DEBTS AND DEBTORS
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• "If I'd been paid by everyone I've worked for Id be a rich man by now." Wouldn't we all? The trouble is, thanks to a rash of heretoday-gone-tomorrow freight forwarders, road hauliers are suffering more than their fair share of overdue accounts.
But let no-one assume that nonpayment of bills is a minor irritant to operators. Someone is taking it seriously — seriously enough to make threatening calls to the Transport Users Group since it set up a blacklist of companies which fail to pay hauliers.
Perhaps the answer can be provided by the British International Freight Association, which is looking to a Government-backed registration scheme to weed out the cowboys.
Perhaps ... but it will take a lot more than blacklists and registration schemes to beat bad payers. For a start many hauliers will have to be a bit more choosy, and arguably not so naive, when it comes to working for forwarders who are all smiles over the phone but not at home when it's pay day.
It always has been and always will be a case of "let the buyer beware". That may be unpalatable to hauliers who have been ripped off in the past, but if you don't take time to make sure that the forwarder you're planning to work for is legal, decent, honest and truthful then don't be surprised when you wind up sitting in a creditor's meeting hearing that your chances of getting paid are zero.