Fleet Operations & Contract Manager

Job Title: Fleet Operations & Contract Manager
Starting Salary: £59,537 progressing to £66,642 per annum – pay award pending
Hours: 37 per week
Location: Stevenage with travel across the County and hybrid working opportunities (at least 2 days in office required)
Contract Type: Permanent
Directorate: Growth & Environment

About the team

This role will manage the day to day and strategic operations of all Hertfordshire County Council (HCC) passenger transport services. The role will take direct responsibility for the planning, procurement, delivery and budgetary control of the transport services both by external contractors and also in-house operatives. The role will also deliver on ongoing service improvements and identify operational opportunities for transformational change, develop operational strategies and action plans to re-shape the service to deliver improved quality and cost reduction whilst continuing to provide overall value for money, safety and effectiveness

About the role

• Responsible for ensuring effective daily operation of HCC commissioned and directly provided door to door passenger transport services in line with agreed client specifications and legal/best practice requirements
• Work on the delivery of integration of day service transport across Adult Care Services (ACS) and potentially into Children’s Services (CS) functions. This type of work will be project based with specific workstreams and target dates
• Manage commissioned and in-house transport budgets on behalf of IPTU and SLA clients
• Responsible for overseeing community transport schemes funding, working in partnership with key stakeholders
• Identify and implement door to door transport operational efficiency measures both reactively in terms of changes to demand and proactively in terms of delivering new approaches to transport efficiency
• Manage and secure efficiencies in HCC in house passenger vehicle procurement/operational resources in line with overall Integrated Passenger Transport Unit (IPTU) service requirements
• Specifying and applying management information to operationally control the transport service and deliver efficiency
• To manage the effective implementation of risk assessment procedures for passengers on HCC delivered or commissioned vehicles
• To manage compliance and training to meet with Home to School Transport under Legislation set out by Department for Education whilst delivering a cost-effective high quality transport services
• Direct ad hoc transport resources to address demand as required by service

About you

Essential

• Substantial ability and experience in the operational management of a door to door transport services
• Extensive understanding of legal and best practice guidance in relation to SEN and Adult Care transport
• Substantial knowledge of the management of procurement of transport services
• Extensive understanding of the requirements of managing an in house transport operation
• Strong knowledge and experience of principles of financial management for a transport or similar operational unit
• Track record of identifying and implementing transport operational efficiencies
• Clear capacity to specify long term operational vehicle fleet requirements in line with ITU, Client and corporate objectives
• Substantial experience in overall management of the end user operation of transport-based IT systems
• Ability to direct, prioritise and assure staff
• Highly developed communication skills

We welcome applications from candidates who currently reside in the UK with established proof of right to work documentation. We are not able to offer sponsorship at this time for this role.

This job role is within the Community Services, level 14 job profile. Please locate this via:

Job profiles - Community services

To hear more about this opportunity please contact Matthew.Lale@hertfordshire.gov.uk for an informal discussion about the role.

Interview Date: 31st July and 1st August 2025

Benefits of working for us

How to apply

As part of your application, please upload your most recent CV. Ensure your CV is up to date with your employment history (including any employment gaps), and including any training/qualifications. We encourage you to include examples of where you have demonstrated the requirements/criteria in the advert / job profile to allow the panel to fully recognise your skills and abilities. You will have the opportunity to include a short covering paragraph within your application to give us a little more information about your skills, knowledge, and experiences.

Additional information

Disability Confident
We are proud to be a Disability Confident employer and guarantee an interview to anyone disclosing a disability whose application meets the minimum criteria for the post.