The car rental company’s co-founder marks the firm’s 10th anniversary and reveals plans to drive the business forward. Rebekah Commane reports
As Affordable Car Hire celebrates its 10th anniversary this year, co-founder and chief executive Angela Day has been checking her rear-view mirror to see just how far the company has progressed.
Day set up the car renta lbroker from her garage with only a remortgage of her house as financial backing.
“Looking back, I don’t think we would have imagined we’d have come this far in 10 years,” says Day, whose husband, James Moore, now chairman, has been a part of the company from the start.
“I remember when we secured our first deal; I think we were set to profit by £20 but we went out and bought a bottle of wine to celebrate.
“We don’t often have a chance to think about just how far we’ve come, but we now work with 583 car rental partners in 193 countries and 15,120 locations – so yes, it’s been a success.”
Affordable Car Hire has boosted its worldwide presence recently by appointing global sales agents in Italy, Spain, the Netherlands, Sweden and Denmark.
The family-owned business isn’t resting on its laurels, however. Day is now looking forward, with plans to develop Affordable Car Hire’s technology offering, interact more with clients and devise agent training and incentives.
Trade ‘backbone’
Day acknowledges that the trade is the backbone to the business and travel agents are offered various incentives and commission starting at 10%.
Affordable Car Hire is also developing a new incentive that will enable agents to monitor their progress and achieve prize bonuses at various milestones.
“Our focus and loyalty lies with travel agents and our partners,” Day says. “We work with indies, miniples and multiples – more than 400 travel agencies in total.
“Our website is set up for ease of use and the booking engine Cars (Complete Affordable Rental System) offers an eight-second turnaround time.”
Affordable has also introduced a ‘live chat’ system that allows agents and clients who have any queries to speak to staff on the website, who are available at all times. A transcript of the conversation is then sent to the agent and a copy is kept by staff for future reference, should a similar query arise again.
The company acknowledges the importance of ensuring agents are properly trained on their system, and for that reason offers the Affordable Road to Success (Arts) webinar information and explanatory sessions. It provides agents with training modules to help them add revenue by making car hire easier to sell.
The courses are complemented by weekly training alerts and monthly free prize draws for those who pre-register.
“We like our agents to know exactly what’s happening and to feel like they can contact us anytime,” says Day. “Our national sales team regularly visit agents to maintain relationships and make sure we’re both happy with how we’re working together.”
New technology
Broxbourne-based Affordable Car Hire is planning to introduce a range of technological advances.
Soon, customers will be sent a text reminder two days in advance of the start of their booking. They will also be able to use vouchers sent to their mobile phone to pick up their vehicle, eliminating the need for paper copies.
In the coming months Affordable Car Hire will unveil an app to make bookings possible vias martphones and tablets. The firm has also updated its website to make it easier to use and made it available in 17 languages.
Day said bookings were up 30% in the last financial year. With a £14 million turnover and in excess of 100,000 rentals completed, Affordable appears to be driving into its next decade in very good nick.