Addressing a press conference here on Friday, Mr GK Raman, managing director of the company, said the card offers the fleet operator, besides prepaid and credit options, free accident cover. The insurance cover, which is being provided by Royal Sundaram, SFL’s insurance arm, is for both the operator and the driver to a maximum amount of Rs 20 lakh.
The card would also provide fleet owners the advantage of monitoring all transactions, tracking fleet movement once it is available nationally through a website. Initially, the card facility will be available on majorhighways and in select trunk routes covering the southern states of Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka and Kerala and then would be extended to the other parts of the country over a period of 8 to 12 months. To begin with, the card could be used in Chennai-Bangalore-Hyderabad-Nagpur route, Chennai-Vijayawada-Vizag route and Hyderabad-Vijayawada, he said.
SFL has also tied up with SchlumbergerSema, one of the leading smart card providers in the world, to extend backend services to the fleet card members.
Speaking on the occasion, Mr PK Agarwal, director (marketing) IOC, said, “the fleet card will go a long way in not only enhancing the efficiency in the trucking industry but also in adding value to their logistics management and fleet control”. Fuel and lubricants form about 30 per cent of the overall operating expenses of fleet owners and monitoring them would help them to enhance the bottomline of the transport operator, he added.