Easytrack ceased trading
Discussion
Cobraman1 said:
Spot on Freddy...i would also point out that when the TDOS book a circuit they take risk and have to pay the invoice...along comes MSV, and poaches the customer and his monthly allowance for a trackday.....and yet still expects the TDOS to pay their bills.....so if you look at it that way...the TDOS took the risks, paid the bills, built the business and now the circuits, take their business, and still expect them to pay the bill.....cake and eat it I'd say....support your tdo and stay away from the circuit run events.
It's a competitive world I am afraid. Look at it the other way too, the TDOs wouldn't enjoy such a variety of incredibly well maintained and incredibly well run MSV circuits if Palmer hadn't taken such a massive financial risk by buying/saving 5 struggling circuits 8 years ago and literally turned them around, investing large sums since then too despite a tough market, look at Snet now compared to what it was like 10 years ago. His exposure to risk is far greater than the combined short term financial exposure of the TDOs.Just had another email from T&T Events?. Seems the company name has changed or another TDO is taking over the day. I'll just turn up ans se what happens.
Track & Tour Events
We're sure you'll be pleased to know that we are honouring the booking that you made with EasyTrack for the 27th April at Bedford.
It's a great opportunity for you to come along and meet the team of TT Events, we are working hard to expand on the current calendar with new and exciting events in the near future.
We already run very successful European events and aim to take this through to our UK events, we're a small, friendly team and the people you speak to on the phone and by email will be the same people that look after you on the day, you'll also see a few familiar faces.
Sign on will be from 07:30
Briefings will be at: 08:30, 10:00 and 11:00
Sighting Laps from 09:00
Please don't forget to bring with you your booking confirmation, driving licence and fully completed indemnity forms, we will be sending the new indemnity forms out tomorrow.
©2013 TT Events | London
Track & Tour Events
We're sure you'll be pleased to know that we are honouring the booking that you made with EasyTrack for the 27th April at Bedford.
It's a great opportunity for you to come along and meet the team of TT Events, we are working hard to expand on the current calendar with new and exciting events in the near future.
We already run very successful European events and aim to take this through to our UK events, we're a small, friendly team and the people you speak to on the phone and by email will be the same people that look after you on the day, you'll also see a few familiar faces.
Sign on will be from 07:30
Briefings will be at: 08:30, 10:00 and 11:00
Sighting Laps from 09:00
Please don't forget to bring with you your booking confirmation, driving licence and fully completed indemnity forms, we will be sending the new indemnity forms out tomorrow.
©2013 TT Events | London
Cobraman1 said:
Spot on Freddy...i would also point out that when the TDOS book a circuit they take risk and have to pay the invoice...along comes MSV, and poaches the customer and his monthly allowance for a trackday.....and yet still expects the TDOS to pay their bills.....so if you look at it that way...the TDOS took the risks, paid the bills, built the business and now the circuits, take their business, and still expect them to pay the bill.....cake and eat it I'd say....support your tdo and stay away from the circuit run events.
Whoever you are, I love you so very much. Beautifully said.jonnyleroux said:
<< loads of company history stuff >>
Fairly sure i've missed at least 1 other company which I can't find now but essentially there is a proven track record for phoenixing. Without a full set of accounts from each of the companies I can't guarantee how long each one was "trading as easytrack.co.uk" and how long each was dormant, but having had one eye on the setup for the last decade I'm supremely confident that this last company is the only one that has submitted anything like 3 consecutive years full sets of trading accounts.
Looks like you can add a new one to your list.Fairly sure i've missed at least 1 other company which I can't find now but essentially there is a proven track record for phoenixing. Without a full set of accounts from each of the companies I can't guarantee how long each one was "trading as easytrack.co.uk" and how long each was dormant, but having had one eye on the setup for the last decade I'm supremely confident that this last company is the only one that has submitted anything like 3 consecutive years full sets of trading accounts.
Track and Tour Events Ltd.
Status: Active
Date of Incorporation: 12/04/2013
Country of Origin: United Kingdom
Company Type: Private Limited Company
Nature of Business (SIC):
None Supplied
Accounting Reference Date: 30/04
Last Accounts Made Up To: (NO ACCOUNTS FILED)
Next Accounts Due: 12/01/2015
Last Return Made Up To:
Next Return Due: 10/05/2014
"Easytrack.co.uk is now the home of Track & Tour Events Ltd"
And to increase your confidence the website now says
"This website is currently being updated
Please check back in 24 hours.
For UK track day bookings click here [link to an aglomeration site]"
Doesn't increase my level of confidence in this pheonix but I guess I'm a little cynical
Perhaps those behind the new venture will be along shortly to add reassurance
"This website is currently being updated
Please check back in 24 hours.
