Van Driver Agency in Newquay

Around Newquay the traffic that slows deliveries in July is the same traffic that creates the volume, so the busiest weeks of the year are also the slowest ones on the road.

The freight geography around Newquay runs on the M5 south of Exeter, the A30, the A38 Devon Expressway, the A390 and A361, Cornwall Airport Newquay and the ports at Plymouth, Falmouth and Fowey. Operators draw on Langage at Plympton and the A38 approaches east of Plymouth and the employers booking temporary staff here are typically regional foodservice and drinks distributors supplying hospitality across the peninsula.

Hospitality across the peninsula orders more often and in smaller quantities in season, which raises the drop count and the driver requirement more than the tonnage suggests.

Early AM foodservice and drinks deliveries into hotels, pubs and holiday parks, finished before the roads fill up.

Sortation and load-out start before dawn, with routes out by mid-morning. Grocery and evening delivery slots run through to late evening, including weekends.

Because there is no qualification card and no tachograph on a Cat B seat, the driving licence record does more work here than anywhere else. Endorsement codes, when they were given, what they were for and how many there are amount to the closest thing to an objective record of how somebody drives. A DVLA share code lasts twenty-one days, so it is generated fresh rather than filed and forgotten.

Rescues and add-on work are the usual source of argument on parcel and grocery rounds. If a driver is asked to collect a second load, take on failed drops from another round or wait for a late sort, that is agreed as paid time at the point it is asked for, not reconstructed at the end of the week.

Twelve weeks in the same role with the same hirer triggers equal treatment on pay and basic conditions under the Agency Workers Regulations 2010. Most agencies notice this after the fact. We count it from shift one and flag it in advance.