I currently work in the warehouse for a food retailer.
To cut a long story short, today whilst in work I get called into the office to take the LWB sprinter van out to a brand new store, pretty much taking as much stock as I can legally fit into the van without it being overweight (my work has its own weigh bridge for the wagons). There was about 7 cages of chill (mixed meats/juice etc) and the manager wanted me to take them all as the store was desperate for stock. Naturally it wont all fit in as it will be overweight, I explained this so we put what we thought would be as much as we could get in.
I then drive round to transport to go on the weigh bridge, turns out I have 350kg to play about with before I’m at the limit. So back round to the warehouse where the back doors get opened and more stuff is added. More managers gather round to give their two pence worth. I then get told that I will have a passenger with me to help unload when I get there, why I don’t know as I could of managed, might of got a bit of a sweat on but I wouldn’t of minded. I explain about this adding weight when one of the managers pipes up with a cracker:
“when you weigh it, make sure Hxxxxx gets out first”.
Bear in mind that it’s gonna be real close to the 3.5t GVW.
I explain to this manager about the MAM/GVW and he scoffs “no it wont it’ll be alright”, as if I’ve just said something really stupid.
Anyway I take no notice and drive round to transport where they tell me to get it weighed with all passengers etc etc, turns out it was 3420kg so happy days and off we drove with this “important stock”.
Just for the record I would of refused to take it if it was over the limit by any margin, but I know for a fact that they use a few different lads from the warehouse to drive the van taking stock etc, just makes me wonder if they used someone who wasn’t aware of the limits etc and they got stopped they could end up in a sticky situation. I don’t think it would of got passed transport if it was over the limit but still, if they had bypassed transport in some way and used someone else they might of sent a 3.5t van out weighing in excess of 4t. I know its not a great deal of weight compared to what you lot drive but its more the blatant lack of knowledge/disregard for the law and peoples licence.
Anyway, feels good to get that off my chest to people who understand 
(I do know that this is pretty much the tip of the iceberg in the transport industry aswell lol)
