It was interesting to hear Pendragon Vehicle Management boss Neal Francis putting the division’s 58% drop in profits over the first half of 2015 down to long delivery times, an issue that was rather pertinent a few years ago but I’d thought was, with isolated examples of in-demand product, consigned to history.
Not so, it seems, because Francis told BusinessCar the company would be reporting year-on-year growth when we come to collate the figures for our 2015 BC50 rundown of the top 50 leasing companies and their number of vehicles on-risk.
So despite a £4m drop in turnover for the first half of this year, he expects fleet numbers to be up for 2015 as a whole, though he wouldn’t give half-year figures for the vehicles the company currently has on its books.
There were significant issues with long wait times on some vehicles pre-recession, stretching beyond half a year, but declining demand driven by the financial crisis seemed to have dealt with that.
Though the BVRLA said it isn’t aware of a particular issue with lead times, apart from on certain specific ultra-low emission models, it’ll be something worth keeping an eye on. Feel free to let me know of any issues you’re having, and we’ll see if Pendragon’s is an isolated case or a looming problem for the industry across manufacturers, sectors or across the board.
