Trust saves £110k giving 198 of its workers lease cars

It reckons it saves in the region of £110,000 on travel expenses by running the leased car system.

The Trust does not provide company cars. Instead it operates a leased car facility for any Trust employee required to travel in order to discharge their duties.

A spokesperson for the Western Trust said an employee clocking up a private mileage of 8,500 and a business mileage of 6,500 would cost the Trust £3,004.32 per year.

Paying the same employee full travel allowances for using their own car would cost the Trust £3,620 per year.

Thus the Trust makes a saving of £615.68 in this instance by using the scheme.

If all 198 employees availing of the car lease facility clocked up the mileage above it would cost the Trust £594,855; paying them travel allowances would cost £716,760.

A spokesperson for the Trust said the same scheme rules apply to all employees regardless of their grade/level.

“By operating a leased car scheme the Trust generates a saving in the region of £110,000 per year.

“This saving is based on a comparison of employees availing of the leased car scheme as opposed to the Trust paying full travel allowances to these employees,” the spokesperson said.

“The annual savings were calculated on taking a random sample of 10 cars and extrapolating to give an approximate annual figure,” the spokesperson stated.

The lease is between the Trust and the contract car company but an employee must reimburse the Trust for private usage through a deduction from their salary.

“The employee pays for all fuel and the Trust only reimburses for business travel and at a lower rate than that for employees who are not availing of the scheme,” a spokesperson explained.

“Entitlement to join the scheme is based on the number of business miles the employee will travel each year or the number of days on which business travel will be required. So, for example, the requirement to travel on an occasional basis would not qualify an employee for the leased car scheme.

“Each leased car contract runs for a period of three years. Should an employee leave the Trust’s employment before the contract expires, the employee has to pay any early termination penalty to the leasing company,” the spokesperson added.