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Cityfox Bus

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Swanny200

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Part two is up on the blog now, reports are that the entire Cityfox brand went bust as of last Friday while the MD was jollying it away in Spain, I know previously I have jumped to his defence, only because I have worked for his likes before and usually after a while, some of them actually end up running a successful business, however on this occasion I was completely wrong.
 

richw

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reports are that the entire Cityfox brand went bust as of last Friday while the MD was jollying it away in Spain

A new company was formed 6 weeks ago. The rest are showing dissolved or accounts overdue on companies house. Accounts were due on those at the end of March
 

Swanny200

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Makes me wonder what Rhys "Bigger than Donald Trump's" Hand is going to come up with next, he has been pretty quiet since a few weeks ago when he last posted on here. I do feel bad for the employees and the customers to a certain extent because as far as I can gather the drivers were pretty much well liked by the customers, hopefully they get jobs elsewhere and that if Mr Hand comes knocking at their door with his next venture they stay well clear.
 

TheGrandWazoo

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according to Companies House, Cityfox Group Ltd was dissolved January 2018 - see
https://beta.companieshouse.gov.uk/company/10306883
did he bankrupt and prepack it into a new company?
That was 2018 not this year. That said, Snowdonia Travel And CityFox Bus are still active. There is also, from Feb 2019, CityFox Group Central Services.

However, I will also draw you to CENTRAL RIDERS LIMITED Company number 11291144

No Hand job (!) here but Kevin Hempstead (Wales Ops Director for CityFox) and his wife - correspondence address is...
Cityfox House, Unit 3 Chapel Street, St. Philips, Bristol, United Kingdom, BS2 0UH!!

Business is:
  • 49320 - Taxi operation
  • 49390 - Other passenger land transport
  • 77110 - Renting and leasing of cars and light motor vehicles

Curiouser and curiouser!
 

bussnapperwm

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That was 2018 not this year. That said, Snowdonia Travel And CityFox Bus are still active. There is also, from Feb 2019, CityFox Group Central Services.

However, I will also draw you to CENTRAL RIDERS LIMITED Company number 11291144

No Hand job (!) here but Kevin Hempstead (Wales Ops Director for CityFox) and his wife - correspondence address is...
Cityfox House, Unit 3 Chapel Street, St. Philips, Bristol, United Kingdom, BS2 0UH!!

Business is:
  • 49320 - Taxi operation
  • 49390 - Other passenger land transport
  • 77110 - Renting and leasing of cars and light motor vehicles

Curiouser and curiouser!

Something smells fishy...

...and its not the grilled Salmon i had for tea...
 

Galaxy

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Strange that as of yet, the industry press have made no noise about this, unless there's anything in CBW this week...
 

richard13

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To me this whole situation looks quite sad. It is not going to work out well for some of the people involved and I don’t believe it is all of their own making. There are too many facts and actions / statements that don’t match without their being other people and events involved.

If as stated, all the Cityfox group has gone into administration with the Bristol Taxi operation continuing under administration with the possibility of a sale as a going concern, then you won’t see any change on Companies House for quite a while. For a company I know, it was 6 weeks from cease of trading to Companies House registering administration and over 3 months before liquidation happened. This is more of a mess and so may take longer; I don’t know.

This is a legal process and must consider whether the directors allowed “theft” from company creditors by trading after they knew they were out of money. Restarting “the one” after the buses had been repossessed was using who’s money for fuel, wages etc? Anything considered “theft” has to be repaid by the directors and many directors therefore go bankrupt themselves. That means you can’t be a company director for some time. There is also always a background question of whether there were others taking decisions only permitted of registered directors – “shadow directors” – and that carries a prison sentence.

Snowdonia Travel will automatically lose it O licences. Whether the TC needs to take further action against the individuals probably depends on the liquidation outcome.

Kevin Hempstead and his wife ran a Crewkerne taxi company with their address as Yeovil, which went into liquidation in 2017. Cityfox group contains Central Road; Kevin’s new company is Central Riders Ltd; There is a taxi company in Yeovil called Central Road Taxis. I guess these are all linked as well as Kevin having a role with Cityfox group.

If Rhys had to sign over the City Fox group to administrators last week, it may have been suggested that someone took him on holiday so as to take him out of circulation until some of the dust had settled. He now has nothing to do. Facing the future consequences of being the sole director of failed companies will not be pleasant. I wish him well and hope someone can use his skills to give him a more realistic future.
 

RustySpoons

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Very interesting reading! It does seem unfortunate now that CityFox/FoxStar and even Rhys will be tainted with a bad reputation within the industry. Not sure how well the taxi side of the business runs/ran, but it does appear that the ventures into the bus world has backfired massively.