For UK track day bookings click here [link to an aglomeration site]"
Doesn't increase my level of confidence in this pheonix but I guess I'm a little cynical
Perhaps those behind the new venture will be along shortly to add reassurance
nickfrog said:
It's a competitive world I am afraid. Look at it the other way too, the TDOs wouldn't enjoy such a variety of incredibly well maintained and incredibly well run MSV circuits if Palmer hadn't taken such a massive financial risk by buying/saving 5 struggling circuits 8 years ago and literally turned them around, investing large sums since then too despite a tough market, look at Snet now compared to what it was like 10 years ago. His exposure to risk is far greater than the combined short term financial exposure of the TDOs.
Thanks for your thoughts, but it's not that simple.....it's like walking into a betting shop, putting £100 on to hopefully win back £10, and then when the race starts finding out the other horses are owned by the betting shop owner ! Personally I don't bet, and those odds are crazy....and now in very difficult times, the circuit owners are competing with their own customers ! it' is a tough market for everyone in all areas of business, but that is not the time to mistreat your very own customers ..you support them, look after them and help them where you can , you don't poach their customers while banking their cheques...!Palmer in particular, takes very well calculated risks and in the early days used other people's money to do it.
Let's not kid ourselves that MSV has invested money in their circuits just to be nice to us trackday and racing drivers. They are out to make money and as such often treat their customers, suppliers and even staff as a means to an end.
I'm not trying to single MSV out as being the only bad guy here. Other circuit owners have been just as aggressive in their business tactics.
Let's not kid ourselves that MSV has invested money in their circuits just to be nice to us trackday and racing drivers. They are out to make money and as such often treat their customers, suppliers and even staff as a means to an end.
I'm not trying to single MSV out as being the only bad guy here. Other circuit owners have been just as aggressive in their business tactics.
Cobraman1 said:
and then when the race starts
The race started a long time ago, they've never taken anyone by surprise. Their TD operation has been running for years yet TDOs keep booking his tracks. They can't say they were not aware.I really can't see what's wrong with wanting to make money as a business and Palmer has invested considerable amounts of his own money too. You can't leverage money without committing your own.
Many industries prosper with different length channels in parallel, providing that the longer channel offers added value compared to the guy selling direct. And providing there's enough demand overall. And if demand falls, then it's about the survival of the fittest (and not always the biggest BTW).
If MSV felt that having a middle-man doesn't add value for the end user, then why wouldn't they do it themselves? If they then generate more margin and dedicate some of it to providing a better quality event (which they do, every time I've used them) I can't see where the problem is. Some of the margin is also used to employ dedicated TD staff, which is great news.
On the other hand, if the TDOs offer something that MSV can't offer and have their own loyal customers, then those will not book direct with MSV, surely.
The TDOs are not forced to use MSV circuits, are they ? If they felt that MSV was an unfair competitor because they own the circuit, they could simply use other circuits who have preferred not to run their own track days, it's a free world. It's that simple. It's the commercial reality of our economy.
I can totally see why the historical / pioneer TDOs are disgruntled though but for me as a consumer, they offer at best a similar service to MSV but without the security of also owning the venue, as demonstrated by this thread. In reality, MSV offers a smoother/better run event with often a lower density of cars, at the same price or cheaper.
FurtiveFreddy said:
Let's not kid ourselves that MSV has invested money in their circuits just to be nice to us trackday and racing drivers. They are out to make money and as such often treat their customers, suppliers and even staff as a means to an end. I'm not trying to single MSV out as being the only bad guy here.
Your comment is not fair.Palmer is obsessed with end-user satisfaction. Anyone who's been to any of his events will testify that, whether as a Corporate guest or a TD billy. He is also very fair to his trade clients if they play by his rules. If they don't, they usually go somewhere else.
As for suppliers, if they don't like selling to MSV, then they simply don't have to.
As for staff, I know a few. They are well treated, again if they play by his rules, like any boss who runs a tight ship. He doesn't suffer fools gladly but he does reward good staff pretty well. And again, no one has to work for him.
Edited by nickfrog on Friday 26th April 15:31
Jesus...
If you own most of the circuits, decide when the competition (who created the market) can trade AND can set their prices enabling you to undercut them with ease...often on the day before of after.
That DOESN'T make you God's gift to UK Motorsport...it makes you a shark!!!
Not to mention being a millionaire and having the backing of several multi-milllionaires.
Dice / Loaded / Mugged.
All IMHO ofcourse. The only good thing about the whole thing is that the circuits didnt fall to housing developers, though they may well have been saved by other parties.
A consortium headed by Damon would have been my ideal choice.
If you own most of the circuits, decide when the competition (who created the market) can trade AND can set their prices enabling you to undercut them with ease...often on the day before of after.
That DOESN'T make you God's gift to UK Motorsport...it makes you a shark!!!
Not to mention being a millionaire and having the backing of several multi-milllionaires.
Dice / Loaded / Mugged.
