A Beginners Guide to Trucking Fuel Cards

The American Transportation Research Institute reported that trucking businesses spent almost $2 per mile and an average of approximately $84 an hour during operation. It is no wonder that many trucking firms go out of business if their services are not properly run and maintained, considering these narrow margins.

Fortunately, the trucking fuel cards program emerges within the industry. Regardless of what types of trucking business you have, be it a fleet of the semi-trailer, tail lift, or bobtail trucks, fuel cards bring in many benefits for the company. From the underlying meaning of fuel cards to the program's advantages for the trucking company, here are all the crucial information that you need to know about trucking fuel cards.

What is a trucking fuel card?

Trucking fuel cards or sometimes called fleet fuel cards are created for truck drivers and carriers in the trucking sector. According to Investopedia, these are payment cards that permit companies to manage their costs concerning the vehicles that they run.

Aside from being used by the company’s transportation personnel for fuel, these cards can also be utilized for vehicle repair and maintenance.

In a publication released by Infosys, several types of fuel cards are available in the market, such as:

The fleet cards are typically easy to use and work somewhat similar to credit cards. It means that truck drivers no longer need to bring cash with them during work.

Who uses fuel cards?

Typically, the customers for fleet cards are the road trucking firms that purchase diesel at truck stations for class seven and eight commercial trucks. Considering that the cards are created for the benefit of carriers that range between a single rig to hundreds of vehicles, all kinds of truck owners can utilize the cards, such as those with contracted carriers or independent owners.

How does a fuel card program benefit the company?

A decent fuel card program provides carriers with considerable savings over per-gallon fuel, including other additional benefits and services. This discount method is one of the ways to generate more visitors and sales for fuel station merchants that partnered up with the fuel card providers.

The use of standard fleet fuel cards by all of the companies’ eligible employees can eliminate the need to use a personal card. This elimination helps minimize the administrative cost involving the reimbursement program that repays the employees’ money spent on gas and transportation maintenance.

Moreover, fleet cards provide a comprehensive report to the fleet supervisors, such as the vehicles’ mileage and liters of fuel filled, which helps them plan out the schedule for the vehicle service and maintenance. These cards also allow companies to monitor their fleet-related cash flow and manage their expenses efficiently.

Fuel cards offer a lot of features and services for truck companies, including a discount on fuel, comprehensive reports on the fleet operation, as well as timely reports for the fleet managers. They eliminate the need to manually submit receipts, audits, and reimbursement, all of which speed up and improve the companies’ operation.