We’re delighted to have secured contracts with Aviva and online insurer Hedgehog Insurance, as well as automotive group, Hendy Group and van rental company, Herd Hire.
Due to lockdown restrictions easing across the UK, changeable weather conditions, and several new partners, March 2021 was our busiest month in over seven years. We are now completing 95.7% of ADAS calibrations in-house, significantly improving the customer journey by allowing the vast majority of work to be completed in one visit. In March, we saw the highest number of calibrations in a single month, 15% more than the second busiest.
Our dedicated contact centre has been ‘buzzing’. We helped 117,052 callers in the last quarter and we’ve seen a 20% increase in calls during the first two weeks of April, compared to March, due to more customers getting back into their cars following lockdown and increase demand from our new contracts.
The usage of our upgraded Panther Fit-Glass lifting equipment is now at 87%, which has resulted in more than 450 working days saved per month, increasing our capacity and reducing manual handling injuries.
Our lead times are at an all-time low of 4.8 days meaning customers and key workers are back on the road quicker than ever before. It’s clear our customers are happy too, we’ve t an ‘Excellent’ score of 4.6 on Trustpilot, a current customer service score of 93 and NPS of 82.9.
We’ve employed 26 new technicians, have taken on 21 ALEX apprentices and 12 new handlers have joined our contact centre team. Over the past few weeks our apprentices have completed the first of their practical GQA-accredited courses in Covid-safe conditions at our Chesterfield head office. We aim to add another 10 Service Centres to the network and have plans to expand our team by another 30 technicians by the end of the year.
We’ve been carbon neutral since 2017, but within the last 12 months have committed to ing one step further, by offsetting 221 tonnes of customers’ emissions when they travel to our sites. We offset a total of 5,159 tonnes of business emissions in 2020, that’s the equivalent to the average emission of one passenger on 5,159 return flights from Paris to New York. These carbon credits are issued by projects across the globe that are making a difference, which include the protection of Zambia’s forests, distribution of cook stoves in Mexico and hydropower development in China. We’ve just been presented with certificates by bp Target Neutral for these achievements.
Shaun Atton (L) and James Reynolds (R) with the certificates
Our Head of Fleet and Facilities, Shaun Atton, won the ‘Fleet Manager: Financial Superstar’ catery in the Great British Fleet Awards recently. Run by Fleet World, the awards recognise the best of corporate motoring in the UK, from fleet managers to suppliers and manufacturers. We’re very proud of Shaun, where we are and what we’ve achieved as a business and fleet.
We’re now looking forward to celebrating our 50th anniversary on 20th May and to the Summer months ahead - we’re clearly ing places!