All IMHO ofcourse. The only good thing about the whole thing is that the circuits didnt fall to housing developers, though they may well have been saved by other parties.
A consortium headed by Damon would have been my ideal choice.
nickfrog said:
I find easier / safer to book with a TDO who is also the track owner, which obviously limits the choice to MSV. But at least, in difficult times, there is a better guarantee that the day will run. It also kind of cuts out the "operational middle-man" and should result in a better run event. Nothing against indy TDOs obviously, just a "consumer" choice.
Some of the worst day's I've been on have been organised/run by the circuit operator, I'd vehemently disagree that booking with the owner is the best way to get a decent day. Admittedly MSV are very good at running days and I've never had a problem at one of there events.The independents really started this industry and should be supported much more than circuit owners/operators as without the indys circuits would be free to run days for maximum profit e.g sessioned and corporate day / experience day customers mixed with TD billys. Sure there are some indy's who really shouldn't be running days but generally they don't stay in business all that long and can usually be spotted by offering very low priced days, stick the major indys and it's never a problem.
Nick frog, you still don't see it I'm afraid, less cars on the day,because they are happy to bring in some revenue on a day they could not sell to a tdo,however if those customers have (as we all do) only so much excess cash for their hobby, and the dates is slightly better for them, or the weather, the circuit gets the money, the customers spend for that month, and the TDOS cheque. From what I see there are too many days available because the circuits run the extras, instead of finding other uses, it's just easy cake and eat it. Further more you seem to be talking a lot about risk, etc and business, so when did we see circuits advertising trackdays in mainstream areas....to build the customer base...we didn't. There too busy destroying there customers....and just to set the record straight, circuit ran days started at silverstone 3 years ago running there own days, msv started 6 years ago. These TDOS having been working at this for some almost 20 years....and when mr palmer spends real money and makes his circuits safer, with proper run off, moving barriers, more gravel traps, rather than a bit of paint and grass.....then he will have invested in his circuits and brought them into the new millinium, and please don't talk about Snetterton as he obviously only did it to raise the price....then he will have done something positive, I watch cars and bikes, did you wonder why he lost world supers, because brands is not safe, watch Cadwell park, his biggest money spinner in the year,and young guys risking their lives on really what is a go kart track, at up to 190 mph, and no run off at all in the woodland sect......the only thing palmer is good for is palmer....if he could sell any circuits for houses he would, except brands, because wherever he goes in the world people know of brands hatch, it feeds his ego ! I'm glad that in my business I deal with people that have honour and integrity towards their clients.....that person has none of those attributes towards anyone.....he will destroy his customers if and when he gets a chance and then, it would be interesting to see how his staff are treated then when they have to fill the void the tdo leaves, and face the losses they do from time to time.
Edited by Cobraman1 on Saturday 27th April 08:32
back on the original topic, the new TTEvents website now carries the following message:
Track and Tour Ltd events has no affiliation or connection with the company or business of Easytrack Ltd who previously owned the domain www.easytrack.co.uk. We cannot assist with enquiries about that company.
As an act of goodwill we are welcoming previous car track day customers of that company to our events, including existing bookings/credits which are to be honoured (subject to our terms).
As we operate only car based events we cannot assist with any enquiry at all regarding bike track days.
Track & Tour Events Ltd
which make me feel it is becoming increasingly unlikely of me seeing my £120 I paid on debit card for Brands Evening on 18th June ever again!
luckily though I've managed to re-book onto that particular session through lotus-on-track 
Track and Tour Ltd events has no affiliation or connection with the company or business of Easytrack Ltd who previously owned the domain www.easytrack.co.uk. We cannot assist with enquiries about that company.
As an act of goodwill we are welcoming previous car track day customers of that company to our events, including existing bookings/credits which are to be honoured (subject to our terms).
As we operate only car based events we cannot assist with any enquiry at all regarding bike track days.
Track & Tour Events Ltd
which make me feel it is becoming increasingly unlikely of me seeing my £120 I paid on debit card for Brands Evening on 18th June ever again!
luckily though I've managed to re-book onto that particular session through lotus-on-track There is only one man on the planet who knows exactly what's happening here unfortunately (MT). My guess would be :-
1) The poor sod who's set up TTEvents Ltd (Dino) had no idea what he was letting himself in for when committing to take over EzT.
2) There will be a (very) large number of credit notes, multi-day packs and pre-bookings coming out of the woodwork over the coming months. Many of which will have been paid by debit card or BACS to avoid chargebacks to EzT Ltd. Dino will, at some point, realise what the rest of us TDO's have known for some time - that the EzT business model of recent months was simply not viable (5 events for £500 - really, did *anyone* think that was sustainable? did nobody smell a rat when you had to pay by bank transfer rather than credit card for it?)
