Fuel Cards or fleet cards are used as a payment method for the purchase of diesel, or gasoline and may include payment towards other services such as vehicle maintenance etc. as outlined by the fuel card provider.
For truckers, particularly small-scale trucking companies and owner operators, Fuel Cards are great way of saving on fuel, which forms one of the biggest operational costs for most logistics businesses. Originally started by oil companies as a savings program for their bulk buyers, Fuel Card’s have evolved into a third-party offering that level the playing field to some extent for small logistics companies and owner operators.
With the sharp rise in gas prices over the last year, coupled with friendly and cost/credit friendly terms from fuel card companies, fuel cards are a “must have” in the financial tool kit of logistics companies.
Fuel Cards operate on different models; the most popular ones being:
- Fixed discounts per gallon
- Rebates
- Cashbacks
- Pre-paid
Best Fuel Cards on the market:
WEX:
- Average Discount: 3 cents per gallon
- Network: 45,000 sites
- Monthly Fees: None (For Wex Flex)
Shell:
- Average Discount: 5 cents per gallon
- Network: 14,000
- Monthly Fees: None
ExxonMobil:
- Average Discount: 5 cents per gallon
- Network: 75,00 sites
- Monthly Fees: None
BP:
- Average Discount: 5 cents a gallon
- Network: 75,00 sites
- Monthly Fees: $10 or none if you buy more than 5000 gallons
TCS:
- Average discount: 35 cents per gallon
- Network: 1000
RTS Financial Fuel Cards:
- Average Discount: 25 cents per gallon
- Network: 2000
Pilot Flying J (Axel Cards):
- Average discount: 3% cashback
Chevron Texaco Fuel Card:
- Average Discount: Up to 6 cents per gallon
- Network: 8000 Chevron and Texaco Fuel Stations
- Monthly fee: None
Sameday Fuel Card:
- Average savings: 40 cents to 70 cents per gallon
- Network: 825Monthly fees: None
Which Fuel Card must you choose?
…one that offers you the most discount, offers the greatest number of locations, with the easiest terms of payment. And while that may seem an obvious answer, a great strategy that we have extended to some of our clients is to use multiple cards to maximize their savings. Many fuel card providers that offer an extensive network of nationwide sites, often have lower discounts. Conversely, to make themselves more attractive to customers, smaller fuel card providers offer bigger discounts but with not as extensive as a coverage. As you may notice, there are many fuel cards that have no monthly fees as such, and one can maximise their savings by using a combination of cards.
Strategy to maximise savings on fuel:
So, while you can use Wex, Shell, ExxonMobil cards that offer an average discount of 3 cents to 35 cents a gallon, for their extensive on-site networks, you can couple them with our SameDay Fuel Card that offers you up to 70 cents a gallon and sometimes, based on your state/location, up to a dollar per gallon. Our fuel card has no fee associated with it – no monthly, annual or transaction fee. It’s a pay as you go card that comes with a line of credit of $4000. Our fuel card covers TA, Petro and Love’s with a total of 850 locations nationwide. We can also offer as many cards as you need based on your fleet size. So, it’s easy to combine it with one or multiple other fuel cards depending on your business needs and maximize on savings on your hauls.
