I agree Whirls - a silent tounge is a wise tounge....you just can't say what you like in this game and you NEVER know who's watching ! :suspect:

KMS - there are TWO RBs and yes, both read Pprune and yes, both have worked out who I am!! Both are also in a position to recruit if not pay wages.

Cheers

Whirls

The quick, no fuss way to get money owed to you in England & Wales is to use the moneyclaim.gov.uk website run by the Courts Service. You can process the whole thing online for very little cost and the Courts system then takes over.
Have used it twice this year on bad debts and got money + costs within 3 weeks.

I totally agree Pugzi is right to stand up for himself, but to go public.....not so sure......I would press the big D button mate ! :(

Why do you all assume Pugzi is a flight instructor, Dragon do CPL groundschool as well.

I can't see anywhere where that assumption (whether made or otherwise) makes any difference to the responses given - this is down to debt and non-payment thereof!

Cheers

Whirls

Who needs the facts - this still is a 'rumour' network, right?

Trouble with UK helicopter community and the popularity of this forum is that some people regard 'all' postings as gospel.

There's probably an 'Old Chinese Proverb' out there that can sum it up better than I can but:

Thank you pugzi for using this forum to highlight a 'possible' rogue operator BUT thank you Whirlygig, and others, for reminding 'prune-dependants' that there are always many sides to a story.................

Like the idea of that 'online' claim scheme...................

For what its worth I think it is quite wrong to post any dispute with your contractor on this site. As has been said here already we only have the complainant's word for this and no notion of the complete picture.

I will say, and back it up to anyone who chooses to ask me privately, that Dragon Helicopters have just paid me a cheque for an amount negotiated for a cancelled free lance pilot's job a little while ago. It would have been easy for them to argue that nothing was due!

I hope this brings some balance to a "debate" that seems to delight in demonising those in this industry who have the gumption to try to make small enterprises work in this exceptionally difficult environment and thus provide the whingeing workers with something else to whinge about along with their remuneration.

The thread is important if for no other reason than spreading the knowledge of moneyclaim.gov.uk.

The same for a thread running on the instructors forum regarding formally employed instructors and non payment for required hours on site.

When the ins and outs of each 'spat' are long forgotten the greater good is served by the site providing better knowledge for those in the UK industry.

Regards
rob

Perhaps we should therefore open up this forum to owners and operators to publicly name names of pilots who's mistakes and/or [ profanity deleted ] have cost them money due to repair of machines after incidents.

After all, do they not have a right to know what reputation the people they are hiring have?

I am a Management Accountant for my sins and have worked in very few organisations who have paid suppliers on time. Whether it is because of a lack of funds or simply to manage the cashflow, it happens in all industries.

Minty,

I think you'll find though that the tide is turning. I have worked for comanies now that very much have a "pay on time" philosophy as they have realised that the goodwill generated by paying suppliers on time outweighs the cash flow.

Trading without the ability to pay debts is illegal trading.

As for your first point, given that the helicopter fraternity is so small, I have a feeling that word gets round anyway!

Cheers

Whirls

Minty,

It's possible for an employer to insure their interests against genuine mistakes made by pilots - it's part of the risk of the aviation business.

It's NOT possible for a pilot to insure against an employer screwing him by not paying him for employment services given. What about the pilot's cash-flow problem? No doubt Management Accountants still get paid, come what may! :hmm:

A colleague of mine is still owed a considerable amount of salary by a company who decided not to pay him before the owner declared bankruptcy. Almost immediately after the company assets were liquidated, the owner of the company (a well known name in the car racing fraternity) immediately set himself up under a different name and carried on trading. His secretary recently phoned my colleague when they needed some important information referring to his employment but as they weren't inclined to pay for the information they didn't get it. Parasites. This sort of thing is one reason why pilots get bitter and twisted.

Loyalty? Unfortunately all too often companies receive it from their employees but when the chips are down it becomes a one way street.....

Minty

Whirlygig is right, your living in the dark ages.
I built up successful computer distribution company over a 9 year period. In that time I never once bounced a cheque or failed to pay any of my suppliers on time. In fact I used to pay over 50% of my suppliers on delivery, this gave us a great reputation within the industry and meant we got better prices than most of our competitors and were always offered the premium deals first. This policy was one of the keys to our success.