3) Anyone with a bike track day (or multi-day bike pack) with EzT will have to get in line with MSV to try and recoup some of their money (less than no chance i'm afraid).
4) I'd be interested to know some more details about this guy "Peter" who was sending the emails out recently. I've got £20 says it's an alias for Marcus, or possibly Dino.
5) Similarly, I'd be interested to know what the arragement is/was for the domain forwarding from EzT to TTEvents. In my opinion, the only value in EzT Ltd now is in the domain name and database. If that has been farmed off out the back door to TTEvents then the administrators should be sniffing around that particular deal especially. I note the domain name EzT is now registered to MT personally, and is therefore presumably & conveniently not an asset of the company.
I don't personally know Dino, but my advice if you're reading this is to walk away from the EzT brand/domain altogether while you can rather than get caught up in the inevitable backlash once EzT heads into adminstration.
Jonny
BaT
1) The poor sod who's set up TTEvents Ltd (Dino) had no idea what he was letting himself in for when committing to take over EzT.
2) There will be a (very) large number of credit notes, multi-day packs and pre-bookings coming out of the woodwork over the coming months. Many of which will have been paid by debit card or BACS to avoid chargebacks to EzT Ltd. Dino will, at some point, realise what the rest of us TDO's have known for some time - that the EzT business model of recent months was simply not viable (5 events for £500 - really, did *anyone* think that was sustainable? did nobody smell a rat when you had to pay by bank transfer rather than credit card for it?)
3) Anyone with a bike track day (or multi-day bike pack) with EzT will have to get in line with MSV to try and recoup some of their money (less than no chance i'm afraid).
4) I'd be interested to know some more details about this guy "Peter" who was sending the emails out recently. I've got £20 says it's an alias for Marcus, or possibly Dino.
5) Similarly, I'd be interested to know what the arragement is/was for the domain forwarding from EzT to TTEvents. In my opinion, the only value in EzT Ltd now is in the domain name and database. If that has been farmed off out the back door to TTEvents then the administrators should be sniffing around that particular deal especially. I note the domain name EzT is now registered to MT personally, and is therefore presumably & conveniently not an asset of the company.
I don't personally know Dino, but my advice if you're reading this is to walk away from the EzT brand/domain altogether while you can rather than get caught up in the inevitable backlash once EzT heads into adminstration.
Jonny
BaT
jonnyleroux said:
There is only one man on the planet who knows exactly what's happening here unfortunately (MT). My guess would be :-
1) The poor sod who's set up TTEvents Ltd (Dino) had no idea what he was letting himself in for when committing to take over EzT...
5) Similarly, I'd be interested to know what the arragement is/was for the domain forwarding from EzT to TTEvents. In my opinion, the only value in EzT Ltd now is in the domain name and database. If that has been farmed off out the back door to TTEvents then the administrators should be sniffing around that particular deal especially. I note the domain name EzT is now registered to MT personally, and is therefore presumably & conveniently not an asset of the company.
I don't personally know Dino, but my advice if you're reading this is to walk away from the EzT brand/domain altogether while you can rather than get caught up in the inevitable backlash once EzT heads into adminstration.
Jonny
BaT
Completely agree. As Marcus always said himself, the value of any company of this sort is the database. I cannot believe he's handed it over to anyone without a large cash payment in return.1) The poor sod who's set up TTEvents Ltd (Dino) had no idea what he was letting himself in for when committing to take over EzT...
5) Similarly, I'd be interested to know what the arragement is/was for the domain forwarding from EzT to TTEvents. In my opinion, the only value in EzT Ltd now is in the domain name and database. If that has been farmed off out the back door to TTEvents then the administrators should be sniffing around that particular deal especially. I note the domain name EzT is now registered to MT personally, and is therefore presumably & conveniently not an asset of the company.
I don't personally know Dino, but my advice if you're reading this is to walk away from the EzT brand/domain altogether while you can rather than get caught up in the inevitable backlash once EzT heads into adminstration.
Jonny
BaT
Similarly, the Easytrack name, domain, trademark, IP etc. would be worth quite a bit IMO and to take on a trading name without having ownership of the domain and trademark can only be a short term position. It's way too risky to put any time or money into a company if you don't own the IP and rights to all of it.
What I still find a bit fishy is the financials of ET over the last few years, which show £100 cash in the bank on every return, liabilities of £100k-£180k and assets of £80k at highest point, leaving a net worth of negative £80k-£100k every year. Maybe someone else has paid for a copy of the full accounts and can explain what has been going on? As Dino is a financial adviser, I'd like to think he's looked at all of this in an informed and objective way and not fallen for any of MT's BS...
The disclaimer "Track and Tour Ltd events has no affiliation or connection with the company or business of Easytrack Ltd" suggests the ET name etc. hasn't been given to TT and so the website will presumably not be there much longer or there will be a new TT website?
I suppose we may find out more after Bedford today...
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