Property Tour

Mechanic Tom Nikolaison working on an e -bus

TRANZIT - KEEPING THE WHEELS TURNING

Tranzit has long held the reputation of being pioneers and innovators and has no intention of stopping. As New Zealand’s largest familyowned transport and tourism company, Tranzit employs over 2000 team members, operates over 2000 vehicles nationwide and has seven workshops located in the North Island. Throughout Wairarapa, Tranzit employs 87 team members across its Health & Safety, Finance, Marketing, People & Culture, operations, drivers, mechanics, panel beaters, auto trimming and spray-painting teams. This team lives in Wairarapa and bring specialist skills to the region to help it thrive. Tranzit’s National Fleet Manager Daryn Murphy says the company does everything from steel work fabrication and panel beating to spray painting and working on its growing fleet of electric buses. “There are engines to rebuild, faults to diagnose and basic servicing, such as COFs to complete as well as the opportunity to work on our diverse vehicle fleet – from vans through to double deck electric buses. It’s an exciting career and full of variety.” A total of 14 mechanics, panel beaters, auto electricians and EV electricians as well as one panel apprentice and two diesel apprentices keep Tranzit’s wheels turning in its Masterton workshop. “Our team is made up of really great people who are hardworking, determined to learn and all enjoy a good laugh at the end of the day,” says Daryn. The other exciting side to electrifying Tranzit’s bus fleet is upskilling its engineers and mechanics. To date four diesel mechanics have completed the MITO New Zealand Certificate in Electric Vehicle Automotive Engineering (Level 5) and three more have been awarded MITO Level 5 scholarships. This helps Tranzit o er a clear career path for the workshop team. “You can begin with us as an apprentice mechanic and end up specialising in e-buses as well be given the opportunity to be involved in special projects such as our Repower bus project,” says Daryn. The team continues to be recognised as industry leaders in electric vehicles and charging infrastructure and because they’ve pioneered e-bus technology into NZ, they have had to learn as they go … and so are happy to share their learnings with others.

Repower Bus In a Southern Hemisphere first, Tranzit’s Masterton workshop team successfully converted a double deck diesel bus to 100% electric.

The project began after the team was discussing alternative ways to decarbonise public transport. After much planning, the actual conversion took six months to complete in 2021 and proved to be an extremely complex project. After rigorous testing, the certified bus began delivering public transport services in Wellington in January. Then, in July 2022 Tranzit took the bus on a groundbreaking 675km road trip from Wellington to Auckland - groundbreaking because it was the first time ever a double deck e-bus had travelled this distance. It used 702kw/h of energy with six chargers and saved 337.7L of diesel and 1 ton of CO2 from entering the atmosphere. Once in Auckland, this bus completed a series of trials on AT’s bus routes which showed it reliably achieved 230km in service - equating to 115 litres of diesel savings and 299kgs of carbon emission savings. When using the dual plug charger at 240wK (close to 400amps) it had a charge of around 45 minutes. It had 16% brake regeneration in Auckland compared with 30% in Wellington, due to its hilly topography.

Come join our team tranzit.co.nz | 0800 200 018

MATT SPICER. Guiding people in a tough financial market

For 21 years registered financial adviser Matt Spicer has provided home loan advice to potential borrowers. Before this, he spent a decade in banking. As a result of his knowledge, keen listening ear, and experience, there are many happy homeowners throughout Wairarapa, whom Matt has helped get a mortgage. Matt describes the past 12 months as especially challenging in the financial sector after the Credit Contracts & Consumer Finance Act which was passed December 2021. “Tough criteria, especially if a client has less than the 20% required deposit for a home purchase, has been hard on people keen to get on to the property ladder. Tight scrutiny over borrowers’ discretionary spending has also been tough.” It has had advisers, like himself, on their toes and in some cases, they have questioned the criteria, such as lenders considering savings as an outgoing cost. Matt argues this should be considered as a positive in the financial picture of a person’s ability to re-pay a loan. “This independent scrutiny has been important in helping our clients and we’ve been able to foster leniency resulting in loans being approved.” Matt is joined by Mortgage Adviser, Kath Clendon, and along with PA Tania Finlayson, they help guide people through the maze of applying for finance. They sit and hear about people’s lives, learn their ambitions, and most importantly, their financial situation, to see if this translates to being eligible to borrow money immediately. If not, they help put a plan in place towards reaching that goal. There’s much ‘behind the scenes’ work before the application is submitted. Here’s what happy clients had to say: “We went to see Matt in the early stages of saving for our first home to get some advice and construct a savings plan. With Matt’s consistent support, we worked hard and stuck to our plan for a year, and we now own our first home. Matt made this very new process extremely seamless, and it was such a positive experience. Matt went above and beyond for us, and for that we are incredibly grateful!” Kayla & Logan. “We’ve had years of experience in the finance industry and keeping up with the trends is vital to helping people get their end goal,” says Matt. The Loan Market team are proud that they keep up with the latest trends. “We save our clients time, cost and hassle and they glean from our wealth of knowledge and experience.” The clear message from Matt to people wanting to secure a mortgage is to “come and talk with us first”. Out of office, Matt enjoys time with his family, from managing his kids’ sports teams to spending precious time with nine-month-old granddaughter, Saydie. He also helps wife Lauren when he can with their early childhood centre, He Pounamu, at Dalefield west Carterton.

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Matt Spicer, Franchise Owner and Mortgage Adviser

M: 027 495 5920