With diesel prices swinging and sustainability regulations tightening, managing fuel spend has become central to profitability and compliance. 

For fleet managers, the challenge goes beyond controlling costs to proving ROI through data-driven improvements.

Motive’s AI-powered fleet fuel management platform offers fleets the visibility to cut costs, reduce waste, and meet ESG goals while improving safety and driver satisfaction.

Ready to see what AI can do for your fleet fuel optimization?

The rising cost of fuel and why management matters

Fuel typically accounts for nearly a quarter of fleet operating costs, making it the single largest variable expense. Even small inefficiencies can cost fleets hundreds of thousands of dollars each year. For example, Southwind reduced annual fuel costs by $500,000 across a fleet of 1,000 vehicles by adopting Motive’s solution.

Fleets that use AI-driven solutions to optimize fuel use can reduce waste by improving driver behavior, routing efficiency, and vehicle utilization. Left unmanaged, waste drives:

  • Higher per-mile costs
  • Reduced competitiveness
  • Tighter profit margins

At the same time, regulators are raising the bar on compliance.

The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration’s (FMCSA) electronic logging device (ELD) rule covers Hours of Service (HOS) and requires recording engine power and vehicle motion status, miles driven, and engine hours – but ELDs aren’t required to track fuel usage. Separately, the International Fuel Tax Agreement (IFTA) requires fuel and distance reporting for qualified vehicles. Clear visibility and disciplined fuel management help fleets meet these obligations while controlling costs.

How can AI deliver real-time fleet fuel management?

Modern fleets need more than raw data — they need a single view of fuel consumption, purchasing, and exceptions to act fast. Motive connects Vehicle Gateway telematics with Spend Management to help leaders cut waste while staying audit-ready. 

With telematics and video data in one platform, fleets can identify unnecessary idling, connect driver behavior to fuel use, and benchmark performance across vehicles. Paired with Spend Management, this visibility creates a clear foundation for targeted coaching and measurable savings.

Here’s how fleets turn that visibility into action:

  1. Connect telematics and diagnostics to fuel analytics: Telematics captures GPS, engine status, engine hours, and miles driven to monitor idling and support fuel analysis. 
  2. Tie purchase data to real-time telematics: Integrate the Motive Card with telematics to auto‑match purchases correct driver and vehicle using GPS, assignment, and fuel level; auto‑decline location or fuel‑level mismatches; and automate reconciliation with configurable controls.
  3. Focus automations on idling at power take-off (PTO): Turn on policy‑based alerts and auto‑actions to reduce non-productive idling and PTO misuse, then quantify impact with idle‑time and cost dashboards. 

How to use AI driver coaching to improve fuel efficiency

Driver behavior directly affects fuel costs. Aggressive driving can lower fuel economy by up to 30% on highways and 40% in city driving.

The fastest path to lower fuel waste is combining telematics insights on behavior and non-productive idling with Spend Management controls and clear policies. This lets fleets curb idling, separate PTO‑driven activity from unnecessary engine‑on time, and prevent out‑of‑policy fueling.

With telematics in one platform, fleets can surface idling, speeding, harsh events, and PTO usage to target waste and measure impact over time.  

Here’s how your organization can turn those insights into action:

  • Identify and reduce idling with Fleet Telematics using rules‑based thresholds, alerts, and reports to highlight where idle time is driving excess fuel burn. 
  • Separate productive PTO idle from unnecessary idle by using PTO monitoring to tie engagement to time and location, and enforce site or route policies.
  • Encourage smoother operation with the Motive Safety Score by applying policy‑based detections for speeding and harsh events and folding those insights into driver programs that support fuel goals.
  • Close the loop with the Motive Card and Fraud Detection to auto‑match purchases to vehicles and drivers and auto‑decline unauthorized transactions, cutting misuse and speeding reconciliation.
  • Quantify results in the Motive Platform combining telematics and card data to report on idle‑time, fuel spend, and exceptions for trend‑line improvements and ROI.  

The outcome is practical fuel savings from less non-productive idling, tighter PTO controls, and stronger spend controls without over-relying on safety tools to claim direct fuel impacts.

Motive Card: AI-powered fuel fraud prevention

Fuel fraud is a major source of unnecessary spend for a fleet. Research shows as much as 19% of fuel costs may be lost to theft, misuse, or error.

