COVID-19 Survey Update: corporate buyers have more confidence than suppliers

If you’re a fleet manager, there are a few silver linings to the cloud that’s hanging over us all. As the May update of our COVID-19 survey suggests, corporate fleet and mobility buyers are markedly more optimistic than suppliers. This increased buyer confidence is an encouraging signal for the future uptake of our industry. And in this challenging and complex market, that gives the fleet and mobility buyer a useful advantage.

Click here to download the full survey results

Mid-April, we published the results of our first survey on the global impact of COVID-19 on the fleet and mobility industry, based on the input of 400 fleet professionals from 34 countries, in Europe and beyond.

Wider sample
Now we bring you an update, based on an even wider sample – 600 members of the global fleet and mobility community, from 38 countries. The professionals come from both the supplier (59%) and buyer (41%) side of the industry.

While the economic impact of the coronavirus and the subsequent lockdowns is felt by everybody, the degree to which this is the case is remarkably varied.

Just one in three (33%) of the buyers surveyed said the crisis has had a ‘major’ impact on their business. Just over half (52%) of suppliers felt the same way.
Specifically, three out of four (75%) suppliers said the crisis had negatively impacted revenue, while that was true for about half (57%) of the buyers.

Diverging views
These diverging views put buyers at an advantage. With suppliers harder affected by the crisis, it could be they will be more eager to strike deals, provide incentives and make concessions.

Some other silver linings in the survey:

The vast majority (>80%) of both suppliers and buyers are already back at work full-time, and >90% are confident their company will survive.
Almost 80% of both suppliers and buyers expect travel bans to be over by the end of June at the latest.
Half of all buyers (50%) expect business to return to normal by the end of this year. Just over 10% of all surveyed believe this will happen later than Q2 2021.
42% of buyers expect the TCO of their fleet to decrease this year, 56% think Residual Values will decrease. Only 23% and 11% respectively think these will increase.

A major takeaway for both suppliers and buyers: during the crisis, most buyers want their suppliers to offer more advice (64%), innovations (52%) and better communication (50%). Less than half (44%) expect discounts.

Click on the link below, to find out:

If the perception on job security has changed?
The short and long term impact on buyers fleet strategy?
If supplier change is to be expected?
How the crisis will influence the use of public transport?

Check out the full results of the survey here.

We would like to thank the media partners and fleet associations across the world that are participating in this initiative, for joining us in this important exercise to support our fleet and mobility community.

With the support of: