European Business Jets
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Zia
Not having a go at you per se, hope all you ebj'ers get sorted as soon as possible, but you know as well as I do that your last post is wrong and a little naive however right or wrong that particular comment is....
Good luck with the future
Not having a go at you per se, hope all you ebj'ers get sorted as soon as possible, but you know as well as I do that your last post is wrong and a little naive however right or wrong that particular comment is....
Good luck with the future
Guest
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Ladies and gentlemen, this is a public announcement.
Feelings are running high which is perfectly understandable. If the allegations of non-payment of salaries and 'stringing along' of employees are true then someone owes you all an explanation, preferably accompanied by a few cheques.
Some of you clearly need to vent your spleens, better out than in and all that. While this is great for your blood pressure the personal comments need to be kept in check and I would ask those of you who have named and shamed to revisit your posts and reconsider them if only for my benefit as I am the one who will be asked to justify them if the lawyers come knocking. I could of course just edit them but nobody likes a bully
Many thanks.
Duck.
Feelings are running high which is perfectly understandable. If the allegations of non-payment of salaries and 'stringing along' of employees are true then someone owes you all an explanation, preferably accompanied by a few cheques.
Some of you clearly need to vent your spleens, better out than in and all that. While this is great for your blood pressure the personal comments need to be kept in check and I would ask those of you who have named and shamed to revisit your posts and reconsider them if only for my benefit as I am the one who will be asked to justify them if the lawyers come knocking. I could of course just edit them but nobody likes a bully
Many thanks.
Duck.
Join Date: Nov 1999
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Surprised its been removed.......it's not like the posters could be sacked like the Virgin crew have been! 
Still, if there were libelous posts, probably best to remove it from the public domain.......
How are you CJ pilots doing? How many of you are likely to end up at Bjets?
Still, if there were libelous posts, probably best to remove it from the public domain.......
How are you CJ pilots doing? How many of you are likely to end up at Bjets?
Join Date: Oct 2008
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We made the Facebook group private because it is a forum for us to share information that may (or may not) lead to action against the former directors of EBJ.
We don't feel comfortable being used as public entertainment.
It is a deeply frustrating and depressing business to have an employer crash and burn when the whole world is facing financial hardship. We, the employees, worked bloody hard for that company. If our manager and the directors hadn't been so offensively arrogant and comprehensively unlikeable then many of us would have probably have gone on working for nothing. Most of the 48 staff are still unemployed.
We wouldn't work for them because we pleaded with them for the best part of a year to listen to us and they ignored us and continued driving the company into the ground. They borrowed money from employees and ordinary creditors alike. Their response when asked to return it was essentially- put up with it or leave. They bounced cheques on suppliers and employees indiscriminately -they simply did not care. At the point we were told it was over - the bailiffs were only days away - they hadn't even bothered to pay the rent on our offices - they owed back rent of about £40,000.
Now Deary has gone to ground and Messer and Quigley are hawking the remnants of their fleet to other AOC holders (one of whom is a convicted fraudster himself) hoping for a chance to repeat the whole shabby scheme again.
They are fools - and we in our turn were fools for letting them fool us.
We have no desire to be a spectacle any further.
If you have something useful to contribute, PM me and we'll talk.
Jon
We don't feel comfortable being used as public entertainment.
It is a deeply frustrating and depressing business to have an employer crash and burn when the whole world is facing financial hardship. We, the employees, worked bloody hard for that company. If our manager and the directors hadn't been so offensively arrogant and comprehensively unlikeable then many of us would have probably have gone on working for nothing. Most of the 48 staff are still unemployed.
We wouldn't work for them because we pleaded with them for the best part of a year to listen to us and they ignored us and continued driving the company into the ground. They borrowed money from employees and ordinary creditors alike. Their response when asked to return it was essentially- put up with it or leave. They bounced cheques on suppliers and employees indiscriminately -they simply did not care. At the point we were told it was over - the bailiffs were only days away - they hadn't even bothered to pay the rent on our offices - they owed back rent of about £40,000.
Now Deary has gone to ground and Messer and Quigley are hawking the remnants of their fleet to other AOC holders (one of whom is a convicted fraudster himself) hoping for a chance to repeat the whole shabby scheme again.
They are fools - and we in our turn were fools for letting them fool us.
We have no desire to be a spectacle any further.
If you have something useful to contribute, PM me and we'll talk.
Jon
Last edited by JonDyer; 1st Nov 2008 at 12:41. Reason: Typo
Join Date: Oct 2008
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As I said on the other thread: the reason that people like these are able to thrive in this industry is that employees fear the consequences of speaking out.
My background is from the Building Industry, where as everyone knows, there are a fair number of cowboys. No one fears them, they operate on the margins, the majority of people in the industry would be happy to see them driven out.