The Motive Card, an AI-powered fleet card, is built to eliminate those losses. Every purchase is automatically captured and cross-checked against real-time vehicle signals — GPS location, driver/vehicle assignment, and fuel‑tank level — to match charges to the right driver and vehicle and auto‑decline location or fuel‑level mismatches under your policy controls. 

That means managers no longer need to chase receipts or manually reconcile transactions. Motive’s AI fraud detection then flags high-risk activity with more than 90% accuracy, such as multiple cards used on a single vehicle and unusually large or after‑hours transactions. 

With the Motive Card, fleets not only reduce fraud but also gain tighter controls, automated reconciliation, and the peace of mind that every dollar spent on fuel is accounted for.

Measuring fuel savings ROI and scaling across fleets

For fleet leaders, proving ROI is just as important as cutting fuel costs. Motive provides a structured path for calculating savings and expanding impact across the organization.

Defining KPI benchmarks and baselines

Before rollout, establish a 30-day baseline to measure improvements:

Key MetricsWhy It MattersBaseline Measurement
MIles per gallonCore efficiency metric of driver and vehicle efficiencyLog 30‑day average MPG and % idling; benchmark to Motive network.
Idling hoursNon‑productive idling directly wastes fuel and accelerates engine wearCapture idle time via telematics; use Idling events reports and real‑time alerts.
Fuel cost per mileReveals the true cost of each mile so you can track trends and quantify savingsCompute baseline from Fuel Hub Summary: Fuel Cost ÷ Distance
Theft/fraud incidentsMotive Card + telematics detect and auto‑decline suspicious transactionsBaseline suspicious transaction count and dollars with Motive Card’s AI fraud controls

Scaling strategies for growth

The most effective adoption path is a phased rollout:

  1. Pilot Program: Target a small subset of vehicles to validate savings and build leadership buy-in.
  2. Regional Expansion: Scale to a broader geography, testing against different routes and operating conditions.
  3. Enterprise-Wide Deployment: Leverage Motive’s cloud architecture to seamlessly manage unlimited vehicles and multiple business entities.

This structured approach ensures consistent savings, smoother change management, and a clear ROI story for stakeholders.

The future of fleet fuel management

Fuel costs will always be one of the most significant variables in fleet operations, but the way fleets manage those costs is changing rapidly. 

With AI-powered analytics, real-time monitoring, and predictive insights, fleets are shifting from reactive fuel management to proactive optimization. They’re using data-driven strategies to cut costs, stay compliant, and run more efficient operations.

Motive is leading this shift, giving fleet leaders the tools to cut waste, curb fraud, and coach drivers in real time while laying the foundation for sustainable, future-ready operations. 

See how Motive can help your fleet save fuel, cut costs, and stay ahead of compliance.

Request a demo today

Frequently Asked Questions

Leading platforms bring telematics and fuel insights into one view to benchmark MPG, PTO, and harsh events to trigger policies and alerts that cut waste. Paired with integrated Spend Management, fleets are able to match purchases, block out‑of‑policy transactions, and capture up to 5% in missed savings by refueling at lower‑cost stations.

An ECM-connected telematics setup gives fleets the most reliable view of vehicle-side fuel usage in real time. With Motive, the Vehicle Gateway pulls ECM signals; Fuel Hub reports fuel consumption and PTO; and transactions using the Motive Card flow into the dashboard to simplify IFTA reporting. 

The best fleet fuel management software is an all‑in‑one platform that unifies objective fuel consumption data, driver insights, integrated fuel purchases, and IFTA‑ready reporting to cut waste and demonstrate ROI. Motive’s Fuel Hub does this by benchmarking MPG against Motive’s 750,000-vehicle network, surfacing coachable behaviors, integrating Motive Card, and helping fleets reduce fuel spend.

The most effective approach combines using ECM‑connected telematics to surface PTO, benchmark MPG, with policy‑based alerts that cut non-productive fuel burn. Then use Fuel Hub to track fuel consumption and compare against the Motive network. Pair it all with Spend Management and the Motive Card to uncover up to 5% more in missed savings.

AI safety coaching reduces speeding and harsh events, promoting smoother driving that supports better MPG. Pair ECM‑connected telematics with Fuel Hub to surface idling/PTO, benchmark MPG, and track consumption — top fleets save up to 13% on fuel. Add Spend Management with the Motive Card to steer fueling and block out‑of‑policy spend for up to 5% more savings.

Yes. Fleet fuel management can integrate with fuel cards; with Motive, the Motive Card links purchases to telematics for unified controls, anomaly detection, and IFTA-ready reporting.

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