Pictured: Amanda Morgan, Customer Relationship Manager, Group Fleet Services at Volkswagen Group
Volkswagen Group has gone live with a new automated system of updating the Leaselink procurement platform from Ebbon-Dacs that will save thousands of hours a year in manpower for its dealer network and increase transparency for leasing companies.
The current system requires more than 700 dealers across the Volkswagen Group’s five brands – Volkswagen Passenger Cars, Audi, SEAT, ŠKODA and Volkswagen Commercial Vehicles – to manually input the status of all vehicle orders they receive from leasing companies.This can amount to up to 20,000 leasing company orders in one current order bank – a huge number with an enormous potential for manual input errors.
Volkswagen Group calculates that it takes one hour to upload every 100 vehicle status updates, a total of around 200 man hours each week. Now, under a new automated process, all new vehicle order details, including registration number, VIN number and engine number, will be uploaded directly into the Leaselink e-procurement platform from the Volkswagen Group’s new vehicle order bank.
The automation of the order process is important for Volkswagen Group because around 70% of its total annual leasing company order take now goes through the Leaselink system, and almost one third of all Group dealers are signed up as Leaselink users. This process is currently undergoing pilot testing to ensure the system works efficiently and accurately. The next phase of the implementation, for completion by August, will considerably increase transparency for leasing companies.
Amanda Morgan, Customer Relationship Manager, Group Fleet Services at Volkswagen Group, said: “These new systems will save our dealers precious time and help reduce error. Once we have completed the second phase, leasing companies will have a clearer view of their orders with us and a more complete picture of build and delivery times.”
Ebbon-Dacs has recently invested in new functionality and a new look for Leaselink, which is being rolled out in stages with an initial emphasis on new functionality modules, before the roll out of a new user interface across the whole platform.
Leaselink delivers numerous benefits for leasing company and other users, including reduced errors, improved productivity and automated features which save time and increase efficiency. It forms the vital electronic link to allow fleet buyers to source the most cost effective vehicles and track their progress online from order through to delivery, and has been proven to generate savings of 10-15% compared to old, traditional procurement methods.
Robert Pilkington, Director of the Leaselink International Division of Ebbon-Dacs, said: “The whole ethos behind Leaselink is to introduce efficiencies across the e-procurement process for all users of the platform. This latest initiative from Volkswagen Group is very much in line with that kind of thinking, introducing as it does both time and administrative efficiencies for the dealer networks, and improving transparency for leasing companies.”
