Manual Gearbox & Clutch Services

The Story of DJ Transmissions

 

So back in the early 80’s after working for a company building manual gearboxes I decided to venture in to the world of self-employment and start up on my own. My childhood was always spent around cars, I got into Autograss racing after leaving school and built cars to compete with and enjoyed the challenges that bought.

 

So, after talking to an Accountant who established I could get start up grants etc I found a unit to operate from in Halesfield Telford, 2 days after committing to the unit and speaking to my accountant it became apparent that the 2 grants would now not be available due to some bureaucracy around signing a lease for premises too early. So onward I plough with no money to buy any equipment, the first 12 months flew by and I had managed to pay the rent every month and even purchased a ramp and some much-needed equipment to make the job easier. My business operated from there until the landlord allowed a motor trade franchise to take next door unit, I spoke to the franchisee to determine what they would be doing and it became apparent that I was in for a stormy ride. I began my search for alternate premises which took a further 12 months, so moved the business to a unit at Heath Hill in Dawley, Telford which were at the time owned by Telford Development Corporation. The new unit was in much better condition so set about getting friends/family to help set it up, building a reception area, painting etc. After 3 years I signed a new lease with increased rent but was manageable until the government changed the rateable value which meant I would have to find the rent money on top each month to pay the rates. During the following months it became very difficult to maintain the financial side of the business, having to find the rates money was a great struggle, to the point of having to make staff redundant which of cause meant I had to lower the volume of work coming through door, at the height of the business I employed 5 staff. I got down to 2 staff and myself and took the decision to downsize as 2 units on the same estate had become available neither were rateable so used one of the units for fitting and the second for rebuilding and storage of gearboxes. The move unfortunately started the demise of DJ Transmissions and I called it a day in the early 90’s so right back where I started, I came out relatively unscathed with the exception od the BANK. I went to visit my bank manager during the shutdown period to discuss a £2000 overdraft that I had incurred, so I asked if that could be frozen for a month or 2 so I could find a job and start paying this off. The very understanding bank manager refused and demanded the money be paid back, I hadn’t got the money at that point and tried to plead for a bit of leniency to no avail. I moved on and found a job and then started getting letters from the bank so I went to speak to the bank again to my horror the debt had doubled so agreed to start paying the debt by drip feeding. Anyway, this went on for years until one day out of the blue I had a debt collection agency on the phone at work and settled the debt.

 

I had moved into the IT arena for work and ended up at a large corporate as an IT Manager after 12 years with them, in June 2010 my job within that organisation got made redundant during that process because of time served and knowledge of the business I was forced to sign a Non-Disclosure so was payed to keep my mouth shut. I had a couple months downtime and then started applying for jobs but paying my mortgage, bills etc the money I got for redundancy and ND was fast running out. I went to sign on in September to get my £68 p/w unemployment benefit and had to jump through hoops to keep that payment coming. In October 2010 I was told my benefit would stop due to gap in my NI contributions so offered to bring that up to date, I was not allowed to that until the following April so walked away. Between June 2010 and October 2010, I had applied for in excess of 2500 jobs of which I had 5 interviews all of which came to nothing mostly due to me being over qualified. I decided to go it alone again and started up painting and decorating but after only a few weeks could see it was not for me, couldn’t have earned enough money doing that I’m too particular and spent far to long perfecting each job.

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DJ Transmissions…….The Phoenix Rises (Chapter 2)

 

During the later months of 2011 it was shit or bust time, my house was on the line so placed an ad in the Shropshire Star, I had some tools in the garage and to be honest I didn’t think as all those years had passed gearbox work would still be a thing. Well how wrong was that LOL, I started to get calls and took a few lose gearboxes to do in my garage at home, borrowing money to buy parts to fix them and then paying the money back at the end of each job. It was however getting to the point that customers required the gearbox removing as well but I was concerned doing that from home. I did it for a while and ended up having 2 vehicles on stands on my drive with the gearboxes stripped in my garage. One of my customers who I had been doing gearboxes for presented me with an opportunity to rent one of his units in Church Stretton, so off I went to have a look and after a lot of discussion with family and friends decided to go for it. Obviously, this meant some spend on bigger better equipment to facilitate my job, I travelled to and from work daily in an old mk4 Astra van sometimes taking friends to help me out. Business was picking up but I had realised that there seemed to be a problem with some builds, usually things that were not bought to my attention prior to me carrying out any work on the gearbox. I found myself becoming increasingly more frustrated, so found myself asking more and more questions of the customer that delivered the gearbox, this usually was the apprentice from a garage who had no idea what issues there were with the gearbox. Anyway, moving on 11 months in at Church Stretton I had a phone call from the landlord asking me to pop and see him, I did and basically, he gave me a month to vacate the premises as he had a better offer for the unit. I looked around for a unit and thought I’d be better in Telford so contacted local council but even with lots of empty units non-where suitable for Motor Trade. I then happened to see Units available at present site Greenwood Court so enquired. I had been travelling from Church Stretton to home in Telford every day with a trailer full of stuff from unit and filling my garage at home. On my last day at Church Stretton and very disheartened I got the call from Bulley’s that Unit E5 was available so at 4pm dropped the keys for Church Stretton unit with the landlord and drove straight over to Greenwood Court to meet and sign the agreed lease. On arrival I read through the lease and highlighted some arears of concern with everything being separated i.e. Rent, Service Charge and Insurance contribution. This was sorted there and then the document amended and re-issued the next day, signed done 3-year lease, happy days. During the first three years I would get the odd demand through the door for Service Charge but a phone call soon sorted that. 3-years pass and it’s time for lease renewal, I was probably fortunate that the landlords wanted to keep their properties occupied with good tenants that look after the place and pay on time, so my lease stayed the same “All Inclusive Rent” at a reasonable cost. Now between 2016 and 2021 the site was sold and this is where this little story gets meaty.

