The Department of Energy's (Department) Property
Management Regulations require fleets of vehicles to be
kept at the minimum necessary to meet programmatic
needs. To that end, they require that organizations
establish controls to help ensure the most economical
utilization of vehicles. While fleet managers are allowed to
establish local utilization standards that are less than those
specified by the Department, they are also required to
maintain utilization records, review utilization at least
annually and identify all vehicles failing to meet local use
objectives. Once underused vehicles are identified, fleet
managers must take prompt action to reassign them to
higher use areas, dispose of them, or justify the continued
need for the vehicles. All requests to retain underutilized
vehicles must be approved by the Department. Despite
these requirements, we found that a significant percentage
of the Department's fleet vehicles were underutilized.
