Yet another Birmingham recycling plant brought to book for possessing bakery equipment thanks to GPS tracking tech
Birmingham, UK – May 30, 2019 – Bakery equipment company Bakers Basco has yet again used evidence gathered through the latest GPS tracking technology to assist with a claim against a Birmingham-based company, Capital Waste Management Ltd, which was in possession of Basco equipment without authorization.
Bakers Basco has been increasing the use of GPS tracking chips in its equipment over the past three years, with regular updates as the technology evolves, and has already had various results with a number of court cases against scrap companies including Judgments and Orders by consent, using evidence gathered in this way, including a case last month against MSA Group (UK) Limited, another Birmingham-cased reclamation yard.
During a hearing in Birmingham County Court on May 24th, 2019, Bakers Basco presented evidence collected on five separate occasions where a quantity of its equipment was taken without permission, the journey each batch took, and when they arrived at the Defendant’s premises.
The Defendant’s Sole Director Mr. Mandeep Gill attended Court but chose not to offer up evidence on the company’s behalf. Mr. Gill agreed to enter into an Order making various promises to the Court agreeing not to take possession of Bakers Basco or its membership’s equipment and allowing Bakers Basco operatives access to his business premises from time to time without prior warning, to confirm that the terms of the court undertaking are being maintained. The Defendants were also ordered to pay £7,500.00 in respect of damages and costs to Bakers Basco.
His Honour Judge Richard Williams impressed on Mr. Gill the consequences of failing to keep his promises to the court on behalf of Capital Waste Management Ltd, including fines and seizure of assets.
Separately, following the visit to Capital Waste Management Ltd, Bakers Basco’s recovery team was alerted to the discovery by police of more of its baskets in the Defendant’s possession in the course of a separate investigation and recovered them. These baskets did not contain any GPS devices.
Richard Mew, General Manager, Bakers Basco, said: “Our investment in deploying GPS trackers across our pool of four million baskets and 500,000 dollies has really repaid the investment over the past couple of years. Our latest court victory, against Capital Waste Management Ltd, was again backed up with solid evidence from GPS tracker units embedded within our equipment, which helps to identify unorthodox movements and subsequent unauthorized possession and use.”
“Our equipment is designed for one sole purpose — to transport bread safely, cost-effectively and in an environmentally-friendly way,” added Mew. “When people take it like this, the bakeries that pay to license our equipment, the retailers that sell their loaves and the shoppers who rely on them for their daily bread all end up paying extra for the actions of a small number of greedy individuals.”
Bakers Basco was set up to manage and license a pool of bread baskets and dollies for the use of bakers. This allows for sharing of costs, a common design which optimizes space in delivery vehicles (hence reducing the environmental impact of truck and van journeys) and a reduction in waste from disposable packaging ending up in the landfill. Currently, around 25 bakeries, ranging from small to very large, are licensed to use the equipment.
Bakers Basco equipment is clearly marked as the company’s property. However, every year, several million pounds’ worth of its equipment, meant purely for the safe transport of bakery products, is misappropriated by third parties who have no contractual relationship with Bakers Basco Ltd. Often, equipment is converted for other purposes, which damages it or makes it unusable for safely transporting bread, or, as with many recent cases in the Midlands, ‘chipped’ – reduced to raw material for resale. As a result, bakers, shops, and consumers all end up paying more than they need to.
“Anyone thinking about stealing or destroying our property in the future should understand that if they get caught, we have a range of measures at our disposal to escalate matters further and will continue to deploy more high-tech equipment in our fight against this unlawful activity,” adds Mew.
Source: Bakers Basco