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'All we need is love. . .?'
Page 56
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THE TROUBLE with the recovery business in Britain is that people are in it for love, not money, W. C. Jackson, who gave a paper on "Recovery vehicle construction and operator training," was told. Mr Jackson, chairman and overseas consultant to Wreckers International, England, and president to Kinman Wreckers International Incorporated, Indianapolis, said he quite agreed.
An expensive wrecker, he suggested, should turn over £30,000 a year. He called for a show of hands on who does this and after one delegate said that this worked out at £600 a week, one hand only went up.
However, other delegates claimed that it is necessary to take into account the money made through recovery, for instance repairs and overhauls.
Another operator interjected: "'Output per man, not per vehicle is the way to look at it." Mr Jackson had suggested in his paper that franchising is a _good idea.
This involves, for instance, a council putting out the tender to recovery operators, say nine miles of motorway and three square miles surrounding for the sole right of operation. But this operator thought that this would bring a bad reaction from the public.
Rates for the jobs interested delegates. One complained that when he charged £35 for a 32ton tow hauliers found this a bit strong. One operator said hauliers did not want to pay a recovery man £25 to £35 an hour — yet they would pay for a crane operator on the nail.
-I charge £25 an hour,'" said another operator. "And for anything on its side I want £150. When the law phones me, I phone the owner and tell him the cost. But I guarantee no more damage will be done."
"I charge more to make up for the cheap A to B work," said another operator.
Mr Jackson was told that 80 per cent of recovery men's work consists of using twin-boom power-operated equipment, and replied that his firm was trying to make a lift-and-tow piece of equipment cheaply. The trouble would be, he added, that hauliers would start buying it.
"A lot of people need a tow truck and not a recovery vehicle," Mr Jackson was told.