Operator Granted Licence After Traffic Commissioner’s Public Inquiry Despite Operating Without a Licence and Using the Margin of Another Operator.

The Operator, represented at Public Inquiry by Harry Bowyer, was running two companies when he decided to close one down. He closed down the company with the Operator’s Licence and continued to operate until one of his vehicles was stopped, thinking that the licence was still open to him to use. Plainly shocked by the DVSA telling him that he was operating without a licence he immediately stopped operating until a kindly neighbour told him that there were two spaces on his margin and the errant operator could use those until his own application for a new licence came through.

When the call in letter arrived the operator, sensibly, called  a transport consultant. He cheerfully told the horrified consultant that his vehicles were on someone else’s licence so that he could continue to operate. When the consultant told our operator the facts of life, including the probable consequences of borrowing someone else’s margin, our operator contacted SBC.

The director/transport manager, who had been enjoying “Grandfather rights” enrolled himself on a Transport Manager CPC refresher and his daughter on an OLAT course. His daughter caught the transport bug from this and is down to do her Transport Manager CPC later this month.

At the Traffic Commissioner’s Public Inquiry, where the Operator made full and frank disclosure of the licence lending arrangement, the Deputy Traffic Commissioner accepted that this was due to lack of knowledge rather than a deliberate attempt to get round the rules. Taking into account the attempts to increase the knowledge within the company and the obvious contrition, the Deputy Traffic Commissioner granted the licence as applied for with a severe warning recorded.