The Covid-19 pandemic has hit the executive sector hardest, as business travel and events work have dried up

Chauffeurs in crisis

DIVERSIFICATION INTO HOME deliveries, courier work and key worker transport has been a business lifeline for many private hire fleets, but the executive chauffeuring sector has found it much harder to access this sort of work – with a £70,000 car it’s a lot tougher to make low-cost jobs pay.

Meanwhile, the lifeblood of the chauffeuring sector has all but dried up. Companies report their business is down more than 90% as business travel, corporate events, financial roadshows, trade shows, dinners, big-ticket sporting events and overseas tourists have dwindled to a trickle as the UK – and the world – lurches from lockdown to lifting and back to lockdown again. Hopes of an effective vaccine in the coming months are strong, but most industry watchers are pessimistic as to when – if ever – the business travel market will return to the “normal” levels of 2019.