 

In October 2021 my 2016 lease was due to expire, I’d like to point out at this time that I had already raised my concerns with the new landlords about the entrance to the site looking like a car boot sale every morning, the state of the yard even raising my concerns about having to pay for one of my customers cars being damaged by an upturned curb stone in the yard.

On to the new lease,

 

I was presented digitally a new lease at the end of October which was recalled due to an error on the lease, it was then sent digitally again early November. I had previously had discussions with the landlord and wanted a Monthly figure to include Rent, Service Charge and Insurance, I was told they could include Rent and Service Charge but their company policy could not incorporate insurance so this accepted I digitally signed the lease which then got sent to my witness who also signed the document. Job done for another three years  or so you would think. I paid the new amount of rent and then in January 2022 I receive an email saying the signed lease was cancelled with no explanation as to why. I emailed several people to ascertain how and why the lease was cancelled and eventually got responses with 2 reasons why, first it was due to their signatories not signing it and secondly it was due to an Audit and changes needed to be made to some wording. Another lease then arrived digitally which had wording changes on page 3 only according to two separate emails sent from the landlord. I read these word changes which essentially negated all my photographic evidence of unit when I moved in originally. So, my understanding of this was for one reason only, that being that when I eventually vacate the property I would be liable for dilapidation costs that the landlord sees fit to charge, Obviously I wasn’t going to sign the lease with these changes so challenged them. When I later decided to sit down and go through page by page of both presented leases I found changes on Page 1, Service Charge had changed to Maintenance Charge and included an uplift in cost by £490 per year. Now whether I agree with the uplift or not it is clearly apparent that the landlord chooses to be deceitful and lie as per their email stating changes were only made on Page 3. Since then 16 Months after the signed lease had been cancelled I have been paying the rent figure I agreed to but have only been receiving invoices for my 2016 lease amount which was all inclusive, until January 2023 when the landlord decided to send me additional invoices for Service Charge so three weeks ago I spoke to the landlords Credit Controller to ask again why I have been receiving invoices for the amount in the 2016 lease and yet I’ve been paying more than that as I agreed in November 2021, his reply was that I had £2600 credit on my account. He also said I had a lease so I asked if he could send me that which I received the next day, this was not a lease but a Head of Terms Agreement at Rent 6800 per year, Service Charge 860 per year and Insurance Contribution 143.12 yearly. Every month for 16 months I’ve paid £766 Rent including Service Charge, I have never received a single invoice for Insurance. So, given 16 invoices at £512 = £8192.00 all-inclusive and paying £766 for 16 months = £12,256.00 the figure on credit is £4064.00 not £2600.00 as the landlord claims.

 

I have now been issued with a Section 25 from the landlord which means that if a lease cannot be agreed by 18th August 2023 I have to leave the premises. All of my contact with the landlord over the past 12 months has been met with total resistance or I’ve had no response from email’s. I have learnt an awful lot through the past 18 months as regards to legalities and commercial tenancies and you would be shocked at how much these landlords can get away with, it’s criminal that that the government in this country is not giving tenants any protection from the racketeering that goes on. Another tenant on this site had a lease with a rent review incorporated which was not initiated at the date in the lease but was two years later and then they invoiced him for £9k back rent. If that have been done to me I’d have been finished, where would a small business find £9k for back rent. Before anyone suggests that legally can’t do that, they can 100%, the law in this country allows that to happen. All that needed to happen in my case over the past 16 months would have been for the landlord to present me with a lease to negotiate instead it would appear I’m too challenging for them but I’ve only ever tried to keep my business afloat. I’m so disheartened that my livelihood I feel is going to be taken away by these people unless I can find alternate unit to work from. Due to the current legalities around what’s going on I am not at liberty to disclose who the landlords are or the names of the people who work for them but once I know where I am I most certainly will, I’ll not be signing anymore Non-Disclosures, people need to know this shit.

 

If anyone knows of anyone in the Media world that would like a story of how small business people are killed off then please contact me I’d be happy to talk and highlight the impact on small business owners.

 

I’d also be happy to advise anyone thinking of taking a lease for commercial property.

 

UPDATES TO FOLLOW !!!!