TÜV SÜD takes over vehicle detailing at Vienna Airport and other locations in the Austrian capital
TÜV SÜD takes over vehicle detailing at Vienna Airport and other locations in the Austrian capital
In the course of expanding its vehicle detailing and fleet services, TÜV SÜD now providesall vehicle detailing services for the car hire company Sixt at Vienna's Schwechat Airport and four other locations in the metropolis on the banks of the Danube. The commission involves detailing for around 100,000 hired cars per year. TÜV SÜD has already been a partner of Sixt at Frankfurt am Main Airport for two years.
Since the partnership was established in early May, the detailing programme offered by the TÜV SÜD specialists has been applied to over 5,000 vehicles at Vienna Airport alone, in addition to a further 5,000 vehicles from Sixt's four city locations at Westbahnhof, the city centre, Kagran and Vösendorf.
In the partnership with Sixt, the experts of TÜV SÜD Auto Service work with the subsidiary Auto-Pflege-Zentrum (APZ) to perform a complete range of vehicle management services for the largest car hire company in Greater Vienna. Bernhard Kerscher, CEO of TÜV SÜD Auto Service GmbH, explains, "After Frankfurt am Main, Vienna is the second major city with an international airport at which we are now responsible for all vehicle management services for Sixt. This new addition will continue to expand our partnership with one of the largest car rental companies, and represents further progress in our consistent expansion of our free-market services - especially at international level."
And the strategy is highly successful: "We invested around EUR 350,000 and created 35 jobs to ensure our optimum performance in this challenging logistical task", says Carsten Arnold, head of the Mobility sector at TÜV SÜD-Landesgesellschaft Österreich GmbH. At Sixt's locations in Greater Vienna, the specialists receive a total of over 8000 vehicles per month from clients, inspect them for damage, refuel if necessary and return them to the car hire stations. A major benefit for the car hire company is that cost savings, especially with respect to documentation of damage, can be enormous.
To check damage to vehicles, the TÜV SÜD experts use an electronic damage documentation system provided by Sixt. The system uses palmtop computers (PDAs) which enable staff to work through a checklist of questions while at the vehicle and immediately transmit the results to Sixt's central evaluation system via an online connection. "This is a huge time-saver", confirms Arnold.
In addition to vehicle management during rental operations, TÜV SÜD is responsible for loading and unloading new vehicle deliveries and processing lease returns. The service package for the 300 or so new vehicles arriving at Sixt in Greater Vienna every month comprises electronic damage inspection, cleaning, refuelling and delivery to the car hire centres - primarily at Vösendorf. When leased cars are returned to Sixt, they are inspected for damage and wear and tear, cleaned, deregistered and delivered to freight carriers for the return transport.
The partnership with Sixt in Vienna is TÜV SÜD's first venture into the large-scale international provision of free-market services. It represents an opportunity for dynamic expansion in this new business sector, which also comprises a new company TÜV SÜD Car Registration Services (CRS), founded last month with Sixt, and a partnership between TÜV SÜD subsidiary FleetCompany and international service provider Fleet Logistics.
Contact: Frank Volk