Fleet News reveal Japanese dominate car leasing reliability in a survey of nearly 1 million company cars

A survey of nearly one million company cars carried out by Fleet News has confirmed the reputation of Japanese models as the most reliable on the market.

The survey gave Honda the top honours for the second year running in a reliability survey carried out by Fleet News, the automotive newspaper for the company car industry. The firm took the overall title for the Most Reliable Company Car Supplier to car leasing firms for 2006, with the Honda Accord securing the title as the most reliable company car model by a significant margin over its rivals. The Honda Civic took fifth place.

Toyota retains second place in the manufacturer league table that it secured last year, with the Avensis also retaining its second position in the model table.

Audi also enjoyed a strong showing this year, taking third place, a jump of two places compared to last year’s table. It also had two cars in the top 10 most reliable company car models, with the A4 in third place and the A3 in eighth.

BMW retains fourth place, while Volkswagen moves up from eighth to fifth, and Ford shifts from ninth to sixth.

Mazda is placed seventh this year, down from third in 2005, while Lexus enters the table for the first time in eighth place. The final two places for Britain’s most reliable brands are taken by Vauxhall (ninth) and Mercedes-Benz (tenth).

The table of most reliable car leasing models includes many company car favourites, such as the BMW 3-series, in seventh, Ford Focus, in ninth, and Volkswagen Passat, in tenth.

This is the fifth year of the reliability survey and this year’s sample is one of the biggest on record, with 987,000 vehicles covered in the manufacturer survey and 918,000 vehicles covered in the model survey.

Only multi-marque car leasing companies were included in the survey, covering the most reliable cars, according to the number of breakdowns per 100 of each type of model on their fleet.

Points were awarded according to the frequency at which brands or models appeared in the tables supplied by the car leasing firms and for the position in which they were placed.

Most reliable manufacturers

1) Honda
2) Toyota
3) Audi
4) BMW
5) Volkswagen
6) Ford
7) Mazda
8) Lexus
9) Vauxhall
10) Mercedes-Benz
Sample: 987,000 vehicles

Most reliable models

1) Honda Accord
2) Toyota Avensis
3) Audi A4
4) Lexus IS
5) Honda Civic
6) Toyota Corolla
7) BMW 3-series
8) Audi A3
9) Ford Focus
10) Volkwagen Passat
Sample: 918,000 vehicles

The Fleet News survey was part of the FN50 report, Fleet News’ annual analysis of the UK contract hire and car leasing industry

Notes to editors:

This and other articles based on exclusive research can be found on the Fleet News’ website, a free to access resource, including news, road tests, jobs, supplier directory, forum and vehicle running costs data, plus an archive of information stretching back 10 years. Further research covering speed cameras, petrol prices, traffic services, congestion charges, car tax calculators, train times, business mileage trackers, road tests, latest car news and mobile traffic tools, can be found on Company Car Driver, also available from Emap Automotive