Company Car or Company car allownace

[michaelc]

Do you guys get a company car or a company car allowance? Do you have a choice?

[BODINE]

Older techs get company cars, New hires get car allowance, with gas around 4 bucks, I am glad I have a company car.

[fixthecopier]

Company provides 08 Toyota Tacoma with company gas card

[KenB]

Personal car with the Runzheimer program.

There was talk of getting us (highly decalled) company cars, but that fizzled... so much to the point where guys that do have them (different division) will be losing them once the leases expire.

Personally, I have no use for a company car. It would just be in the way and an added responsibility.

If we do ultimately do go that way, (which is very doubtful) I would leave it at the office, pick it up at 8:00 and drop it off at 5:00. That way there would be no BS with company vs. personal miles.

IMHO, the guys (and gals) who need them are the young new hires. Typically, they make less money (if that's possible ), don't have established credit, and are more likely to have a few points on their license so that their insurance costs more.That was me when I first started - we had company cars back then. To me, that was by far the biggest benefit, and was the biggest single reason I got into the business.

I thought I'd do the gig and get out after a while, but that was 32 years ago.

[CanonSco]

[charm5496]

I have had both and prefer to lease my own vehicles and get reimbursed for mileage.

[KenB]

If you drive your own vehicle, it only makes sense to buy something that's affordable, easy on gas, and most importantly, won't eat you out of house and home in maintenance and repairs.

For instance, all the Hondas (Civics and Accords) and Toyotas (Solara and Tercel) I've had over the years have been stellar.

On the other hand, the '99 Dodge Intrepid I had pretty much ate me alive in repairs and breakdowns.

Another plus is that instead of worrying about paying taxes on a benefit, I get to write off the IRS allowance versus my vehicle compensation at tax time. In my case, that normally makes about a $1500 difference.

[cobiray]

We have company cars and it's not that much in taxes to drive them home. We used to "pay" to drive the vehicles home instead of picking up and dropping off everyday, but payroll changed it to a "job benefit" or something so we only pay tax on the government set amount for using the vehicle. I believe it ends up being $1.50 one way, so $3 buck a day is the assumed cost to the company. We then pay the tax on that non cash benefit back to the government. I think on an average check it's about $12 for 2 weeks. I can't operate a vehicle for $6 a week so I don't mind paying that.

[Tricky]

Going off topic just a bit...

Do you guys have trackers fitted to your cars so the company knows where you are, my company has just started this and its not very popular with some techs.

[KenB]

Not yet, but it has been discussed.

I think I see a roll of aluminum foil in my future...

[cobiray]

It's been discussed, but it will be in the cell phones some how for us. I don't like it, but if it means the lazy techs have to pull their own weight and actually start at 8 and end at 5 instead of whenever-they-like I think I can handle it.

[CanonSco]

Going off topic just a bit...

Do you guys have trackers fitted to your cars so the company knows where you are, my company has just started this and its not very popular with some techs.

Not yet. Although we have a "tracker" fitted by the car lease company, but only them and I can access the info and it is mainly there for maintenance monitoring. It works on a sim card not gps.

The GPS tracking has been discussed many times. Im sure if there are any of us left it will be in our future.

[cobiray]

The GPS tracking has been discussed many times. Im sure if there are any of us left it will be in our future.

Copier repair in a post apocalyptic zombie world???? I call dibs on the Mad Max car.

[KenB]

Personally, I really don't care (The aluminum foil was just a bit of a dig. )

I guess it depends on just how micro managed you are. If you'll get slapped for showing up at 8:03 or clocking out at 4:57, regardless of how many "extra" hours you put in, I would take serious exception.

[cobiray]

I guess it depends on just how micro managed you are. If you'll get slapped for showing up at 8:03 or clocking out at 4:57, regardless of how many "extra" hours you put in, I would take serious exception.

No, I'm not talking about 3 minutes, I'm talking 15 minutes or more habitually in the morning and as much as 90 minutes in the afternoon. And it's not the fact they do it, I understand the nature of our job allows us some freedom from time clocks, it's the fact they claim the time as worked on a time sheet.

Sorry for hijacking the thread...