It's almost as though FoxStar was pretending to be a successful operation with their giveaways and hints towards expansion, whereas it was anything but!
 

richw

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It's almost as though FoxStar was pretending to be a successful operation with their giveaways

Although on the other hand such big prizes will boost numbers if patronage is low. It’s a gamble. If it gets enough extra passengers it’s a huge win. Promo doesn’t get enough extra passengers it’s a failure
 

RustySpoons

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Although on the other hand such big prizes will boost numbers if patronage is low. It’s a gamble. If it gets enough extra passengers it’s a huge win. Promo doesn’t get enough extra passengers it’s a failure

It was the £5 weekly ticket offer they ran throughout January that got me wondering if the service was super popular, or a very desperate attempt to gain passengers. The latter, it seems.

Running one high frequency route, in competition with another operator also running the same route at a high frequency and having a much bigger network and more connections whilst practically haemorrhaging money isn't really a good business plan.
 

nesw

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I believe that Kevin Hempstead departed from Cityfox shortly after the Newport service started after serving as their Newport ‘manager’ for a month or so. He was replaced by Harry Burgan.
 

Dai Corner

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I believe that Kevin Hempstead departed from Cityfox shortly after the Newport service started after serving as their Newport ‘manager’ for a month or so. He was replaced by Harry Burgan.

Was that his decision, Rhys's, by mutual agreement or was he on a fixed-term contract with the task of launching the Newport operation?
 

richw

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Was that his decision, Rhys's, by mutual agreement or was he on a fixed-term contract with the task of launching the Newport operation?

Or as it appears he’s the director of a new company at companies house sharing Cityfox house, running some of the Bristol taxi fleet, a sideways move to prevent loss of the entire business?
 

richard13

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Or as it appears he’s the director of a new company at companies house sharing Cityfox house, running some of the Bristol taxi fleet, a sideways move to prevent loss of the entire business?

You have to read Companies House entries carefully, particularly incorporation date and shareholders (owners). These are in the setup document and subsequent confirmation documents. In this case Rhys is the owner of City Fox Taxis Ltd, where as Central Riders Ltd is owned by the Hempstead family. My guess is that the Hempstead family now need to give Companies House a change of address as Cityfox House is no longer convenient, but they may not wish to use their private home address and so what address. Rhys's Excite Venues Ltd uses an address in central London.
 

TheGrandWazoo

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“Kevin Hempstead and his wife ran a Crewkerne taxi company with their address as Yeovil, which went into liquidation in 2017. Cityfox group contains Central Road; Kevin’s new company is Central Riders Ltd; There is a taxi company in Yeovil called Central Road Taxis. I guess these are all linked as well as Kevin having a role with Cityfox group.”

As you say, the CRT business was dead before CityFox announced its purchase in 2018. Suspect it was another group company/outpost that never really existed though with the faint whiff of plausibility through the Hempstead link. The offices (opp Yeovil bus station) are long closed.

MOT and Tax both expired in October 2018, no taxi plate.

I suspect from other records available it’s a self employed owner driver owner rather than company owner... last change of owner was 2011, RH was barely out of nappies then, let alone playing taxis

I suspect that this is the reality of much of the CityFox empire - lots of owner drivers with a virtual brand and few actual assets.
 

RustySpoons

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Just to give it the benefit of the doubt, the fact it hasn't been taxed and doesn't have a taxi plate theres every chance it could have been stolen and ditched. Plus taxi MoTs don't always show up on the governments MoT checker service. Then again, tax does.

Although with the odd goings on with the company recently who knows...?
 

Bletchleyite

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I suspect that this is the reality of much of the CityFox empire - lots of owner drivers with a virtual brand and few actual assets.

To be fair, this is not in and of itself an issue (other than the wider societal one of the "gig economy" generally) - plenty of modern businesses are like that, think of your Ubers and your Deliveroos.
 

TheGrandWazoo

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To be fair, this is not in and of itself an issue (other than the wider societal one of the "gig economy" generally) - plenty of modern businesses are like that, think of your Ubers and your Deliveroos.

Fully agree with you - that is the gig economy. However, there was often the perception that the relationship was more that they were owner of the assets etc. That's before you get onto other (ahem) grey areas.

Appreciate that the taxi model of mixing owner drivers with core fleet provides flexibility but some of the statements didn't really stand up to close examination.




 

6Gman

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Can the TC ban a director or is it down to the courts?

My understanding is that the TC can remove a person's entitlement to operate a transport undertaking. I suspect it's the courts for directorships.
 

Bletchleyite

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My understanding is that the TC can remove a person's entitlement to operate a transport undertaking. I suspect it's the courts for directorships.

Must admit I think (more generally) that being a director of a company that fails (i.e. is unable to settle its debts rather than close in a controlled manner) should be disqualified from Company directorship for a reasonable period of time.
 

Galaxy

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Looking back on the thread, I would have thought Rhys might add some wee and wind for us, but alas not.
 
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