By Ed Pierce, Contributing Editor

While vehicle registrations can be difficult enough to manage for one vehicle, the task becomes even more daunting when you’re a company handling thousands of vehicles.

From car rental companies to fleet management companies, vehicle registration is an integral part of managing company-owned cars. These companies usually rely on tag & title businesses to ensure their vehicles are properly registered and kept up to date.

But while this field is dominated by larger businesses, there are a few smaller players that have managed to make a name for themselves in recent years.

One of the most notable of these businesses is J3 Management Group, a sister-run tag and title company specializing in serving fleet vehicles.

Founded by sisters Lora Dunton and Karla Jackson, J3 Management Group has experienced major success in the two short years since its inception, due in large part no doubt to the dynamic effort of these sisters and their families.

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By Mike Sheldrick, Senior Editor

LeasePlan USA has released its first EV Readiness study across the U.S.

According to the company, “It provides a clear overview, across all 50 states (plus the District of Columbia), of five key factors for electrification: favorable state legislation and incentives, EV penetration, charger to vehicle ratio, charger availability, and climate suitability.” It does that in a thoroughgoing, readable study.

There some are surprises. Top among them, the state with the leading readiness score is Nevada, followed by Mississippi, and Hawaii. LeasePlan’s 2022 data showed that all three states have a welcoming climate for EVs, and Nevada and Mississippi provide a “reasonable” amount of public charging stations. Hawaii already has begun integrating EVs into its overall vehicle market.

Some statisticians will have a field day with findings that seem so surprisingly different than common wisdom, but that won’t detract from the value of the study. It’s well-reasoned; moreover, LeasePlan lays out its methods in detail. Besides, as LeasePlan points out in its top takeaway, “It’s important to note that no states ranked in the top bracket for EV readiness, and the top three states in the index barely qualified for the second rating bracket of EV accepted.”

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Growing climate change concerns are increasing EV popularity among both consumers and lawmakers, spurring OEM manufacturers to offer a wider range of both EV classes and models.

With the number of EVs on the road increasing every day, there is cause for worry about overtaxing the charging infrastructure.

This timely whitepaper from Fleetio covers the latest trends in EV sales and charging infrastructure growth solutions and discuss key considerations for incorporating EVs into your fleet.

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May 7, 2022 – Drivers and passengers in a 5G-enabled vehicle will be able to quickly connect to various online services — for information, entertainment, navigation and communication — but 5G will also allow fast over-the-air updates to the vehicle’s various computer systems.

Just like Apple, Android and Microsoft push updates to phones, tablets and laptops, car owners will be able to benefit from new features and software “patches” to fix issues. 5G also helps facilitate a faster and more reliable connection between a driver and their vehicle, even when they are not inside of it, such as accessing the car’s systems remotely on a companion app.

via The Star

May 7, 2022 – While the Infrastructure Act was primarily intended to deliver big money to the states for the improvement or repair of crumbling roads, bridges, pipelines, internet broadband access and power grids, it also contains little-noticed sections designed to implement a reduction in the rising toll of automobile crashes, deaths and injuries.

The infrastructure bill includes such safety issues as improved headlights, updated back-seat safety standards, new front seatback standards, incorporation of crash avoidance technology in all new cars, and new federal hood and bumper standards.

While the vehicle safety provisions may appear to be a modest part of the new law, we should celebrate that the often deadlocked Congress passed legislation that can have a major impact in reversing the shocking increase in vehicle crashes and in the lives lost or forever changed on our nation’s roads.

via The Hill

May 6, 2022 – The owner of a stick-shift Jeep handed the keys over to a Jeep dealership for a routine oil change. A teenage dealer employee who reportedly wasn’t licensed to drive and didn’t know how to operate a stick-shift attempted to move the owner’s Jeep, when it lurched forward with enough force to kill a nearby service technician.

Because of the way the law works with regard to the legal principle known as vicarious liability, the family of the service tech isn’t suing the dealership—they’re suing the owner of the Jeep. Anything a driver does with an owner’s vehicle, it’s still the owner’s responsibility.

via MotorTrend

May 5, 2022 – Now that nearly every new vehicle comes with automatic emergency braking (AEB), the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety is looking for ways to encourage even better systems that can prevent more severe front-to-rear crashes that occur at higher speeds.

In the new study, IIHS Senior Research Scientist David Kidd found that only 3 percent of police-reported rear-end crashes happen at low speed limits. Increasing the speed of the IIHS test to 35-45 mph would make it relevant to more than 10 times as many police-reported rear-end crashes.

Based on Kidd’s findings, IIHS plans to conduct research tests on six vehicles equipped with different front crash prevention systems at speeds up to 45 mph. Tests will also be conducted using different types of passenger vehicles and other vehicles like a motorcycle and various sizes of trucks as the stationary vehicle.

via IIHS-HLDI

By Dave Bean, Associate Editor

While owners of electric vehicles (EVs) are more likely to use automotive smartphone apps than gas-powered vehicle owners, they are less satisfied with the experience, according to a newly released survey.

The J.D. Power OEM EV App Benchmark Study examines user experience (UX) satisfaction with automotive mobile apps from 20 leading car makers that offer EVs in the US and Europe.

This key finding is especially poignant since even though all vehicle owners are reporting an uptick in reliance upon auto-specific smartphone apps, EV owners remain more likely to use it regularly.

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By Ed Pierce, Contributing Editor

“All vertical fleet markets want to become electric,” says Sean Larkin, Director of Sales and Business Development for Amply Power. “There is a demand in the marketplace. The vehicles themselves are the true drivers.”

This trend toward electrification is evident and growing every year. Companies are setting goals to limit their carbon footprint and making the transition towards all-electric fleets. EVs have been ready, available, and deployed for quite some time now, and an upcoming surge in light- and medium-duty vehicles is all but certain.

In order to effectively make that transition, however, fleet operators have to do a lot more than just onboard a few electric vehicles.

They need a solution that can handle the infrastructure and charging aspects of electrification while guiding them through the design, deployment, operation, and maintenance of their new EV charging infrastructure.

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By Ed Dubens, CEO/Founder of eDriving, a Solera company

“The effectiveness of communication is not defined by the communication, but by the response,” is a quote attributed to Milton Erickson, a late American psychiatrist and psychologist.

Why is this relevant? Because it perfectly describes what happens if fleet operators don’t communicate effectively, they don’t get the response or results they want.

Effective communication is one of the key elements of a successful driver safety program. But what constitutes effective communication?

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