Fish contracts at risk
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• Scottish fish haulier Charles Alexander may lose contracts worth more than £500,000 because London wholesalers fear the TDG subsidiary's London depot will compete with Billingsgate Market.
Traders at Billingsgate have accused Alexander of bypassing the wholesalers and are threatening to replace Charles Alexander with a haulier which will not carry out retail deliveries.
The London Fish Merchants Association has started talks with a major reefer operator on taking over Charles Alexander's delivery routes. The company delivers fish to London from Aberdeen, Humberside and the West Country.
Charles Alexander's London depot opened last month in Silvertown, near Billingsgate, on the same site as a Beck & Poilitzer depot, a fellow TDG company. It takes over the work formerly handled by a depot in Welwyn Garden City and houses a fleet of reefers.
The London Fish Merchants Association says Charles Alexander, in common with other fish hauliers, has been "direct dropping" for some time. The opening of the Silvertown depot has been seen by its members as the last straw, because it will be operating under their noses.
"The money we pay Charles Alexander to deliver to us is being used partly to finance an operation dealing directly with our customers," says David Jolley, chief executive of LFMA. "A condition of taking on a new haulier is that it will not engage in direct dropping."
Fish delivery is acutely time sensitive, with damaged or late consignments likely to lead to large claims against the supplier. Jolley says Charles Alexander has offered a good service over the years with very few late lorries and increasingly refined documentation systems to speed up delivery acceptance.
But despite this good working relationship, the London fish wholesalers are anxious to minimise competition by having control over their haulage contractors' operation.
Charles Alexander was unavailable for comment as CM went to press.