Capita

 

Mr Mustard owns a few shares. Mr Mustard is jolly pleased that he doesn't own any in Capita.

Mr Mustard did think, for a brief period, that once the conglomerate was stripped back to a much simpler corporate structure, running such lovely repeat business as the Red Route, ULEZ and Congestion Charge charging schemes and processing the hundreds of thousands of PCNs  that capita might we worth a punt.

Whilst Capita negotiated themselves a marvellous deal with Barnet Council, which gave them lots of juicy billing for extras, it looks like TfL are better at negotiating.

One thing that Capita have to do is to present the case for the prosecution (so to speak) for TfL when a motorist takes his PCN to Appeal. Mr Mustard bumps into them occasionally and this is a summary sheet of the evidence which TfL (or any other enforcement authority) have to produce for the adjudicator which includes the evidence of both parties.

What takes the most time is section B. TfL have to produce a case summary. One Mr Mustard looked at recently was 3 closely typed pages and another was 14 pages. Naturally these take time.

 

Even getting out the statutory documents, the photographs, the representations which were made, the rejection letters, the traffic order, a marked up map, photographs of the locale, perhaps a video.

 

Mr Mustard doubts that even with the maximum automation, an evidence pack can be produced in less than a couple of hours and maybe four for a complicated case, perhaps also including a transfer of liability from a hire company. They usually run to between 50 and 100 pages.

 

For preparing these, and there about 5,500 TfL PCN appeals a year, TfL pay Capita the princely sum of £16.66 per case. 

If Capita are being similarly lowly paid for other services under this contract, they don't appear to be making money.

Mr Mustard will put his savings into something a bit more blue chip and a lot less risky.

The end (and possibly not far off for Capita?).