Business Fuel Cards

There are only two main offerings on the market if you want to give your drivers access to all the fuel brands:

1. Fleet Card (Business Fuel Cards)
2. WEX Motorpass (WEX)

Both these providers cover 90% of fuel sites in Australia and have options for you to enable non-fuel purchases, so the fuel card can be used for purchases at select partner sites like food and drinks (like those at service stations), vehicle related expenses like car servicing or car washing, and even taxis.

These benefits do come at a slightly higher cost of ~$2.50/m per card but is a good way to reward your employees – which you can monitor the spend online.

All fuel cards will give you the basic benefits of eliminating fuel receipts which is the reason why most businesses begin looking at fuel cards. If you’re a smaller business and want to keep the monthly fees to a minimum, the best options will be to look at fuel cards from one specific fuel brand. E.g. Caltex, Shell, BP, etc.

Most of these brands will have a lower monthly card fee because you’ll be tied to their fuel stations. The card fees range from $2.20 – $3.00/m per card (vs up to $6.00/m per card). As the monthly fee differences are quite minimal, the choice really comes down to which petrol stations are in your area that you can stick it.

When shopping for a fuel card, make sure you ask these questions around fees:

• What are the monthly card fees?
• Is there a transaction fee?
• Are these promotional fees and what will it revert to?

Some fuel cards are “open loop” which means that while they are meant for use with one brand, they can also be used at other fuel stations at an additional charge – but this is only the case for cards like Pumacard and Mobil which is operated by WEX.

Fuel stations that run their own fuel cards localised only to their own network are:

• Caltex
• United
• Shell
• BP

If you’ve got a few tradies to look after, we recommend looking at a more comprehensive ‘full service’ cards like Fleet Card or WEX Motorpass. These will give you the most complete coverage meaning no matter where they have to go, they’ll be able to fill up with both these brands covering 90% of all fuel sites. The 10% is comprised of independent stations or extremely rural areas.

Both cards also have bolt-on services beyond the vehicle servicing, like roadside assist and tolls which can be added as extras.

For those in professional services, a good option to look for is including car washes with the fuel card. If image matters and keeping the car clean will send the right impression, it might be worth that small investment.

Fuel cards like Fleet Card and WEX Motorpass allow them, but so do other fuel-specific brands like BP, Caltex or Shell however you will need to check whether these stations you pass have car washes.