This related to complaints lodged by Kevin Banks of the Sweet Green Tavern in Bolton.
The Respondents were Punch Taverns.
The hearing was chaired by a specialist solicitor to the licensed trade. The PICA-Service panel was made up of a small multiple pub operator, a consultant to a family Brewer, a multisite licensee running both freehold and leased premises and an operator of a small number of freehold licensed properties.
The complaints briefly centered around allegations to a number of visits made to the complainant by his Business/Partnership Development manager, the provision of minutes concerning these meetings where they had taken place, the failure to undertake property checks and cellar visits, the failure to reply within detailed permitted timescales to various complaints, a dispute as to the extent of the tie and the manner this was dealt with, alleged untruths told by Business/Partnership Development manager, issues concerning structural work carried out by the complainant, a failure to provide electric, gas, asbestos, PAT energy performance certificates and a fire risk assessment, a failure to provide a schedule of condition of the building and the delaying of a survey of the complainant’s property.
The PICA-Service panel found that evidence had acted to clarify the fact that sufficient meetings had subsequently taken place in order to satisfy the requirements of the Industry framework Code and the Pub Co’s own Code of Practice (followed by the issuing of adequate minutes of such meeting), or that alternatively the Respondents had made sufficient efforts to arrange such meetings.
The panel did not find for the Complainant in respect of the remaining complaints he had detailed taking the view, from the facts presented to the Hearing, that these either did not represent breaches of the respective Codes, did not represent breaches in the spirit of such Codes or that such allegations had not proved from the evidence provided to be able to be substantiated.
More information about PICA-Service PICA-Service comes within the auspices of the Pub
Governing Body having been formed by six of the industry’s leading associations (the ALMR,
the BBPA, the BII, the FLVA, the Brighton and Hove licensee Association and the GMV) in
order to deliver self-regulation to the tied tenanted pub industry. Its mandate is to deal with
technical breaches or breaches of the spirit of the industry framework code of practice, or
breaches of individual pub company (and pub-owning brewery) codes of practice, occurring
after 30th June 2010 – the date the framework code came into effect.
The PICA-Service panel comprises independent experts made up of a diverse group of
individuals including a circuit judge, a member of the Chartered Institute of Arbitrators,
accountants, solicitors, a barrister, a magistrate, chartered surveyors, licensed trainers,
pub tenants and retired pub tenants, plus brewery/pub Co and retired brewery/pub Co
executives.
More details are available on the PICA-Service website including how complaints should be
lodged.
The PICA-Service website address is: www.picaservice.com