A big diesel bill and a hunch about the heavy land
Every month the fuel invoices arrive: deliveries to the yard tank, and perhaps a bowser filled at the yard and towed to outlying farms. Some customers let your operators fill from their own tank and charge you, or they supply fuel as part of the deal. The total is one of your biggest costs, and it moves with the price.
What you do not know is where it goes. You have a hunch that ploughing on the heavy clay burns far more per acre than the rates you charge assume, and that the long road runs to outlying customers cost more than you think. But the fuel was bought for the business, not for jobs, and nothing links one to the other.
Why fuel cannot be traced to jobs
Fuel is recorded when it goes into a machine, and work is recorded when it is done, and the two records are made by different people at different times.
- Tractors fill at the yard tank in the morning, then work on two or three jobs before the next fill.
- Bowser fills in the field are rarely recorded against a machine.
- Fills from a customer's tank arrive later as a charge on their account, or as a deduction.
- Road travel between jobs burns fuel that belongs to no field.
- Operators record hours and acres on worksheets, but not fuel.
So you can work out fuel per machine, roughly, if the yard tank records are good. Fuel per job needs one more step: splitting each machine's fuel across the jobs it did between fills.
What not knowing fuel per job costs
The biggest risk is pricing. Your rates are set per acre, hour or load, and fuel is a large part of the cost behind them. If a particular operation, soil type or customer uses much more fuel than you think, you may be doing that work at a thin margin or none, without knowing. What rates to charge is your decision, and your accountant's advice, but without fuel figures it is a guess.
When fuel prices rise sharply, customers may accept a surcharge if you can show your reasoning. Without job figures, you are applying a flat rise and hoping it is roughly right.
Diesel per job, from fills and hours
What we build is a fuel record that follows fuel from the tank to the machine and from the machine to the jobs it did.
- Every fill is recorded against a machine: at the yard tank by scanning a code on the machine and photographing the pump meter, at the bowser the same way, and at a customer's tank with a photo of their meter and a note.
- Where your tractors have telematics that report fuel used, and the manufacturer allows access, we use that instead, which is more precise.
- Each job record, from your operators' phones or your job system, carries the machine and its start and finish hours.
- Fuel between two fills is split across the jobs that machine did in that time, by hours worked, with road time kept separate.
- Each job then shows fuel used, fuel per acre or per hour, and fuel cost at the price you paid for that delivery.
- Reports show fuel by operation, by customer, by soil or area, and by machine, and fills from customers' tanks are matched to their charges.
| Question | Answered from |
|---|---|
| How much does ploughing use per acre on heavy land? | Ploughing jobs on fields marked as heavy |
| Which customers cost most in road fuel? | Road time split by customer |
| Which tractor is thirstiest on the drill? | Drilling jobs by machine |
| Is our surcharge right? | Fuel per unit, set against your rates |
Reviewing rates before the next season
Before autumn work starts, you sit down to review rates. The fuel report shows ploughing and heavy cultivations by field type, with fuel per acre from last season. Two customers on outlying farms show a lot of road fuel for small jobs. Drilling is in line with what you expected. You decide the rates, and now you know what is behind them.
When the fuel price jumps mid-season, the same figures show what the rise means per acre for each operation.
Does this sound like your fuel bill?
- You know total fuel spend but not fuel per job.
- Bowser and customer tank fills are loosely recorded.
- Rates have not been checked against fuel use for a while.
- You suspect some operations or customers cost more than you charge.
- Fuel surcharges are applied as a flat guess.