inefficient use of our resources. What I was hoping to hear was some assurance and a greater focus on fleet management. I feel like there could be savings of up to half a million pounds.”

Fleet management in local authorities involves managing all information associated with vehicles. Responsibilities include vehicle maintenance, overseeing fuel consumption, fuel costs,and driver management.

people in Sandwell have often complained to the council that not enough vehicles are out and about fixing problems they raise.

It is unclear why Sandwell council does not have an accessible or easy-to-use booking system.

Fleet management systems in neighbouring local authorities have an availability search based on time, dates and location.

From the list of pool vehicles available, drivers can then select a vehicle and make a booking. They enter their details including name and employee number and the system then checks the date of their last licence check.

It means staff can check availability and make bookings any time without having to contact the fleet team.

Simone Hines, director of finance at Sandwell council, said: “In terms of future savings, the leadership team have been developing a transformational savings programme that will be included in the final budget report listed next week.

“There are cross-cutting measures, and waste services will be included in those.”