430-mile trips
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Mr Whittle's company has two units included in Truck Plan. They are both used intensively opera tin g daily return trips with fruit from Liverpool docks to the new Covent Garden market in London.
On a 430-mile round trip every day averaging five days a week the vehicles log an annual mileage in the region of 100,000 a year. The amount of maintenance to keep them on the road and achieve maximum availability is, therefore, not inconsiderable.
By using Truck Plan, Bowker is able to spread the maintenance cost load over the whole of a 12-month period rather than having to find a large capital sum for this purpose at what might be inconvenient cashflow points.
Participation in Lancashire Truck's Truck Plan will inevitably tie the operator to using Volvo which might or might not be to his taste. Perhaps if operators press their usual source of finance or the dealerships of other manufacturers to include more facilities such as maintenance in their hirepurchase agreements, they can be persuaded to follow suit.