Fiddles are on the cards
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• An international haulier with an £800,000 annual fuel bill has challenged Shell's claim that its Euroshell fuel card eliminates the "fiddle factor (CM 14-20 Nov).
Brian Yeardley Continental, which runs more than 40 trucks a week to the Continent from Yorkshire, says it was forced to dismiss drivers because they were using Shell fuel cards for beer, gloves and even cash while abroad.
According to managing director Brian Yeardley, the frauds were carried out in collusion with station attendants on the Continent. One driver admitted sharing cash obtained from a fuel card with three other drivers.
Yeardley stopped using Shell fuel cards last year after 10 years and has switched to IDS cards. He says Shell refused to accept responsibility for sundry items appearing on his receipts as diesel. In a letter to Yeardley, Shell's solicitor said: "Our clients do not own any petrol stations outside the UK and ... most of the stations within the UK that bear the name of our clients are not actually owned by them."
Yeardley now monitors fuel consumption "to the nth degree"
and pays his drivers fuel bonuses to encourage economic consumption. He is happy with his current drivers: "They are honest, as good a bunch as you can get," he says.
Shell says it is vital that hauliers choose the correct Euroshell card, such as one which only allows fuel purchases. The company says the card aids security by preventing drivers carrying cash abroad: "I don't deny problems can exist," says card marketing manager Mark Foster. "If a retailer and a driver want to collude in fraud they will find a way to do it."
Foster says that Shell will investigate Continental stations where fraud is reported, and any garages which do not take positive action to stop it could lose their franchises.
Foster believes fiddling will be eradicated by the spread of pump-linked automatic transactions which are tamper-proof.