Fleet Maintenance - 28

keep the failed part on-hand until he receives
credit for the warranty.
Penske Truck Leasing's Senior Vice President,
Procurement and Fleet Planning, Paul Rosa,
confirms their process is similar because sending in the failed parts can assist with diagnosing
the issue for future vehicle system or component
designs. Due to the volume of warranty claims
Penske handles - with the company's fleet size of
more than 320,000 vehicles, Rosa says they will
not send in every part.
"We want to be sure we're giving them parts that
can help them deduce what the issue might be," he
says. "While we don't send every warranty claims
part, we certainly do a representative sampling of
what they need in order to render some solutions
for what's going on."
Given the volume of vehicles serviced and
maintained through Penske Truck Leasing, if
there is an issue with one type of vehicle unit,
Rosa advises Penske has the means to offer realworld feedback on vehicle issues.
"One of the things that we provide to many of
our partners - meaning the OEMs, the suppliers, the component providers - is early predictive analytics to help identify an issue before it
becomes a larger one," Rosa says. "If you have
more of your vehicles operating and they start to
develop a problem and we're finding it when we're
analyzing the work that's done on a unit, you start
to say, 'Wow, X percent of a brand new unit went
into service. Something's going on.'"
Rosa confirms Penske shares this information
with companies to assist with diagnosing the issue.
"We gather that information, we send it out to
the respective OEM, and we start to work together
to find solutions," he says.
This process can also allow those companies
to proactively alert other fleets of the issue and
can help address future designs of components
and systems.

Submitting warranty claims

Currently, Ozark's Pasby adheres to the directives of the given manufacturer or supplier to
submit claims. This may mean logging into an
online portal to file the claim as is the case with
Freightliner and Detroit, or it may mean printing
off a form, completing it, and mailing the form and
failed parts to the supplier, such as with companies like Stemco.
Pasby is hoping with the new TMT Fleet
Maintenance business information system his
company is implementing there may be a more
streamlined process. As it stands now, he must be
familiar with and track all of the different warranty claims separately. His filing system consists of
manila folders for each manufacturer or supplier.
Once a warranty check comes back and clears, he
removes the claim from the folder.
Penske's Rosa advises that due to the number
of truck manufacturers and component suppliers
the organization works with, Penske has built an
internal system to manage the various companies
honoring warranties.
"We have a very sophisticated in-house-built
warranty tracking system that integrates with
each one of the partners that we work with," he

28 Fleet Maintenance | May 2020

Should I get an extended warranty?
When it comes to OEMs, fleets can decide if
they'd like to stick with the base warranty
or purchase an extended warranty option.
An extended warranty
option provides coverage
beyond the original manufacturer's base warranty.
It can cover beyond the
drivetrain to other OE supplier
systems and components,
and the warranty work for
this type of coverage is completed at the dealership.
Following recommended maintenance schedules is imperative
to ensure optimized uptime for
a truck. It also is often a requirement for any vehicle warranty,
including extended warranties.
Craig LaPinta, marketing manager, aftermarket service products
for the Daimler Trucks North
America Extended Warranty
Program, advises a new commercial truck will typically have
minimal issues under 100,000
miles. But there is a point
where a fleet can extend the
life of the vehicle by conducting
regular preventive maintenance
inspections. As vehicles age in
the fleet, an extended warranty
can provide peace of mind as
the fleet continues to operate
and service the vehicles well
past the base warranty.
"That's the discussion we
like to have with customers
that want to understand the
value that they're getting
out of their extended warranty," LaPinta advises.
Purchasing an extended warranty can also up the tradein value for older vehicles,
because the warranty will often
transfer to the next vehicle
owner. Additionally, extended
warranties can account for
servicing areas of the vehicle
that are equipped with what
had been new technologies at
the time but have aged and may
need some additional service
after the base warranty expires.
"You're kind of starting over
with your risk assessment,
because the trucks you inspected four years ago and bought
aren't the same trucks as they
are today," LaPinta explains.
Also, as new technologies are
introduced that are designed

to improve the performance
and efficiency of a vehicle, the
drawback can be that there
are fewer tested miles of that
new function or feature.
"The customer is constantly
demanding improvements to
the truck for fuel efficiency,
for safety, for emissions, and
we're keeping up with those
changes, but introducing those
engineering solutions has risk
as well," LaPinta says. "And while
there may be less of them, the
ones that do occur could very
well be more expensive than
ones that happened before."
While extended warranties
can be added during the initial
purchase of the truck, LaPinta
confirms that fleets can add
extended warranties onto
vehicles long after purchase.
Fleets can also opt to add
additional extended warranty
coverage in smaller increments. This service through
Daimler is called Extend Next.
"For customers who had
already bought an extended
warranty product, you're
eligible to buy more time and
distance to go even longer on
your coverage," LaPinta says.
This may be purchased for
fleets who opt to extend
the lifecycle of a vehicle by
a year - from four to five
years, for instance - while
still maintaining some type
of warranty coverage.

FEEDBACK
FROM FLEETS

"We evaluate the application
that a unit's going in, the
vehicle type that we're talking
about, how long we might be
keeping it," advises Penske
Truck Leasing Senior Vice
President, Procurement, and
Fleet Planning, Paul Rosa.
These evaluations help
determine if an extended
warranty makes sense to
help manage maintenance
costs for the vehicle.
"We do purchase extended coverages for all of our powertrain

components, along with the
emissions component coverages," confirms Griffin Pavement
Striping Fleet Manager Eric
Moore. "These practices have
been more than 80 percent
beneficial in having failures that
would normally be out of pocket
covered by the extended terms."
Moore says this warranty work
is performed at the dealer.
"There is an upfront cost to
these coverage options," Moore
notes. "When predicting what
costs would be incurred in a
catastrophic event, that cost
becomes zero when factoring
in the total overall cost [of
the vehicle], especially if the
vehicle is financed. Whatever
additional amount is added
to the monthly note, it's
surely less than the cost of
an out of pocket repair bill."
Moore stresses the importance
of keeping thorough service
and maintenance records to
prove the vehicle was properly
maintained at recommended
intervals to avoid warranty coverage issues. This is
something that may be done
in-house or by the dealer.
"Having a good relationship with
your OEM really helps facilitate
these requests as they likely will
have all of that documentation
on-hand," Moore says. "With
a good advisor or warranty
manager, you as the end-user
may never even know about
some of these requirements.
All requests by the OE will be
handled by the service staff and
the customer need only pick
the vehicle up once complete."
Be sure to also confirm the fine
print. Some extended warranty
contracts may only cover the
parts. The fleet may be responsible for items such as diagnostic services, fluids and filters,
additional labor costs, disposal
charges, or other shop supplies.
"An OEM or a supplier is no
different than an insurance
company," Rosa says. "They
evaluate the vehicles involved,
they assess the risks, they
try and help out as best they
can, and they provide a policy. We evaluate what that
program that they're willing
to offer is, and if we find that
it makes sense, then we obviously would consider it."

Fleet Maintenance

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