Employee moving away - Field engineer

[merge]

As title.
Engineer employed within our local area 3 months ago, has been commuting (at our cost) in our company van to his new girlfriend 44 miles further away from his town. At the point now where we need to address to extra costs and time he's taking to get to clients.
Obviously if he chooses to move 200 miles away he can't expect the original contract to stay in place, but does anyone have any thoughts on how to proceed?

[SteveStrange]

Check with vehicle tracking how often he makes the 88 mile round trip, and ask him to cover the fuel costs for it? Is his travel time (from hers) paid for? Or is there a simple (say) 30 minute allowance for travel to/from whichever site?

[dirky dirk]

id pull him and say listen mate its got trackers on your welcome to use it and give it a wash and stick a bit of fuel in yoursself,

we dont mind you using it but play the game

all guns blazing youll jsut get a barrier

[sunbeam alpine]

OP - does this change mean he's living outside his work area?

I started my career as a sales rep. I was expected to live in my sales area, which covered an area including Oxfordshire, Buckinghamshire, Northants, Gloucestershire and a chunk of Berkshire and Wiltshire. Some days I'd be driving 80 miles to my first call, others it would literally be at the end of my road - swings and roundabouts. So long as I was at my first customer at a reasonable time, there was never a problem. Admittedly this was pre-tracking and pre mobile phones, so I had a lot of freedom.

I'd be more concerned if he was failing to get to appointments on time or his work wasn't up to scratch.

[Muzzer79]

merge said:

As title.
Engineer employed within our local area 3 months ago, has been commuting (at our cost) in our company van to his new girlfriend 44 miles further away from his town. At the point now where we need to address to extra costs and time he's taking to get to clients.
Obviously if he chooses to move 200 miles away he can't expect the original contract to stay in place, but does anyone have any thoughts on how to proceed?

Firstly, what's his arrangement with the van?

Is it a company vehicle, that he pays BIK on and can use for personal use - such as commuting and pleasure?

Or is it a company vehicle that he doesn't pay BIK on that he can therefore only use for business use?

Secondly, does he live with the girlfriend as his main residence or does he live at his own house and use the van to go and visit her?

If he chose to move 200 miles away, there's no reason why he can't theoretically expect his original contract to stay in place, as long as he can fulfil his end of it......

[Collectingbrass]

dirky dirk said:

id pull him and say listen mate its got trackers on your welcome to use it and give it a wash and stick a bit of fuel in yoursself,

we dont mind you using it but play the game

all guns blazing youll jsut get a barrier

This. How hard will it be to find a replacement at an economic cost? If he isn't meeting his targets its another thing, but if he is?

[Zetec-S]

Muzzer79 said:

Firstly, what's his arrangement with the van?

Is it a company vehicle, that he pays BIK on and can use for personal use - such as commuting and pleasure?

Or is it a company vehicle that he doesn't pay BIK on that he can therefore only use for business use?

Secondly, does he live with the girlfriend as his main residence or does he live at his own house and use the van to go and visit her?

If he chose to move 200 miles away, there's no reason why he can't theoretically expect his original contract to stay in place, as long as he can fulfil his end of it......

^^^ This. Can't really answer the question properly without that info.

[TCX]

3 months employed? Basically got no rights?
Having said that,took over managing an area of business where a remote based engineer was leaving,owner of business allowed him to work month's notice,I said get shot straight away,proved right,bloke did no amount of trouble to business in his area before he was gone

[surveyor]

If he’s good what is 80 miles a day?

I would use this to point out that he needs to commute in his own time, and if on call be around the area, not an hour away.

Much depends on his contract.

[wolf1]

surveyor said:

If he’s good what is 80 miles a day?

On an average Mpg of 38 and fuel at approx £1.75 per litre I'd say an extra £90 a week on fuel or £4650 a year if he goes every week 5 days a week.

[MustangGT]

No advice around this one, but, next time can you put a distance or time from centre of area clause into the contract? For example a maximum of 30 minutes/20 miles from the centre of his area, obviously dependant on size of area.

[N111BJG]

I think we need to know if this question is from the envy (new girlfriend real looker) or incredulity (resenting him using up your diesel to shag a minger) perspective to give objective views.

[surveyor]

wolf1 said:

surveyor said:

If he’s good what is 80 miles a day?

On an average Mpg of 38 and fuel at approx £1.75 per litre I'd say an extra £90 a week on fuel or £4650 a year if he goes every week 5 days a week.

Depends on if he's using a tank a day, or a tank every two weeks. Is there an opportunity to tweak the areas slightly?

Lots of potential fixes before coming down heavy. Staff are heard to recruit right now. At least in my experience.

[SteveStrange]

OP could insist that the van gets parked in the company yard every night and the Engineer commuted to the company yard every morning in his own vehicle, and then takes the van from there. Surely the most obvious and easiest fix.

[MustangGT]

SteveStrange said:

OP could insist that the van gets parked in the company yard every night and the Engineer commuted to the company yard every morning in his own vehicle, and then takes the van from there. Surely the most obvious and easiest fix.

Not possible if allowed to do private mileage and pays tax on it.

[SteveStrange]

MustangGT said:

SteveStrange said:

OP could insist that the van gets parked in the company yard every night and the Engineer commuted to the company yard every morning in his own vehicle, and then takes the van from there. Surely the most obvious and easiest fix.

Not possible if allowed to do private mileage and pays tax on it.

True, but if allowed to do private mileage, and if he pays tax on it, then OP, as a responsible and professional employer, would not be moaning about it.

[MustangGT]

SteveStrange said:

MustangGT said:

SteveStrange said:

OP could insist that the van gets parked in the company yard every night and the Engineer commuted to the company yard every morning in his own vehicle, and then takes the van from there. Surely the most obvious and easiest fix.

Not possible if allowed to do private mileage and pays tax on it.

True, but if allowed to do private mileage, and if he pays tax on it, then OP, as a responsible and professional employer, would not be moaning about it.

The OP appears to be moaning about the amount of private mileage.

[Kev_Mk3]

Need to look at probation periods and contract clauses. When his probation is up work into the contract that he has to pay extra or something for the private miles at a set cost per mile.

[merge]

Thanks for the replies guys.

He was taken on as being based centrally in our general focused area. The salary (of course) reflects the time (and the costs, mainly fuel) it would take him attend our clients.

The van is not for personal use, he has a car and a motorbike himself.

We've worked out the additional cost that we incur with his extra travel from both his current address and the northern edge of our area ( his girlfriend lives
We'll put it to him that we either deduct those costs from his salary or he leaves the vehicle at our unit. The later would be a pain as he'd end up with a 1.5hr commute to the unit with then another possible 1 - 1.5 hrs to reach clients. Most of which we attend at 8am.

Wrote this on Friday but forgot to submit. Thanks for the input guys.

[MustangGT]

Your reply does not make sense to me. Is he normally expected to return the van to your unit every night? If not, this implies private use is allowed. Is the van declared to HMRC as a benefit?