Another piece of computer technology became available in the early nineteen eighties, computer routing systems.
Our friends Thorn Emi bought one, and used the results from this the compare with he mileages we charged that had been achieved by our drivers.
We found invoices were being held up because of disputed mileages. Of course these disputes didn’t come to life until five to six weeks after the work was done and started causing cash flow problems as the disputed invoices were held in their accounting system and not passed for payment.
I went for a meeting and they showed me print outs of various journeys and deliveries made by our drivers, showing huge discrepancies in mileages. Initially when we looked at them they were blatantly wrong. For instance Spennymoor to Wetherby is 60 miles and there wonderful system showed 40 mile. That solved the initial problem and the computer program was sent back.
However senior directors on Thorn main board were not satisfied and agreed that the programmers should be allowed to improve the initial results, and back it came again.
Although they appeared to put the obvious mistakes right drivers, who have human brains had to take other factors into consideration. Many of the deliveries were to shops as well as warehouses, and shops, in those days still had half days closed mid week. Also if a driver was delivering into the West End of London, they couldn’t park on Oxford Street overnight. They had to travel to park, and park somewhere that was safe, to avoid the remainder of the load being stolen. Experienced drivers planned their journeys to cover these points and loaded their vans accordingly.
Friendly arguments continued and eventually we were persuaded to employ someone from their transport department who was being made redundant who they would trust to check the mileages before we submitted them.
Jock (I cannot remember his second name) used to drive for Ramar Dresses, and he lived in Crook. Dad had known him from the Ramar days in the early 50’s.He had gone to ATM from Ramar, where he was given the responsibility as Transport Manager supervising the drivers and vehicles. When we took over ATM work ATM made him redundant, and as at that time we didn’t have work for him, dad recommended him to Smart & Brown (Thorn) and they employed him. As. Is often the problem< Jock as an ex driver could do the job much better than their office staff and was a fish out of water, so hence his redundancy.
Once more technology had landed us with an additional wage, and expense, but at least with him checking the mileages we got our invoices passed quicker, and by avoiding the potential delay in payment made his wage worth while.