In aviation we hide behind anonymity - concerned about the apparent 'reach' of people who merit no such fear or respect. Two of the three I am talking about were sacked from previous positions - and the other one has no previous experience. They are nobodies and nothing to fear - and they have proved that by the inept and amateurish manner in which they burned through £6m in three years.
DC - I know you, and I'm sure you have your reasons for staying as DC - but you've got a lot of useful information locked behind that pseudonym that could help ensure that these individuals can't find work in this industry. It's evident that lots of people contributing to Pprune have met them before and yet still they can find finance and opportunities.
Surely it's time they were stopped?
I know 45 people, all at least £2000 out of pocket, that would agree with me, and I have a list of other creditors that runs to over £1 million that might take a slightly tougher line.
Things are difficult enough at the moment in this industry without these three taking part of what little investment there is and sacrificing it to their seemingly boundless vanity and ego.
My background is from the Building Industry, where as everyone knows, there are a fair number of cowboys. No one fears them, they operate on the margins, the majority of people in the industry would be happy to see them driven out.
In aviation we hide behind anonymity - concerned about the apparent 'reach' of people who merit no such fear or respect. Two of the three I am talking about were sacked from previous positions - and the other one has no previous experience. They are nobodies and nothing to fear - and they have proved that by the inept and amateurish manner in which they burned through £6m in three years.
DC - I know you, and I'm sure you have your reasons for staying as DC - but you've got a lot of useful information locked behind that pseudonym that could help ensure that these individuals can't find work in this industry. It's evident that lots of people contributing to Pprune have met them before and yet still they can find finance and opportunities.
Surely it's time they were stopped?
I know 45 people, all at least £2000 out of pocket, that would agree with me, and I have a list of other creditors that runs to over £1 million that might take a slightly tougher line.
Things are difficult enough at the moment in this industry without these three taking part of what little investment there is and sacrificing it to their seemingly boundless vanity and ego.
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JonDyer
".....but you've got a lot of useful information locked behind that pseudonym that could help ensure that these individuals can't find work in this industry...."
Do you need anything from me or shall I just observe
".....but you've got a lot of useful information locked behind that pseudonym that could help ensure that these individuals can't find work in this industry...."
Do you need anything from me or shall I just observe
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Insolvency claim forms and redundancy forms
Guys
Having been in your situation this year as well, I well understand your situation.
Out of curiosity have you all filled in your insolvency wage claim forms and statutory redundancy forms? Assuming an administrator has been appointed!
I managed to claw back just under half what I was owed, although still a kick in the teeth was better than nothing.
Having been in your situation this year as well, I well understand your situation.
Out of curiosity have you all filled in your insolvency wage claim forms and statutory redundancy forms? Assuming an administrator has been appointed!
I managed to claw back just under half what I was owed, although still a kick in the teeth was better than nothing.
Join Date: Jan 2002
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as far as anyone can tell there is no administrator. Nobody has a scooby doo whats going on. The structure of the company is unclear and nobody can tell which bit has ceased trading. All that the employees know is that the doors are locked, the computers have gone (we don't know who has got them), none of us have been paid, the customers have been dropped in it, and there is a feeding frenzy for the fallout business. None of which appears to have come off yet. It's all a bit of a bleeding mess! It appears that Peter and Nick are hoping to start trading under another companies AOC. Some aircraft have flown privately, others appear to have been moved. It's all a bit bizarre..
big issue anyone?
big issue anyone?
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So,
A few of us (about 16 or 17) got together today to exchange information about the behaviour of our ex-directors and Peter Quigley. A lot of information came out, some of which can be reproduced here.
We know that they are out and about again today trying to piggyback someone's AOC so if you're thinking of doing business with them - just to let you know:
1. EBJ stopped operating owing the bank £871,000+ - I saw a letter confirming that from our bank, dated the day after we "went under". Think about that for a moment - aside from the £1m they owe other creditors they also owe the bank £870,000. I expect they would claim that they believed we were still solvent at that point....
2. We've got a letter to Quigley, dated six weeks before we stopped trading instructing him to remove the steep approach supplement from our OPS manual because: "as you know it infringes our copyright because it is a verbatim copy of the submission written by [name of author] ... and we have never granted you permission to use it.” I guess it goes without saying that at the point we ceased operations – 21st October (5 weeks later) Peter had made no attempt to modify the manual.
The letter also refers to an “embarrassing” error made by EBJ when Peter submitted the manual for publication still carrying references to BMIBaby and the operation of Boeing 737s. It seems that he sourced the text of the EBJ corporate Citation 525 operations manual from an airline that flies the 737.
Needless to say we hadn’t paid the company concerned – hence the letter.
3. We have e-mails from a handling services card, and a fuel card supplier – both instructing Nick Messer to cease using the cards and collect them in for return. This they ignored.
On 7th October the fuel supplier sent a statement telling Messer that we were £73,000 over our limit (£32,000) and that they had had more than one direct debit rejected. They threatened a stop on the account if we didn’t settle up immediately.
