Federal law has increased the amount of money per month that companies can use to subsidize their employee's commutes under the
Commuter Choice tax incentive. Now, up to $115 tax-free can go each month to workers that travel to work via public transit and qualified "vanpools."
We all know that transit around here leaves much to be desired, so what's up with the vanpool option? That's where
VPSI comes in. The Troy-based company manages 4,000 vanpool routes across the U.S. and Europe. For each, VPSI provides a van and covers its insurance and maintenance. Each route has six to 15 passengers.
VPSI started as a subsidiary of Chrysler in 1977 and was sold to Budget Rent A Car before being spun off as an independent company in 2001. Autonomy suits the company well, says president and CEO Jeff Henning, but lessons were learned from its relationships with large companies: "Our financial discipline, our systems, are very well vetted."
VPSI finds its busiest markets to be employment centers with heavy congestion and long commutes. Henning cites Hawaii, Anchorage, California, Texas, Florida and Washington, D.C. as examples.
Locally the service is known as MichiVan and counts Ford, General Motors, Chrysler, Blue Cross Blue Shield, University of Michigan, Compuware, the State of Michigan, Delphi, SBC (AT&T) and Dupont among those companies that it works with to set up pools.
Rising gas prices and financial incentive have increased interest in vanpooling. Henning says that growth typically has been 1 to 3% a year, but there has been an average 10% increase each of the last three years, meaning an additional 300 groups added annually.
Henning sees Southeast Michigan as a great place from which to operate VPSI's international network. Northwest's hub at Detroit Metro Airport makes it convenient for travel to The Netherlands, where the company has one of its 40 offices, and close relationships with auto manufacturers have been important to maintain.
"We've been here for 30 years," Henning says. "We're big fans of the state of Michigan."
VPSI employs 41 in Troy and foresees adding one or two to that number each year in the coming years.
For more information about starting or joining a vanpool, visit
VanRide.com or call 1-800- 826-RIDE.
Source: Jeff Henning, VPSI
Writer: Kelli B. Kavanaugh
Enjoy this story?
Sign up for free solutions-based reporting in your inbox each week.