McFall Fuel is a logistics specialist delivering fuel and lubricants to commercial and construction businesses, forestry crews, agricultural contractors, fishing boats and farmers from Wellington to Warkworth and everywhere in between. There are three golden rules at the family-owned and oriented business: No harm to people, no harm to the environment and no accidents. With 46 Volvo trucks in his fleet, Logistics Manager Scott Jeanes knows a thing or two about safety.
“Volvo Trucks provides us with support that goes beyond the hardware,” said Scott. “The company helps us to achieve our golden rules through driver training, mechanical and sales support. We’ve been buying Volvo for more than ten years and that speaks volumes about their safety track record, market-leading technology, customer support —the full package.”
As soon as Volvo launched the Active Safety pack, McFall Fuel has opted to have it fitted to every truck. In a recent announcement, Volvo Trucks New Zealand announced that this pack (valued at $10,000) will now be fitted as standard on all new trucks — Scott sees this as further proof of the business ‘walking the talk’ when it comes to safety.
“All of the Volvo safety features are important to us,” said Scott. “the safety systems from the integrated seatbelt through to the driver airbag, collision warning system, driver alerts and lane departure sensor — it’s the whole package.”
With a team of 75 professional drivers, professional development and on-going training is high on Scott’s list of priorities. “We have a very supportive culture at McFall Fuel. Our drivers know that we supply the most fit-for-purpose gear and training to keep them safe.
“We run in-house driver training and Sean Webb, driver trainer at MTD, provides us with detailed product training that’s specific to the trucks in our fleet. This training is based on data from Dynafleet Telematics and open conversations that we have with Sean about our business.”
Scott describes the significance of the driver training support as ‘huge’ and values being able to easily contact people like Sean who have detailed product knowledge. This enables Scott to address any driver queries quickly and accurately.
McFall Fuel started their relationship with Volvo and MTD with a single six-wheel tractor unit in 2008 and now runs a fleet of 46 Volvo trucks with a further 6 currently on order. Over the past ten years, the relationship with Volvo distributor, MTD Trucks has gone from strength to strength.
“You can’t completely eliminate all accidents, but I am just more confident with Volvo products – they are among the safest HGVs on the road,” said Scott. At the end of the day, our priority is to get our drivers home at night. There are a lot of families depending on us and we feel a great sense of responsibility for our people. Our business takes safety very personally.”