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Sadly we are coming to the end of what wasn’t a bad summer other than August that was complete rubbish! Nights are drawing in and whilst we are still enjoying some late sunshine we should be making plans for the winter months ahead.

Thinking of a change but unsure as to the best way to finance your car? Then you need a copy of my car finance book, Car Finance – A Simple Guide by Graham Hill. Click on the link below to buy the best car finance book on the market, available as a Kindle Book and Paper Back.

Fleet News has provided a few pointers and given us a few things to think about. Inevitably there will be a few days when it will be difficult, if not impossible, to either drive to work or use public transport (bit of wind, snow, leaves on the train line, volcanoes erupting, landslides etc.) so do you have a back up plan that enables you and/or staff to work from home in the case of an emergency?

Don’t forget if you employ staff you are responsible for their health and safety and could leave yourself exposed if you insist they come to work when the authorities or experts have advised against it. With regard to your car, have you considered swapping to winter tyres to reduce tyre wear and increase grip. Many of the national tyre fitters now offer a service whereby they will swap over tyres for you between summer and winter and store your summer tyres till spring.

Fleet News also suggest that you consider 4WD cars but I disagree. I don’t recall one day last winter when a 4WD car would have avoided taking any time off work and I have to say that unless you have taken a 4WD course the chances are that you will be no better off driving a 4WD car than a 2WD car. Oh and a little tip if you are stuck in snow, try letting a little air out of the drive tyres to increase grip or better still buy a set of snow chains and a spade to dig yourself out.

Make sure that your car has been serviced and there is enough anti freeze in your radiator and plenty in your windscreen wash. In fact make up some anti-freeze screen wash and keep it in a bottle in the boot, it is so easy to run out of screen wash on a trip and end up not being able to see out of the windscreen. Give yourself a few minutes to sit in the car with the engine running in order to warm up the heater.

If it is cold or raining and you drive straight off you will find the windscreen heavily misting up before it starts to demist making it impossible to see where you are going. Remember it is an offence to drive a car if you cannot see through the screen due to either dirt or mist. Oh and another tip, get yourself some Marigold rubber gloves and stick them in the boot.

Snow chain at the front wheel. Photographer: Devchonka. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

The best type of gloves to wear when clearing snow or frost off the car or even to wear when fitting snow chains or digging out the snow. They are totally waterproof and surprisingly warm. I’ll add a few more tips into my next newsletter as the countdown to winter continues. There are lots more tips to come so make sure you read them and stay safe! By Graham Hill

The Graham Hill in depth car review this week is of a new Peugeot. Many years ago a certain car outsold its direct competitor, the VW Golf, through its looks and performance whilst making me a lot of money at the same time. The car was the Peugeot 205 GTi. It was a hugely popular car so when it disappeared it was a sad day but it looks like it’s back in the guise of an updated 208 with the old GTi badge attached. Read more »

Trying to get everyone to go green overnight and buy electric cars will simply not work. The view is now to take a piecemeal approach and start by getting people gradually into more fuel efficient cars that kick out fewer CO2’s. Drivers should first be made more aware of cleaner driving practices. Knocking 10% off your cruising motorway speed can improve fuel consumption along with controlled braking and less Read more »

If you are hell bent on driving a 4 wheel drive I would make the most of it now as auction house Manheim have reported exceptional losses sustained by leasing companies when re-selling end of contract 4WD cars. At the moment manufacturers are offsetting poor resale values with big discounts and bonuses but the long term view is that manufacturers will scale down production and switch the lines over to smaller more desirable ‘greener’ cars. This will mean that they will give away less by way of bonuses making the lease cost of gas guzzling 4WD cars very high.But whilst we are in this honeymoon period and you like 4WD’s now is the time to take one because by the end of the year rates will potentially be horendous and deliveries even worse. Hands up who wants a Hummer? By Graham Hill

There has been a great deal of talk recently about extending the use of tachographs to all vehicles used for business as it seems unfair that the driver of a commercial vehicle is covered by European driving hours directives whilst sales people and service engineers driving small vans or cars aren’t but are just as likely to fall asleep at the wheel. However, many are not aware that the law already applies if the car, or 4×4, plus trailer plated gross weight exceeds 3.5tonnes. If this is the case the vehicle should be fitted with a tacho and drivers Read more »

With fuel prices constantly hitting record highs Peter Hollinshead, head of vehicle finance at HSBC Bank, has provided the following advice to motorists and companies in order to try to contain the soaring fuel costs.

•  Is the journey necessary? It could be that meetings can be carried out via video conferencing or webinar – a web based seminar or presentation.
• If the journey is unavoidable work out the shortest route to the destination before leaving. Read more »