Two years to extract pay
Page 10
If you've noticed an error in this article please click here to report it so we can fix it.
IN Freight forwarder Federation Freight has paid a Dutch operator—more than two years after it carried out the work, and only after being threatened with bankruptcy by the hauliers' lawyers.
Peter Boom from Venray-based Boom Transport was first approached by Federation boss Jeff Lewis in December 1997. In March 1998 Boom took a load of frozen carrots from Norfolk to Germany and then carried out three further jobs, the last one at the end of May 1998.
When Federation offered Boom another job he turned it down, saying he was still waiting for the March payment.
When a reminder invoice was ignored Boom started to call Lewis every week and then every day for five weeks. Initially the person who answered the phone said Lewis was either away or ill; but eventually the phone was simply hung up.
Boom's lawyers then tried to find Lewis's office to launch legal proceedings but found the address on Federation's letterhead was merely a business forwarding service.
After contacting Commercial Motor the lawyers traced Lewis to his bookshop in North London and forced him to pay up.
Federation's business practices first came to light in November 1998 when hauliers warned others not to accept work from it. Lewis and his son had been involved in four previous forwarding companies in five years and had run up at least 20 County Court Judgments.