Bedford company told it "deserves to go out of business" after having goods operator licence revoked

Following repeated warnings and £1,000 in fixed penalties to RTS Bedford Ltd’s director and transport manager, Cristian-Constantin Crisiarcu, the firm has now been disqualified from holding an operator’s licence.

And the Traffic Commissioners for Great Britain – which is responsible for the licensing and regulation of operators of heavy goods vehicles – launched a scathing attack on the company’s director, saying: “Cristian-Constantin Crisiarcu is not of good repute” adding that he ‘had a year to put things right and wasted the opportunity’.

RTS Bedford Ltd – which is just outside of Wootton, in Manor Farm, Roxhill Road – came to the attention of the DoT in January 2023 when it applied for a licence for four vehicles and four trailers. It was at this point the DoT discovered RTS Bedford Ltd was in fact already operating trailers in clear breach.

According to Nicholas Denton – deputy traffic commissioner – a few months later, the company was refused the application on the grounds it did not have nearly enough finances to support an increase to four vehicles and that it should have its licence completely revoked.

A public inquiry was held earlier this month. The decision has only just been made public here – and reveals the deputy traffic commissioner has revoked the operator licence and disqualified the company for three years. Due to its seriousness, the company was wound down immediately instead of being given the usual 28 days.

Mr Denton said: “The company lacks both professional competence and financial standing. He [Cristian-Constantin Crisiarcu] has failed to appear at the public inquiry so I am disqualifying him for an indefinite period of time.

“There is nothing to put on the positive side of the balance. The fact that the company has continued to operate trailers despite several warnings not to, and has operated a vehicle in excess of its authority, means that I cannot trust it to comply in future. I conclude that the company deserves to go out of business.”

Last year, the Driver & Vehicle Standards Agency (DVSA) also lambasted the company for a litany of breaches:

• Failure to secure 12 pallets at all
• Failure to use a tachograph card
• Failure to take sufficient daily rest by more than two hours
• Exceeding maximum daily driving time

The driver – again Cristian-Constantin Crisiarcu – was ordered to pay £900 for the drivers’ hours offences and £100 for the insecure load. Then later last year, another driver – Robert Coker – was also discovered to have made multiple drivers’ hours offences.

The DVSA carried out a maintenance investigation at the company’s operating centre in November where they gave it an ‘unsatisfactory’ rating for multiple breaches including one vehicle operating with dangerous defects.

We have approached RTS Bedford Ltd for comment.