Transport

[andy_s]

2) Make the company you work for acknoledge that they are just going to have to stump up the money to get the operators license.

It's not just the money, unfortunately, or I would certainly do this. You also have to satisfy requirements regarding the premises where you keep the vehicle (which we don't own!), maintenance regimes, etc. That for me is the real sticking point at which it all becomes rather too much trouble.

[mike]

hear what your saying, will let you know. I know that there is a way round these things, and am meeting with the chaps who supply our vehicles, as they have a cunning plan. We also, do not have maintenance regimes etc.etc. Will PM you next week.

mike

[andy_s]

Ta Mike - I'll look forward to hearing from you

[gareth]

yup - sprinters are the merc "transit", I guess. But I used to drive splitters with a gross of 6 tonnes - also mercs, but I can't remember the model - might have been 609 or 709?? -  for companies like Trestle and The Sphinx. Are these now verboten?

Sounds like they'd mean a GVOL is required by the company - either a 'restricted' one if they are hiring the vehicle, or a 'standard' one if they own it. I'd be interested to know whether any small-scale touring companies have come up against this situation, and how they dealt with it ...

[James C]

Does anyone know when the requirement for a GVOL on 7.5t came into force? We only bought a 3.5t here, as it's all that those meanies at the lottery would give us :D , but I've frequently driven the bigger mercs (I still weep for Bessie, my beloved Vario 814D, whom I'd naturally (if over-optimistically)assumed would be given to me as a leaving present after my last job :D ) for small-scale tours in the past. I'd be interested to know if I was operating one of these illegally without realising. The last time I had a 7.5t from a hire company (for work purposes) was probably Summer 2001.

[Tomo]

Look at your driving licence.

 

B classification entitles you to drive anything with 8 or fewer seats up to 3500kg.

If you've got a C1 classification on it you can drive anything up to 7500kg except minibuses, and if you've got D1 you can drive a minibus.

(C lets you drive bigger HGVs, and C+E is for artics)

 

The rules changed in 1997 IIRC, so if you got your car licence before then you've probably got C1 and D1 on it.

The DVLA site has some rough guidelines, but they've got standard "this isn't necessarily the full law" disclaimers.

 

That said, I can drive a minibus up to 3500kg 16 seats on my B licence, so long as it's voluntarily and not for hire or reward - I can be given out of pocket expenses (fuel etc), but no more. It's to make it easier for charities to use minibuses basically.

[James C]

Thanks, Tomo, but regardless of my, or my stage manager's licence classification, I understand from Gareth's post that I could no longer hire a 7.5t vehicle from Ryders for work purposes, as my company does not possess a GVOL. Just wondered when that particular piece of legislation came into force.

[gareth]

Look at your driving licence.

 

B classification entitles you to drive anything with 8 or fewer seats up to 3500kg.

If you've got a C1 classification on it you can drive anything up to 7500kg except minibuses, and if you've got D1 you can drive a minibus.

(C lets you drive bigger HGVs, and C+E is for artics)

 

The rules changed in  1997 IIRC, so if you got your car licence before then you've probably got C1 and D1 on it.

The DVLA site has some rough guidelines, but they've got standard "this isn't necessarily the full law" disclaimers.

 

That said, I can drive a minibus up to 3500kg 16 seats on my B licence, so long as it's voluntarily and not for hire or reward - I can be given out of pocket expenses (fuel etc), but no more.  It's to make it easier for charities to use minibuses basically.

All true - but that isn't what James was asking, he wanted to know when the requirement for hirers of 7.5t trucks to have a GVOL came into force. (That is what you asked, isn't it, James?)

 

The answer, as far as I can tell, is that if the last time you hired a 7.5t for work use was 2.5 years ago you were unlikely to have been operating illegally. The impression I got from the TAN advisor was that this requirement was a very recent one (i.e. the last few months). I guess some DfT/VOSA pen-pusher had nothing to do one afternoon last summer, and decided to invent yet another piece of enterprise-stifling red tape just for something to do. :D

 

Edit : This site contains some useful information for anyone who might be affected by this. Also, follow the link from the main page of the VOSA site to the TAN site for a few more relevant bits and bobs.

