The loan of a disc between two brothers had led to the revocation of the 10-vehicle national O-Licence held by Rotherham-based Aijaz Ahmed, trading as Advanced Travel, and the two-vehicle restricted licence held by Imtayaz Malik.
Traffic Commissioner (TC) Tim Blackmore said the loan of an O-Licence disc was extremely serious to use another operator’s disc, and fundamentally dishonest. It struck at the whole O-Licensing system.
He disqualified Mr Ahmed from acting as a Transport Manager until he passed a fresh CPC exam.
However, in delaying the revocation of Mr Ahmed’s licence until 15 February 2020, the TC said that he may be prepared to consider an application for a fresh licence for no more than 15 vehicles, supported by a satisfactory independent audit of Mr Ahmed’s systems and the continued assistance of a transport consultant, as Mr Ahmed’s son had only just gained his CPC.
The TC said that on 20 March a vehicle stopped in a school bus check in the livery of Advanced Travel, driven by one of Mr Ahmed’s drivers, was displaying one of Mr Malik’s discs.
It was extremely serious to use another operator’s disc and fundamentally dishonest. Mr Ahmed had said that he had gifted the vehicle to his brother. There was no evidence to support that. He had applied for the increase in licence authorisation immediately after the 20 March incident. The use of the disc had been reckless, and Mr Ahmed had gained a clear commercial advantage.
Mr Ahmed agreed that he couldn’t prove that the vehicle was transferred to his brother, who had moved abroad a couple of years ago. He said he assumed that his brother put it on his licence. He accepted that the vehicle had not received a first use inspection.
The TC said that Mr Ahmed had said that he had been short of vehicles and had asked his brother whether he could borrow one. Yet when interviewed by a Traffic Examiner, Mr Ahmed had said that he was short of discs.
In reply to the TC, Mr Ahmed said that he had spare vehicles he could have used that day. He had 18 in his possession. He subcontracted work to three other operators, who used their vehicles and staff.
Mr Ahmed had honestly believed that he had not been doing anything wrong. He had since realised that it had been inappropriate and that it should not have happened.
The TC said that over the last couple of years there had been a 50% prohibition rate. That compared to the national average of 17%. Many of the recent prohibitions had been for driver reportable defects. Inspection sheets also showed driver reportable defects.
Out of 10 driver defect report books he had looked at, eight had no defects recorded. However, the TC noted that there had not been a prohibition for a year.
