Motive
Available to Motive Card customers, the new fuel fraud control tool integrates telematics from the Motive platform, enabling organizations to customize spending limits, automatically decline suspicious transactions, and receive instant alerts for location inconsistencies.
The new tool has already saved customers more than $250,000 from over 1,200 unauthorized transactions in a 30-day trial period.
“The expansion of this impact will be powerful for the organizations fueling the physical economy,” said Hemant Banavar, vice president of financial products at Motive. “Controls like these will significantly decrease the impact fraud has on these businesses so that in the short term they’ll be able to analyze their bottom line, better tackle inefficiencies and focus on other elements of their people and businesses. Longer-term, tools like these will make fraud a less significant issue in the physical economy overall.”
Holiday periods are notorious for having a spike in cargo theft and fraudulent activities. During the Thanksgiving holiday period alone, CargoNet analysts recorded over 450 fictitious pickup attempts in 2024. Trends also suggest a significant shift toward more complex fraud schemes.
Banavar said nearly 20% of fleet spend is lost to fraud or theft, leading to an average revenue loss of nearly $1 million per year for companies in the trucking, logistics, construction, oil and gas and other sectors.
The Motive Card fraud controls use AI by automatically pulling and analyzing telematics data from Motive’s platform, including the locations of both the vehicle and purchase at the time of transaction, as well as the amount. It can then decline the transaction and send alerts in real time to the fleet manager with the ability to freeze the card in case of an unauthorized attempt.
“These new features create an essential layer of security, allowing fleet managers to prevent these losses using AI-powered telematics data,” Banavar said. “It gives these managers a comprehensive view of all activity so they can control and stop unauthorized spending and improve profit margins, savings and operational efficiency.”
Customers can act quickly on suspicious transactions with the fuel type mismatch and fuel level and spend mismatch alerts.
Motive
For example, a notification can show that a certain number of gallons were purchased, yet the vehicle’s fuel tank level remains the same, allowing the option to view the vehicle’s history to investigate further or freeze the card used to make the transaction. Fleet managers are also alerted if the fuel type purchased does not match the fuel type of the vehicle.
Other capabilities include setting spend limits by categories, ranging from merchant type, times of day, days of week, billing cycle, and transaction locations. Customers can enable one-time hotel expenses for immediate driver needs and set lower limits at certain stores and higher limits for fuel and maintenance spend.
Integrating fleet telematics with spend data also offers fleet managers an overview of all activity so they can eliminate unauthorized spending, enhance savings, and optimize operations.
“We haven’t had any fraud since using the Motive Card,” said Alex Amort, vice president of compliance for Cascade Environmental. “Because we’re able to manage our fleet and expenses in one dashboard, we have much closer control over our operations, can stop fraud before it happens, and can better coach our drivers on fueling policies and efficiency.”
