Taxi Driver Online

Cabbie tells council to pay fare


A LEIGHTON taxi driver who is owed two months of fares has called on contractors, Central Beds Council, to stump up the cash or the district’s school runs could be thrown into turmoil.


Geoff Thompson is one of a number of taxi drivers throughout the district who have been forced to dig into their own pockets to stay on the road for vital school run contracts after the authority failed to pay its bills.

Mr Thompson, of Jupiter Drive, runs his own taxi company, Geoff’s Cars, in the town but he is also sub-contracted to the 69ers taxi firm, of Houghton Regis, to make a twice weekly run to The Isle of Wight to take his own two grandchildren to a special needs school. The contract pays him £1,120 a month which is paid to him by CBC via the 69ers.

But Mr Thompson hasn’t been paid by the council since August. The taxi firm managed to pay the driver from their own cash in October but he is still awaiting cash due from September and November.

“We’ve been having problems since June getting money through from Central Beds. I’ve left messages with them and no-one has called me back.

“I’m not the only one. There are other drivers still waiting to be paid. The trouble is that it isn’t cheap to drive these days and I cannot afford to keep paying for my own fuel. I’m seriously out of pocket and won’t be able to carry on for much longer unless I’m paid.”

A spokesperson for Central Beds Council, said: “We apologise for any inconvenience caused to our suppliers for the backlog issue on some of their recent invoices and thank them for continuing to work positively with us while we resolve this problem.

“We have been keeping operators regularly updated about the status of their payment but can confirm that the majority of all our suppliers will be paid by early next week. I can assure all our suppliers that we are carrying out an internal review of our processes to improve efficiency and ensure this does not happen again. For an update on transport payments please contact the council in the usual way.”

http://www.leightonbuzzardonline.co.uk/ ... _1_3268186

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Think of how stupid the average person is, and realize half of them are stupider than that.
George Carlin

Depending on the contract, if payment is late, they can add interest at a daily rate

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Note to self: Just because it pops into my head does NOT mean it should come out of my mouth!!

Do you deal with many council school contracts Toots? I thought not. everything is one way with them. For instance our contracts state that to terminate a contract requires 2 weeks notice by either side. Now if we want to terminate a contract with immediate effect for whatever reason we are required to meet the costs of the council replacing us. so if we had a contract that paid £100 per day and the new people wanted £120 per day we would have to pay the council for the £20 per day difference for 2 weeks. However if the council want to end the job without notice, they just suspend the job until further notice so that they don't have to pay us anything. As for late payments, all they do is wait until the contract is due for payment and then raise a query on the contract and then the waiting period will start again. Don't forget it is the council that set the terms for school contracts not the service provider.

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Grandad,

Yep I concur with grandad one of the reasons I don't do school contracts for councils these days is the vast amount of paperwork for prequalifying etc and if you do manage to land one the chances are that it will suddenly cancel and of courswe you are ALWAYS expected to forgo any compensation for sudden termination and I think they will find in this case that they will be expected to NOT charge any interest

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lack of modern legislation is the iceberg sinking the titanic of the transport sector

That's why I said "depending on the contract" because I don't deal with council contracts. Obviously to undertake such contracts one needs to ensure that cash-flow is not going to be a problem for them if the council aren't going to play ball very fair

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Note to self: Just because it pops into my head does NOT mean it should come out of my mouth!!

To avoid problems with cash flow because around 90% of our work is school contracts, I have started using invoice finacing (factoring). I send in my invoices at the end of the month and 80% of the invoice value is available the next day and the balance when the invoice is paid. The factoring company do all the chasing as well.

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Grandad,

Would that be 100% of the balance?

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Note to self: Just because it pops into my head does NOT mean it should come out of my mouth!!

Of course not. There is a charge for the service based on how many days you have "borrowed" your money.

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Grandad,

I know We used to use a factoring company when we first started up

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Note to self: Just because it pops into my head does NOT mean it should come out of my mouth!!

I have had 2 fleet clients brought to their knees by late paying councils. One in Somerset and one in Kent. I was in Cardiff last year and was told by a hackney driver he had bought a brand new wav vehicle in the school summer holidays to fulfill a contract he had been awarded, only to be told at the start of term that the contract was withdrawn.

I would be worried that at some stage councils will not be able to find firms to do the work. I live in a rural area and the local comp school where my wife works rely on the local cab firms for transporting kids from outlying areas.

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Nobody told me to use my initiative. To err is human to arr is pirate.