[Tom]

It's not as recent as the last few months - I had to jump through this particular hoop last spring. I think the rules have been around for a while but they have been tightened up more recently. There used to be a "showmans" get out clause but I this has now been closed.

 

Edit A bit more info - there are two types of GVOL; one allows you to operate a number of specific vehicles, the other allows you to operate a given number of vehicles.

 

The former can be swapped between different vehicles but you have to send the disc back to the licensing authority to get it changed each time.

 

You can tell if the vehicle you are driving has a GVOL because it will have a disc, similar to a tax disc, in the window. But the driver has to be "working for the operator" for this to be valid so a van hire company's GVOL will not cover you.

[gareth]

It's not as recent as the last few months - I had to jump through this particular hoop last spring.  I think the rules have been around for a while but they have been tightened up more recently.  There used to be a "showmans" get out clause but I this has now been closed.

If you don't mind me asking, Tom, what was the context of your particular encounter with the GVLO regulations, and were you able to work around them or did you end up stumping up the cash for the licence?

[Tom]

It was a collaborative piece involving several companies. We needed to hire a 7.5T to move everything ( actually as it turned out we needed two but that's another story) but we had our own driver.

Luckily, one of the companies involved (Forkbeard Fantasy) had a GVOL for their big Merc van. I was able to get it transferred to the hire van for the duration of the job and then made it look like the driver was working for them - which he was sort of. As the truck was going to France I was keen that all the paperwork was in order.

 

It didn't cost me anything to do it but it doesn't sound like it's going to be a solution for you.

 

On another side note - you do not need a GVOL if the truck is empty (I think).

[James C]

Just to bung in another spanner for anyone considering purchasing a shiny new van:

 

I once worked for a company who had to get planning permission to park their 7.5t vehicle even in view of the street! It was on property leased to them, but visible to local residents, and apparently the fact that people might object to the sight of it meant permission was needed.

 

Another cautionary tale!

[andy_s]

It's not as recent as the last few months - I had to jump through this particular hoop last spring.

I came up against it towards the end of 2002 when I was looking into the cost doing a self-drive tour - something we don't usually do. I had hired a small Cargo couple of months before (16ft box),to pootle around London for a couple of days doing returns, but was looking for a 20ft box to fit the whole show in , which my usual company didn't have, so I started talking to the bigger nationals like Ryder. It then took me a month to find out what an operators licence entailed - no-one seemed to know which dept dealt with it (I too tried DVLA as mentioned above) by which time I had a perfectly nice quote from Paul Matthews for a proper lorry to do the tour, so stopped any further research - hence my interest in hearing from people who got further down the road than me.....

[gareth]

It then took me a month to find out what an operators licence entailed - no-one seemed to know which dept dealt with it (I too tried DVLA as mentioned above)

The DVLA was my first port of call, too. I called their helpline and asked the relevant questions, and was assured that I didn't need a GVOL just to hire a vehicle, even if it was for commercial use. I wasn't really convinced, so I called another of their numbers a couple of days later, and was given exactly the same answer by another department.

 

A small nagging doubt still remained, though, so I did some more research which finally led me to the Traffic Area Network in Birmingham, who were able to put me right. They were amazed to hear what the DVLA have been telling people - I'd have loved to have been a fly on the wall when someone from the TAN called someone from the DVAL to ask them what the f :blink: ck they thought they were doing!!

 

An update on my quest .... I'm now trying to get hold of someone from the Welsh Development Agency to find out whether there are any grants available to assist new businesses in complying with legislation like this. I'd prefer to get some sort of government agency to pay for it rather than have to pay for it out of my own pocket. ;) The business development people in Cheshire council were about as useful as a load of one-legged men in an arse-kicking contest - although I have a Chester postcode, I'm actually a whole 1/2 a mile over the border into Flintshire, and as such they absolutely didn't want to know! Buggers!

[andy_s]

Just to bung in another spanner for anyone considering purchasing a shiny new van:

and have you heard about about the two theatre companies who had to swap vans, as the one with the 7.5 tonner had hired young stage management, and the one with the sprinter had stage management of a more venerable vintage. Wonder if they were affected by the GVOL rules?

 

 

another cautionary tale.....