Countryliner was a bus and coach operator, based in Uckfield, England. It ran over fifty bus services, mainly operating in Sussex and Kent with some operations into Hampshire. On 8 October 2012, it was placed in administration. It continued other services under a different licence trading as SwiftBus, this ceased trading on 18 January 2013.
History
The history of Countryliner can be traced back to 1911, with the formation of the East Surrey Traction Company, which was based in Reigate, Surrey. This later became part of the London General Omnibus Company, which was later absorbed into London Transport.
In 1933, Green Line operated coaches across the home counties and London. The success of a Guildford to Charing Cross route led to the opening of the bus depot in Guildford. Buses were suspended from normal operation during World War II, but afterwards, Green Line carried on operating from Reigate. The company was involved in the Festival of Britain in 1951. In 1970, Green Line lost its link to London Transport, to become part of London Country Bus Services, which was a subsidiary of the National Bus Company.
On 7 September 1986, the south west region of London Country Bus Services was transferred to London Country South WestOut on its own Commercial Motor 6 December 1986 page 54 and on 19 February 1988 was sold to the Drawlane Group, which was restructured as British Bus in November 1992.London Country Bus (South West) Commercial Motor 25 February 1988 page 7£6m payment renews fat-cat row The Independent 27 November 1995 On 1 August 1996, British Bus was sold to the Cowie Group,Cowie buys British Bus for £282m Herald Scotland 1 August 1996 Competition Commission 31 October 1996 which in November 1997 was rebranded as Arriva.Bamber Forsyth unites Cowie Design Week 23 October 1997
Green Line's private hire department was renamed Countryliner in 1992, and in 1996 London & Country South West, bought Blue Saloon Coaches of Guildford, a large bus and coach operator in the area. In August 1998, Arriva sold Countryliner in a management buyout.
In 2001, the company diversified into bus operations. A new livery was adopted with a cream or white body, with a lime green skirt. Originally, buses were cream and coaches white, but most became white.
The fleet was renewed between 2001 and 2006, with low-floor Dennis Darts making up the bus fleet and a mixture of Mercedes-Benz and Volvos making up the coach fleet.
Countryliner SussexCompanies House extract company no 5515688 Countryliner Sussex Limited was formed in 2006 to take over the bus operation of RDH Services of Ditchling Common, in East Sussex. It operated in Lewes, Burgess Hill, Kent and Haywards Heath. Countryliner Sussex was placed into administration in October 2012.
Countryliner BusesCompanies House extract company no 5781412 Countryliner Buses Limited was also formed in April 2006, which took over the Hickstead operation of Compass Travel, also operating in the Burgess Hill and Haywards Heath area, and through to Brighton. At this time, the Countryliner group of companies operated around 80 vehicles through Surrey, Hampshire and Sussex.
In 2008, Countryliner commenced operating the Petersfield Town Services on behalf of Hampshire County Council, thus extending the operating area into Hampshire. In addition to this, more contracts were awarded to operate between Petersfield and Chichester and Midhurst on behalf of West Sussex County Council.
In June 2009, Countryliner Group LimitedCompanies House extract company no 6946470 Countryliner Group Limited was formed, to take over full ownership of all Countryliner subsidiaries. Incorporated were Bob Hodgetts, Roger Belcher, James Holmes and Craig White, the former two of which are company directors. However, the latter two represent Merchant Corporate Recovery plc, who paid £200,000 for a 51% stake in Countryliner Group, and who also provided a working capital facility of £300,000, showing extra cash had to be put into the business. Holmes said, "the issues in the business can be clearly defined and the management has the ability to tackle them with our support". Merchant Corporate Recovery valued Countryliner's assets at the time as £1million and said it had made pre-tax profits of £250,000 for the first half of 2009.
In 2009, Countryliner's financial standing was further brought into question. In November, a High Court hearing to wind up three of the Countryliner Group's companies, under the Insolvency Act 1986, was adjourned until January. The affected companies were Countryliner Buses Limited, Countryliner Coach Hire Limited and Countryliner Sussex Limited. With Countryliner operating around 150 vehicles with around 200 staff at the time from five depots in Hampshire, Surrey, West and East Sussex and into Kent, it caused worry among passengers and local authorities. Countryliner ran 23 routes in Surrey and Hampshire at the time, and during the proceedings Surrey County Council - who Countryliner ran a number of services under contract to - said they were "monitoring developments". Countryliner made no comment but to confirm services were operating normally and that a restructuring was underway.