Nick Messer wrote back (24 hours later) stating that the accounts would be settled ASAP and in return obtained a 48 hour delay on the credit stop. This earned EBJ an extra two days to fuel the aircraft legally. Naturally we didn’t clear the balance and the supplier wrote again on 10th October saying that we had to pay £45,000 that day to avoid a stop.
On that day Graeme Deary wrote an e-mail to the ops staff stating that “the cards will work until 12!” I wonder why he wrote that?
In the end we continued using the cards right up until the end 12 days later. At no point were the pilots told that the cards were stopped (there’s an e-mail from Messer admitting they were on stop but making no mention of telling crews) thus dragging us into their nasty little conspiracy.
4. Removed. Reflected on, thought better of it. 3 will have to do.
As the days go by so more and more comes out. These are indeed interesting times.
A few of us (about 16 or 17) got together today to exchange information about the behaviour of our ex-directors and Peter Quigley. A lot of information came out, some of which can be reproduced here.
We know that they are out and about again today trying to piggyback someone's AOC so if you're thinking of doing business with them - just to let you know:
1. EBJ stopped operating owing the bank £871,000+ - I saw a letter confirming that from our bank, dated the day after we "went under". Think about that for a moment - aside from the £1m they owe other creditors they also owe the bank £870,000. I expect they would claim that they believed we were still solvent at that point....
2. We've got a letter to Quigley, dated six weeks before we stopped trading instructing him to remove the steep approach supplement from our OPS manual because: "as you know it infringes our copyright because it is a verbatim copy of the submission written by [name of author] ... and we have never granted you permission to use it.” I guess it goes without saying that at the point we ceased operations – 21st October (5 weeks later) Peter had made no attempt to modify the manual.
The letter also refers to an “embarrassing” error made by EBJ when Peter submitted the manual for publication still carrying references to BMIBaby and the operation of Boeing 737s. It seems that he sourced the text of the EBJ corporate Citation 525 operations manual from an airline that flies the 737.
Needless to say we hadn’t paid the company concerned – hence the letter.
3. We have e-mails from a handling services card, and a fuel card supplier – both instructing Nick Messer to cease using the cards and collect them in for return. This they ignored.
On 7th October the fuel supplier sent a statement telling Messer that we were £73,000 over our limit (£32,000) and that they had had more than one direct debit rejected. They threatened a stop on the account if we didn’t settle up immediately.
Nick Messer wrote back (24 hours later) stating that the accounts would be settled ASAP and in return obtained a 48 hour delay on the credit stop. This earned EBJ an extra two days to fuel the aircraft legally. Naturally we didn’t clear the balance and the supplier wrote again on 10th October saying that we had to pay £45,000 that day to avoid a stop.
On that day Graeme Deary wrote an e-mail to the ops staff stating that “the cards will work until 12!” I wonder why he wrote that?
In the end we continued using the cards right up until the end 12 days later. At no point were the pilots told that the cards were stopped (there’s an e-mail from Messer admitting they were on stop but making no mention of telling crews) thus dragging us into their nasty little conspiracy.
4. Removed. Reflected on, thought better of it. 3 will have to do.
As the days go by so more and more comes out. These are indeed interesting times.
Last edited by JonDyer; 7th Nov 2008 at 14:30. Reason: Formatting was poor
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My understanding is that they are not dealing with anyone. The 3 at the top, and we know who I'm talking about so won't name names, appear to have just closed the door leaving money owed to customers, creditors and staff alike but now appear to have the balls to be starting something new. Well, one of the 3 at least appears to be doing this.
Quite how the ex staff of EBJ feel about that is anyone's guess.
The above may not be fact, but, it's what I heard from a reliable source very recently.
Quite how the ex staff of EBJ feel about that is anyone's guess.
The above may not be fact, but, it's what I heard from a reliable source very recently.
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no winding up order in place - nothing has changed. None of the creditors (including Barclays) are currently forcing administration because there are absolutely no assets whatsoever. No shares in aircraft, no customer goodwill, no brand to sell, and they haven't ever paid rent on the offices that they occupied for a year so there won't even be office assets. All computers in the office were mutilated in an attempt to hide any wrongdoing and most of the financial files have been taken.
Most of the staff have been left completely high and dry - they can't even make claims from the government because the company hasn't officially made them redundant.
I'd still like to know who Silverhawk is so if anyone knows please pm me.
Tom
Most of the staff have been left completely high and dry - they can't even make claims from the government because the company hasn't officially made them redundant.
I'd still like to know who Silverhawk is so if anyone knows please pm me.
Tom
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mate of mine still looking for a new job having been laid off...nothing out there at the moment...last l heard bookajet were taking all the charter aircraft tho the hangar talk is another operator was going to extreme lengths to try and get the planes on there books....hope all the guys are sorted soon crap time at the minute.