Fleet Maintenance Glossary

Fleet maintenance has its own vocabulary. Here are the terms that come up in every conversation about maintenance programs, compliance, and cost — 20 definitions, no fluff.

MRC (Monthly Recurring Charge)

The fixed monthly price per asset for a Slick managed maintenance program. Your MRC is based on which services are in your program, your fleet size, and visit frequency. Parts are billed transparently at invoice level — no surprise invoices.

Preventive Maintenance (PM/PMI)

Scheduled service — oil changes, fluids, filters, brakes, tires, and wear items — performed on a set cadence to prevent breakdowns. A PMI (Preventive Maintenance Inspection) pairs that service with a documented inspection. Preventive maintenance is the single biggest factor in fleet uptime.

PMI+

Slick's on-demand engagement: on-yard mobile maintenance without the managed layer. You decide what gets done and when — PM, tires, brakes, DOT inspections — and Slick sends the same W-2 technicians and custom vans, invoiced per visit. Nothing recurring, nothing bundled.

HD-PMI

Heavy-duty preventive maintenance inspections tailored to heavy-duty assets like Class 8 tractors, performed on-yard by W-2 heavy-duty technicians.

DVIR (Driver Vehicle Inspection Report)

The pre-trip and post-trip inspection report required for commercial vehicles under DOT regulations. Slick performs and tracks DVIR requirements as part of its rhythmic inspections, with records maintained in TruView.

DOT Inspection

The annual federal inspection required for commercial vehicles. Slick performs DOT annual inspections on-yard, maintains digital records in TruView, and keeps fleets audit-ready year-round.

TruView

Slick's proprietary AI platform. It integrates telematics, service history, inspection results, and driver reports into a single system that predicts what each vehicle needs before it breaks — with real-time dashboards for vehicle health, maintenance spend, and compliance status.

HUB

A fully staffed Slick regional base with its own fleet of custom-built service vans, a local management team, and direct accountability for every vehicle on its roster. Each HUB covers a 75-mile service radius; Slick operates 10 HUBs serving 100+ cities.

UpTime by Slick

Slick's flagship managed maintenance program. One monthly program covers your PM rhythm and prepaid corrective labor, coordinated by a dedicated Fleet Coordinator and backed by written SLAs — ≥98% availability and ≥95% PM compliance.

W-2 Technician

A technician employed directly by Slick — not a 1099 subcontractor or gig worker. Every Slick technician is trained through Slick University, a 24-month curriculum, and the workforce holds 99.5% retention.

CPM (Cost Per Mile)

Maintenance spend divided by miles driven — the standard way to benchmark fleet maintenance cost. Well-run fleets land around 9–12 cents per mile; neglected, reactive fleets can reach 70 cents.

Reactive Maintenance

The break-fix model: fixing vehicles only after something fails. It means unpredictable invoices, driver downtime, and zero visibility — and it's always more expensive than preventing the problem.

Managed Maintenance

A model where one provider owns the maintenance outcome — scheduling, staffing, parts supply, and reporting — for one predictable monthly cost. Slick delivers this as UpTime, replacing the reactive break-fix model with a managed, predictive one.

Mobile Maintenance

Maintenance delivered by technicians in fully equipped service vans at the vehicle's location instead of a shop. The only shop trips left are the big ones — engine swaps, transmission swaps, body work.

On-Yard Service

Work performed where the fleet parks — nights, weekends, after hours — so vehicles are road-ready every morning. No shop trips, no towing, no driver downtime.

Telematics

The GPS, engine, and fault-code data feed from a vehicle. TruView integrates with major telematics providers and reads that feed as one more signal — and telematics is optional; if you don't run it, nothing about your program changes.

Uptime / Availability

The percentage of a fleet that is road-ready when drivers need it. Slick UpTime carries a written SLA of ≥98% vehicle availability, backed by service credits.

Spare Ratio

The number of spare vehicles a fleet carries relative to its active fleet to hedge against downtime. Reactive fleets carry more spares as parked capital — one FedEx ISP fleet cut spares from 4 to 1 after switching to Slick.

Deferred Maintenance

Service that gets postponed instead of performed on schedule. Deferred maintenance leads to failed DOT inspections, fines, and liability — routine maintenance today prevents expensive failures tomorrow.

Steam Cleaning

Interior and exterior fleet cleaning using 290–330°F steam. It uses 1–2 gallons of water per vehicle (versus 40–100 for traditional washing), zero chemicals, and is performed on-yard during regular maintenance visits.