FLEET & BUSINESS SOLUTIONS
Months of waiting disappear as group gets to grips with customers’ desire for swift fulfilment
Partnership content, funded by STELLANTIS
Bauer Media Registered Company Number LP003328 (England and Wales) Registered Office: The Lantern, 75 Hampstead Road, London, NW1 2PL
BACK TO THE TOP
SEARCH BY BRANDS
Bespoke and speedy conversion services from Stellantis Specialist Fleet
Head of Stellantis Specialist Fleet Richard Abbott discusses the choice of conversion services that the business, with its CustomFit programme and links to local UK converter partners, can make available to fleets, and how it supports emergency services around the country.
CUSTOMER EXPECTATIONS: ACCELERATED PACE
For commercial fleets, vehicle provision – whether with newly-built or previously-used vehicles – frequently involves conversion. From lining kits to access handles or specialised refrigeration units, the range of options is vast and can involve lengthy processes, often with additional validation, before a fleet receives the vehicle. “Previously, it was the norm for a vehicle to take 10 months,” says Abbott. “From the vehicle being ordered, built, moved into the country, moved to a converter, converted and then back to a customer.” With commercial fleets reliant on having vehicles on the road, conversion providers are under significant pressure to complete orders at speed. Abbott explains: “The pace at which customers want us to move and respond to their requirements has changed massively.”
With commercial fleets requiring a range of vehicle conversion options at speed, Stellantis Specialist Fleet offers accelerated, personalised and validated conversions.
CUSTOMFIT: FAST AND BESPOKE CONVERSIONS
The Stellantis CustomFit programme offers fleet customers factory-fit conversions that can be ordered directly from a range of options. “It’s made up of vehicles that we convert and manage the final stage homologation in our factory,” Abbott says.
A customer can go to our commercial vehicle price list and see a price for it as a completed, fully homologated product.” With its factory-fit conversions, CustomFit allows customers to acquire vehicles at speed with bespoke fittings. “These vehicles will take roughly an extra week on our standard build times in the factories,” Abbott says. “The vehicle will get built, that process still has the same timeframe, but then it will be straight into the conversion centre for the conversion elements. Within a short period of being built on the production line, the vehicle is then fully converted.” Commercial price list products are available across small-, medium- and large-van options, and are fully covered by Stellantis warranty as homologated products with GB and EU approvals. Larger van options, based on Ducato, Movano, Relay and Boxer models launched in April 2026. Through CustomFit, Stellantis offers personalised upfit services, where a customer can add to an already homologated vehicle – either from a digital catalogue or as a fullybespoke solution. “We’re in the region of just over 5,000 orders taken so far this year in terms of personalisation,” notes Abbott. “From simple fit-out, ply-lining, floors, handles, those sorts of things.” The wide range of personalisation options is possible thanks to critical partnerships with local converters.
“We’re not going to offer every single option,” Abbott acknowledges. “Especially when a change in homologation is required. UK converter partnerships are still a vital pillar of success to the Stellantis CustomFit strategy, to supply customers vehicles that are fit for their unique requirements.”
Converters working with CustomFit receive Stellantis validation across their individual conversion offerings. Abbott says: “In the past 12 months, we’ve increased our validated converters, which is why they are so important to us. There were just over 60 and now we have 91. “Fit-out providers and converters are absolutely crucial to our success.”
ELECTRIFICATION AND BLUELIGHT CONVERSIONS
As more fleets engage with electrification, achieving effective conversions for electric vehicles (EVs) rather than internal combustion engine (ICE) models presents unique challenges – particularly when additional interior elements are required.
“Consider a Royal Mail driver in an electric van,” says Abbott. “From an operational perspective an electric van is ideally suited, the challenge is charging infrastructure.
“With an ambulance, you’ve got the challenges that exist for more standard products, and the additional challenge of needing power for conversion elements that are going onto that vehicle – all of the equipment in the back, which normally would have auxiliary batteries linking into a split-charge in the ICE engine to constantly provide top-up.”
As a major supplier to UK emergency services – delivering up to 700 ambulances every year along with up to 1,500 full turnkey police vehicles (including cell vans) – Stellantis is supporting the electrification of emergency services, driving towards a net-zero solution while ensuring their vehicles remain effective operationally.
“They still need to do the job they were doing yesterday,” says Abbott. “But with very different technology in there.” Last year, Stellantis extended its support for EV conversions with the launch of electric power take-off (ePTO) options for small- and medium-sized products, with larger vehicle ePTO options launched in April 2026.
CustomFit allows customers to acquire vehicles at speed with bespoke fittings
“The pace at which customers want us to respond to their requirements has changed massively”
Richard Abbott, Head of Stellantis Specialist Fleet
Fleet Strategy
DS & Alfa Romeo
CUSTOMFIT:
