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ADVICE
Page 58
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The world of hire and reward is full of pitfalls for the but Phil Noel is offering prospective owner-operators insight into the problems the business can throw at unwary, an early them.
• Phil Noel does not like looking through the back pages of Commercial Motor — he knows that many of the trucks in the classified section are up for sale because some haulier's business has gone to the wall. But Noel is now doing something to help ownerdrivers get started in the hire and reward sector on a firmer footing.
Noel runs Dorset-based Leon Price & Associates, a management consultancy as well as a haulage company with three vehicles, used mainly on Continental contracts to Spain and Portugal. So when it comes to giving advice on haulage matters he knows what he is talking about.
Over the past few months Noel has noticed that an increasing number of clients, owner-drivers and small fleet operators, who had only been trading for a short time, have been coming to him for advice on a variety of problems, from keeping tachograph records to sorting out cash flow. "Yet in 75% of cases the problems these people were meeting could have been avoided altogether, if only they had been given an early insight into some of the pitfalls they could expect to encounter when setting up a haulage operation," says Noel.
So he decided to draw up a one-day training programme, aimed specifically at owner-drivers. The agenda for the seminars, which will kick off early in the new year, will be flexible enough to meet specific requirements, but based around a core of sessions including operator licencing, operating centres, fiscal requirements, vehicle maintenance, CPCs, environmental issues, finance and insurance, sources of capital, invoicing, factoring, the importance of a good relationship with the bank, the necessity of good book-keeping, VAT registration and the pros and cons of becoming a limited company.
"We will also have delegate participation sessions to look at preparing cash flow charts and business plans and keeping daily cash books," adds Noel.
BUSINESS SENSE
Other elements could include the importance of getting the right insurance for your work; the conditions under milming which the goods are carried, and general business sense such as costing jobs, ways of controlling costs — and a self-appraisal to see whether you have the qualities needed to start in business on your own in the first place.
"The general idea of the training course is that each delegate can leave the session prepared to enter the hire-and-reward industry as an owner-driver," says Noel. "He will know exactly what he has to do and the order in which he should do it. He should be able to approach his bank mana ger with a basic business plan and a much less basic cash flow forecast and, although he will not be able to be his own accountant or solicitor, he will understand the importance of both these roles and know when he needs their services."
Noel intends to charge around 1'90 for the seminar, including lunch and refreshments, and anyone attending will also qualify for six months' free access to Leon Price and Associates' help line to get their problems solved by phone, fax or Prestel.
To encourage participants to bring wives and girlfriends along to the course, Noel is prepared to offer a 10% discount: "Owner-drivers' partners provide an enormous amount of practical assistance and backing," he says, "from doing the books and dealing with customers on the phone to handling all the administration. The abilities of a partner, who can hold the fort while her husband is out driving, can often make or break a business."
The training seminars will be held at weekends in 16 locations around the UK. Leon Price and Associates will run the events in Crest Hotel or Moat House sites in Derby, Birmingham, York, Grimsby, Newcastle-upon-Tyne, Preston, Rochester, Dover, Gloucester, Cardiff, Exeter, Yeovil, Swindon, Gatwick, Peterborough and Welwyn Garden City. There will be a maximum of 10 places available on each course but, if the demand is there, there will be repeats.
To complement the course Noel is trying to put together a training film in the John Cleese 'Video Arts' mould, which will make serious points using comedy. Making such a film is an expensive business and Noel has already been talking to a truck manufacturer about getting sponsorship. He has also received a letter from the Western Traffic Area's Licensing Authority Major-General John Carpenter offering his department's assistance.
Other plans include various specialist seminars. One soon to be scheduled deals with the pitfalls faced by Continental drivers; an area in which Noel has had a great deal of experience.
As far as he knows this sort of training seminars for owner-drivers has not been offered on this scale before: "It's a very new venture," says Noel, "but we have carried out a lot of research. We came to the conclusion that it is something the industry needs.
"I am always at a loss to understand why people rush headlong into this industry, but it remains a fact that they do," Ix says. "So it is important that they get an opportunity to familiarise themselves first with things that are bound to crop up."
Delegates to Noel's events will also be presented with a certificate at the end of the seminar which, although it has no training value yet as far as bodies like the Road Transport Industry Training Board is concerned, will at least indicate that thc prospective haulier has made an effort to prepare himself for the way ahead.
AT THE LIMIT
"People often come to us when it is all too late," says Noel "They come when the are right at the limit of their overdraft, when the bank manager is demanding money and they ask us what they can do. At this stage there is usually little we can do."
He hopes the training courses he has planned will give would-be owner-drivers a good grounding before they start out. "Lorry drivers can be incurable optimists and think that, because they have got the driving skills there is not much else to starting out on their own. Some think they have just got to go out and buy a lorry, take the going rate and they will automatically make a profit," says Noel.
"We will equip them with the ability to assess their own capabilities of succeeding. I certainly would have been grateful i I could have found a similar training course when I was starting out."
1=1 by Barbara Millar Contact Leon Price & Associates on (0202) 842603.