Our Cost Tables Further Improved T HE new edition of The
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Commercial Motor Tables of Operating Costs marks the twenty-ninth year of publication and is included free with this issue of The Commercial Motor. It comes at a time when the information embodied is more than ever necessary, when it is more than normally useful. Rates for road haulage and their stabilizalion are the topics of the moment. The leading associations are actively pursuing the latter object ; the rank and file of the industry have it well in mind. Therefore, the figures for cost and for minimum rates in the Tables, being, as they are, up to the minute in their accuracy and in their representation of all classes of operation and kinds of vehicle, can well serve as a basis for the calculation of a rates structure. We strongly recommend them for that purpose.
Readers will note many new departures represented in this new issue. Several of them have been pending for some little time ; their introduction has been postponed until it was clear that the occasion for that had arrived. In a matter of this kind, whilst it is necessary to move with the times, it is equally needful to exercise discretion so that the advance shall not be too rapid. The objective is always that of meeting the needs of the greatest number of users.
Cost Figures Valuable to All.
It must be obvious, too, that those who have most need of the information in these Tables are the less experienced and, as yet, more numerous type of operator. ' Large and experienced users have already seen the wisdom, the necessity, of compiling their own cost data. They, too, need the Tables as a check upon their own figures, but they are not so dependent upon them as are the smaller operators. To that end we have always believed that simplicity is essential. Keeping the Tables simple and easy to understand has made it essential to eliminate, in past issues, certain factors which, although admittedly important, are not of such widespread interest as to justify the complication which their inclusion would involve. The spread of knowledge of the essentials of costing, brought about in part by the increasing use and appreciation of these Tables, in part by the articles "Solving the Problems of the Carrier" which are a regular and appreciated feature of this journal, also by the lectures which, for three years past, have been delivered in all parts of the country by our costs expert S.T.R., has made it practicable to introduce these changes and to make the Tables a little more comprehensive than they have hitherto been.
Modifications to Extend the Scope.
What the alterations are is set out in detail in the explanatory introduction to the Tables, embodied in the booklet itself. All we need do here is to point out that they considerably increase the value of the figures, in that those figures can now be used with greater accuracy to forecast and check the cost of operation of vehicles whether they be on work of a normal and routine nature or engaged in specific operations in which the mileage fluctuates sometimes within wide limits.
It should be noted, however, that we have in no way departed from the original basic principles which have served so successfully for so many years in this connection. The information embodied is practical, not academic ; the figures are those experienced in actual use and not derived from more or less abstract calculations. All that has been done, in effect, in the modifications *hich we have introduced, is to analyse, more minutely than hitherto, the figures for operating cost. Averages for vehicles used in work involving low weekly mileages have been separated from those of vehicles covering normal mileages, and these again from those relating to vehicles cover ing high annual mileages. Information more directly applicable to the needs of various classes of user is thus provided, to the benefit, we hope, of all, It is in conformity with this principle, of adhering strictly to actual data, that we have been compelled to refrain from doing as we have been a27 requested, namely, to include tables relating to gas-driven buses and to goods vehicles operating on producer gas. The data available are not sufficiently wide in their application to justify inclusion. It is more than likely that, at an early date, we shall be able to meet the requirements of those who are interested in vehicles so propelled, and in the meantime we shall be glad to have forwarded to us any actual data which may be available relating to the operating cost of such vehicles in the hands of various classes of user either here or abroad.
Licence Renewal Threats
Ithe haulier operating under an A or B licence, land particularly the former, having been granted a concession in respect of a longer licence period, to have this counter-balanced by further restrictions?
It appears that this may be the case, if we can judge from the information demanded on the form applying to the second renewal period. On that issued for the first renewal, the details required were merely the name and address of the applicant and the number of vehicles concerned. Now, on the form which has to be filled in for the A licence, it is necessary to describe the work performed. This may be either with the intention of tying him down to a moral obligation to confine himself to that work, or, if he shows that he is altering his objective and entering some fresh field of activities, to coerce him into changing to a B licence. We think, however, that this latter course is improbable, but, undoubtedly, any alteration in the circumstances will be likely to cause the applicant a considerable amount of trouble before the Licensing Court.
In one instance which has been brought to our notice, an important and old-established haulage concern in Covent Garden, which is operating A-licensed vehicles, is the subject of a railway objection, in which it is stated that the objection is also so directed as to ascertain what is the normal sphere of the applicant's activities. As the work of this concern is -thoroughly well known to the railways, such a proviso might appear ridiculous on the surface, but may really possess a deep-rooted significance.
We suggest that the associations concerned should investigate this matter at once, endeavour to obtain a clear insight as to the course of procedure, and lodge strong protests if the haulier is to be further browbeaten.
Men who are in a position to analyse conditions have, on several occasions expressed grave doubt as to the benefit which would be conferred by the extensions of the licensing periods. That the increases were essential cannot be denied, but they may not Drove so great a blessing as many hauliers believe, if they are to be coupled with licensing difficulties even greater than those which have previously confronted operators. We may be accused of exaggerating the danger or of creating mountains out of molehills, but long experience has taught us that any neglect to take early action often results in the institution of procedure which, once it is really under way, is extremely difficult to arrest or even modify. Consequently, in such cases, it is better to take the offensive, and not to wait until the defences—if any—are overwhelmed.