The adjourned hearing took place on 20 January 2010. It emerged that the winding up order had been started by HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC) over an unpaid debt. At the hearing, the applications were dismissed and Countryliner were awarded costs against HMRC. Director Roger Belcher said, "There was an outstanding debt to HMRC and they issued winding-up orders even though our negotiators were speaking to them at the time." The Countryliner Buses company had paid off all its debts and been liquidated, and Countyliner Coach Hire entered into a company voluntary arrangement.
Roger Belcher was confident about the business, saying at the time that "it's trading healthily" and that there was never a risk that they would have been wound up: "All of our suppliers have been paid on time and all of our staff have been, there's one creditor and one creditor only." The third winding up order against Countryliner Sussex Limited was heard on 17 February. As per what Roger Belcher expected in January, all debts were paid off in time for the hearing and that case too was thrown out.
A number of changes to the company's Surrey network occurred from August 2010, as part of phase 1 of the Surrey County Council "Bus Review", a review of all of Surrey County Council's tendered services, with the aim of reducing the amount of subsidy paid by the council. Routes 73, 81, 462 and 463 were taken on commercially. All of Countryliner services in Surrey had previously received some form of support from the County Council. As part of the changes, routes 71, 72 and 97 were withdrawn, and Countryliner lost the tender for route 437 to Arriva Guildford & West Surrey. With this loss of work, Countryliner decided to start half-hourly commercial service 464 between Guildford and Cranleigh from the day of the bus review changes, in competition with Arriva Guildford & West Surrey routes 53 and 63.
Arriva also increased their services from the same weekend to every 15 minutes, however Countryliner's Neil Hatcher denied reports of a bus war (where Arriva would react to Countryliner's new service by purposely increasing theirs). Arriva's changes were not from the same day, and neither company would have been aware of the other's intentions at the time the changes were registered with the traffic commissioner.
Countryliner offered a more regular service to the Summerlands Estate in Cranleigh, and some buses ran via Guildford station towards Guildford unlike any other buses. Lower fares were charged, although Arriva did reduce their fares for their service changes. The service interworked with routes 462/3 to Woking (and from there the 73 to Chobham), with through fares available, although the workings did cause large problems with punctuality until February 2011 revisions. Neil Hatcher said that if the 464 was successful it would consider further expanding its services into Cranleigh's housing areas.
Further financial problems surfaced on 1 March 2011 when Fisher Partners, a business recovery specialist, informed creditors that Countryliner Coach Hire Limited had failed to keep up its payments to HMRC, against the terms of the creditors voluntary agreement, and said that they were to petition a winding up order against Countryliner.
Countryliner faced further problems in 2011, this time regarding maintenance. At a three-day public inquiry finishing on 16 March 2011, just two out of five of the company's operator licences being investigated survived being cut by Traffic Commissioner Philip Brown. The Countryliner Coach Hire Limited licence, with authorisation for 35 vehicles, was revoked from the end of that week, from 23:59 on 18 March, after being found to have poor financial standing and having had several vehicle problems. This licence carried around half of the Surrey services and some Sussex ones.
The C&S Coach Travel Limited licence, with authorisation for 33 vehicles, was found to have lost its repute, in particular following the numerous tachograph infringements, and was revoked from 31 July 2011 to allow school contracts to finish at the end of the school year. A condition was attached that no new EU work could be taken on, and director Geoffrey Shaw was banned with immediate effect from holding or obtaining an O-licence for two years. The other director voluntarily resigned. The business was wound down gradually.
The Countryliner Limited licence, with authorisation for 15 vehicles, and with the other half of the Surrey routes on it, received a formal maintenance warning after a high MOT failure rate and was allowed to continue, again with the condition it must not take on any new EU work. The Countryliner Sussex Limited licence, with authorisation for 17 vehicles, carrying most of the Sussex and Kent routes, was allowed to continue. Again, no new EU work could be taken on, a new transport manager must be submitted by 25 March and finances must be shown. Finally, an application for a new licence, Countryside & Suburban Limited for 104 vehicles, was withdrawn at the inquiry. This was to have been a "catch-all licence" covering all of the Countryliner Group subsidiaries. Together, the O-licence authorisation fell from 140 vehicles to 72.
The final licence held by Countryliner Group, RJB (UK) Limited, with five O-licences for buses based at Borden, Hampshire, was not part of the inquiry, being in the Western Traffic Area as opposed to the South Eastern and Metropolitan area. To overcome the cut to the licences, Countryliner stopped operating several routes, and numerous routes changed to different licences. To overcome the immediate cut to the Countryliner Coach Hire Limited licence, Surrey routes 10/11, 98, 478, 678, 823, and E303 were abandoned, the 10/11, 478 and 678 Surrey County Council tenders all being taken on at short notice by Arriva from the next day of operation, similarly the 823 by Safeguard Coaches and the E303 by Reptons Coaches.