COCKNEY CLASSICS
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Bill Humphreys and his son run their company in style. Their customised trucks are impeccably maintained and given a name — but after 30 years, their business is under threat.
• Bill Humphreys' business card reflects the "can-do" attitude he brings to road haulage: "You name it, and pay for it, we do it!" is the motto, flanked by a jokey catalogue of more outlandish claims, such as "Dragons Slayed", "Orgies Organised", "Riots Started and Quelled" and "Maker of Miracles".
Miracles, it seems, are the order of the day for Humphreys, whose depot in Silvertown near the Blackwall Tunnel has been placed under a compulsory purchase order by the Docklands Development Authority.
"The DocWands Authority people are all faceless — for all I know, General Pinochet could be behind them. We've tried to put our case but it falls on deaf ears," says Humphreys, still fuming at the 225,000 he has just wasted on an unsuccessful hearing at a public inquiry. "If we lose, the business will have to go."
END OF A STORY
If that happened it would be the end of a story which started 30 years ago with a 1939 Q Dodge and an S-licence. Humphreys UK International Transport has shifted up a few gears since then. It now runs a fleet of nine magnificent trucks, lovingly serviced by six drivers and nine mechanics.
Flamboyantly customised, the wagons are pristine, despite some impressive distances under their wheels. Humphreys' favourite workhorse, a 140 Scania christened Gay Lad, has covered over 1.5 million kilometres. Black Panther, The Scarlet Pimpernel, Battle Bones and their stablernates have all reached a million.
It takes Humphreys and his men up to three months to transform a well-used workhorse into a mechanical Mona Lisa, and this summer their efforts won two of the top prizes at Commercial Motor's Truckfest South West — best kept working fleet and best kept working truck. The workshop team makes numerous modifications, such as raising the cab and installing their own tilt mechanisms. Cab interiors are refurbished and a luscious coat of paint with art lettering finishes the job.
"Doing up the trucks gives the driver a sense of pride," says Humphreys. "It makes him an individual and encourages him to take care of the vehicle. Anyway, I've always liked to keep my trucks a bit decent."
The trucks may be getting on a bit — the company has not bought a new model since 1977 — but Humphreys insists it is not a sentimental policy. "You pay through the nose for a new vehicle. With an old truck, you have to spend a little more time on maintenance but you save money. A new truck is only new for 12 months," he says.
Scanias dominate the fleet. "I got into Scanias a long time ago and it's gone on from there. The parts are easily interchangeable and I have a great dealer nearby, in Purfleet," says Humphreys.
THE DANCER Latest addition to the fleet is a battered 1977 Scania 141 bought from Scantruck. After getting the Silvertown treatment it will emerge as The Dancer. "We chose that name because it'll be as big as a ballroom," enthuses Humphreys. It is obvious he can hardly wait to get stuck into the conversion.
For the first 20 years of its life, UK International Transport specialised in temperature-controlled work but, as Humphreys recalls: "Fridges in those days were more trouble than they were worth." He moved into tilts and opened up a vehicle repair business, M & H Commercial Repairs.
Nowadays Humphreys takes on just about anything, and has some adventures in the process. He once transported three helicopters for the Maltese Air Force; their entire chopper force at the time. "I've never seen a man so nervous as the bloke they sent to oversee the trip," says Humphreys. "He nearly had a seizure every time we hit a bump. When the first truck arrived with only two of the helicopters, he went green. We hadn't told him the third was coming down in another vehicle."
Then there was the deal with an Arab businessman who conducted some marital business in the depot: "He divorced one of his wives in the office after she'd had a bit of a nick with wife Number One, then he turned round and we got straight on with the deal."
The operation now centres around oneoff hire-and-reward jobs, a regular service to Italy, transporting exhibition equipment and vehicle repair and painting contracts. Local timber company TTL rents part of the yard, as does Scottish paper maker Munro of Markinch. A small tanker park completes the set up.
FAMILY AFFAIR
Humphreys runs the firm in partnership with his son, Bill junior. "This business is a family affair," he says. "Me and Bill junior run it together — what's mine is his and what's his is mine. . our board meetings are conducted at home over a gammon steak or a Dover sole."
London's hauliers are lumped together into the Arthur Daley school of road transport, according to Humphreys. "Everyone out of London imagines that because you've got an address in the capital, you're into sharp practices. We rely on service, quality and reliability, avoid cost-cutting wars and hope the customers keep on coming." Quality first has paid off for Humphreys, and the business is humming. Property developers, however, are not renowned for their sympathy with traditional East End family concerns which stand in the way of their ambitions. The Docklands Development Authority has offered Humphreys 2300,000 for his depot; and that, says Humphreys, is not enough. "They are offering me chickenfeed for this place. It cost me over 2100,000 to buy the freehold 12 years agt and since then I've made improvements that mean it's tailor-made to suit us."
A nearby plot has been offered at the Coley Road business site for 2180,000, but a surveyor has told Humphreys that it will take at least 2800,000 to remove a metre of topsoil and fit out the site properly. That shortfall of 2680,000 threatens UK International's future.
Humphreys will not know his fate until the official decision on the compulsory purchase order is taken next year. Gay Lad may be clocking up its last kilometres unless Humphreys can find that miracle he's looking for.
0 by Paul Fisher