Tyre-payment Delays to Hired Operators
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CASES of hardship among operators of vehicles hired by the M.O.W.T. Road Haulage Organization, said to be clue to delay in tyre payments by the Ministry, were mentioned by Mr. R. E. Britton, chairman of A.R.O.'s Yorkshire Area, at the Leeds Sub-area's annual meeting last week.
He said that there were thousands of pounds due for payment to hiredvehicle operators under the arrangement whereby the Ministry paid for tyres purchased for such" vehicles as from January 1.
In numerous instances operators had not yet received any cash payments under this arrangement, and Some were thereby suffering financial hardship. Delay had been caused by the Ministry's difficulty in obtaining a sufficient supply of the formt on which operators were required to make their tyre claims, and in these circumstances an emergency procedure could be adopted in cases of urgency. Under this procedure the receipted bills in respect of the operators' tyre purchases should be submitted to his unit controller, who would endorse them and forward them to headquarters in London with a view to early reimbursement.
A useful new concession which had been granted to hired-vehicle operators
applied to Ayres on new vehicles. The purchaser of a new vehicle enrolled under the Ministry's ' hiring terms thereby provided for the Ministry's service the new tyres for which he had paid when buying it, and under the Ministry's tyre-allowance arrangement he had, hitherto, been at a financial disadvantage as compared With the purchaser of a used vehicle with well-worn tyres or n–o tyres at all. Therefore the Ministry had agreed to pay for the tyres on new vehicles, subject to a deduction of 15 per cent.
An aspect of tyre arrangements about which he was not happy, however, was that hired-vehicle operators were still required to pay for tyre repairs. Steps were being taken to take this 'matter up with the Ministry.