Nexus Vehicle Rental has announced another record-breaking year for commercial vehicle (CV) rentals in the run up to the peak Christmas period.

It has reported a 10% increase year-on-year as fleets prepare for the annual online retail frenzy.

Industry experts are predicting another record-breaking year fuelled by key Christmas commerce events Black Friday and Cyber Monday with reports suggesting £7bn will be spent online during Black Friday week.

Daily rental is proving increasingly popular with logistics and courier companies looking to scale up their fleets to cope with retail demand, now including customer expectations such as same-day-delivery and more recently same-day-returns.

Over the past few years Nexus has seen unprecedented bookings from retail and courier companies as they look to cope with ever-increasing demand.

Yvonne Palmer, head of operations and Supply at Nexus Vehicle Rental, said: “Our customers know that through our supply chain and unique booking platform we are able to deliver their requirements at very short notice, and our suppliers know we have procedures in place such as the rapid turnaround of damage claims, making us the perfect partner to help meet the dynamic nature of the peak period. 

“Every year the amount spent online during the Christmas period increases and every year we look to improve our ‘peak product’, with several innovations in the pipeline for 2018. This year we added 24 commercial suppliers to our network to ensure we have large volumes of the types of vehicle popular with Christmas courier companies such as extra-long wheel base vans; the most popular being the Sprinter.

“At the moment the peak vehicle category of choice is vans but because our business is based on technology and we have a platform that is agile and scalable, in Christmases to come, we foresee being able to add other types of vehicle in line with market demand.”

Nexus offers daily, short, medium and long-term rental with access to over 550,000 vehicles, including 100,000 specialist and commercial vehicles and 50,000 HGVs across 2,000 UK locations.

Despite record rental levels for Nexus during the 2016 peak from October 2016 to January 2017, it reduced the damage claims resolution rate to a record low, down to just 45 days from an average of 90 through a new, streamlined process.