Nick Brookes is a busy man. Over the last 20 years, he has built up a thriving business in Wardle, Cheshire, providing services including aggregates, asbestos removal, demolition, recycling and skip hire across the north-west of England, to customers including leading house builders and local authorities.
With the Nick Brooke Group operation involving almost 100 employees, a substantial vehicle fleet and thousands of skips, Nick is constantly juggling dozens of different demands on his time.
So knowing that he can turn to John Dyne, of Dyne Solicitors Limited, for expert legal advice means he has one less thing to worry about.
Nick first began working with John in 1999, on the recommendation of another contractor. Nick says: “He said John was the man for the job, and that has proved to be the case.”
In the last six years, John’s professional expertise and proactive approach has helped Nick to stay up to date with the ever-growing and frequently changing regulatory regimes affecting his operation, including vehicle and health and safety issues.
Nick knows only too well how the level of regulation affecting businesses in his sector has increased over the years, creating new challenges for operators to stay compliant with the law. He says: “I would say the amount of paperwork we deal with has trebled in 20 years.
“John has been very good in steering us in the right direction, so that we have the right systems in place and everything is regularly refreshed. He’s helped us with a whole range of issues, including health and safety, drivers’ hours, vehicle maintenance and paperwork and record keeping.
“I like his hands on approach and the personal way he deals with clients – when you ring up, you talk to him and are not passed on to someone else – and we have people here who attend his seminars, which we find very good.
“The newsletters he sends us are useful, and he’ll also ring to let us know if he’s learned about a particular issue that we need to tighten up on. What John does is to help us put everything in place so that we can stay a step ahead of the regulations.”