Any company who fails to pay for a service or goods is basically stealing. If you went to Tesco for your weekly shopping and told the girl/guy on the checkout “I’ll pay you when I can” before driving off would they not call the police?

My company used to get lot’s of bad debts from companies who ordered our goods sold them at cost or even at a loss to pay other creditors/staff. These people usually start a business with no sound business plan or financial backing. It used to make me so mad.

Use moneyclaim.gov.uk to nail them. Once you get a reputation of not rolling over and waiting for ever to get paid your customers start to pay on-time.

Rant over..

Minty Fresh Just out of curiosity ..... was your salary paid on time or were you content to be paid as and when it best suited your employer's cashflow?

Re making people wait for money they are owed ..... do you draw any distinction between large-scale suppliers and sole traders?

Insurance comes with an excess - it still costs the owners and sometimes those excesses are large.

Dark Ages? No - Small Manufacturing Business? Could be.

The only way a lot of small businesses survive is to pay late - as the people they supplied are doing exactly the same - I know I had to try and get the money out of them!!!

Ok, its not trading legally but people aren’t going to role over, give in and let their company fold. They will do anything to keep it going through rough times.

The two aren’t too dissimilar- British Manufacturing is on its arse and there is very little margin in grass routes aviation.

I'm sure eventually they'll be the idyllic world where everyone pays ontime - in the mean time remember that there's probably people owing Dragon too!

"Insurance comes with an excess - it still costs the owners and sometimes those excesses are large."

Yes, aviation business can be risky due to accidents, always so, but how can you compare that to a company arbitrarily deciding not to pay earned salary / wages to an individual because they would prefer to spend the money elsewhere?

A more valid comparison would be an individual not turning up for work because he prefers to work for someone else, but subsequently expecting to be paid for the time he wasn't there!

And would YOU accept it if it happened to yourself? I doubt it very much, no-one would.

Aviation CANNOT happen without pilots, however much management (and accountants) would wish otherwise.

I fully appreciate that we have not heard Dragon's side of the story but the UK helicopter aviation industry is a small world and Dragon would be very wise to sort this out asap.

Don't necessarily name the assailants! (legally dodgy anyway) BUT definitely discuss the scenario so the industry can be warned. An interested party can always dig deeper to find the names, I'm sure.

Can't believe there are people like Minty who still think it's moral (and essential) to delay payments to suppliers....Who do you think you are?
If you (as a small manufacturer) can't pay when due - pack up and move over for a more resiliant company who deserves your niche in the marketplace.
Refuse to pay me for my services - and I'll send the boys round.

Minty won't be the smell eminating from your office thereafter! :mad:

Sorry to repeat but I highly recomend the online Small Claim Court at:

https://www.moneyclaim.gov.uk/csmco2/index.jsp

Very easy to use and you can have the balifs round in a couple of months from starting the procedure (I have done it).
That will focus the mind of the debtor I can assure you.

Stand up for what is yours.
This guy is not a friend of yours any more so send in the heavies.
Act before he goes bust and then you wished you had acted sooner.

Good luck

Thomas Coupling - I'll PM home address for the boys or you. Smell it – you’ll be sitting in it - Now lets continue this debate without snide remarks.

I think you need to distinguish the two types of people who don't pay.

There are those who are tw@ts - bankrupt themselves not paying anyone and retire to nice home in spanking new cars. The other type are people whom have/are struggling to run a fledgling company. I'm sure if every businessman had a quitter mentality then the World would be short of a few very successful business people now who struggled in there early career.

So let me get this right, you're of the second kind are you?

You find yourself struggling so to make life a little less of a problem for yourself you delay paying your suppliers for as long as possible.
That way there's a chance you might make it thru the next month...oh bye the way, to hell with the other fledgling company waiting for their money eh?

Lovely mantra minty....what a delightful person you must be.

Don't tell me...even if you did go bust and still owed everybody...you're also the struggling little manufacturer who'll pop up next week trading under a different name:E

Mmmmmm - hope you sleep well at night.