Decision for Emitrans Ltd (OF2054723)
Source: gov.uk (2025-08-14)

Written decision of the Deputy Traffic Commissioner in the East of England for Emitrans Ltd and transport manager Andrei Nasui

EAST OF ENGLAND TRAFFIC AREA

DECISION OF THE DEPUTY TRAFFIC COMMISSIONER

PUBLIC INQUIRY HELD IN CAMBRIDGE ON 17 JUNE 2025

OPERATOR: EMITRANS LTD LICENCE OF2054723

Decisions

The standard international goods vehicle operator’s licence OF2054723 held by Emitrans Ltd is revoked with effect from 0001 hours on 26 July 2025 pursuant to Section 26(1)(c)(iii), (ca), (e) and (f) and Section 27(1)(a) of the Goods Vehicles (Licensing of Operators) Act 1995 (“the 1995 Act”). Until 26 July 2025 the licence is curtailed from eight vehicles and eight trailers to four vehicles (the number it is currently operating) and four trailers.

Emitrans Ltd and director Constantin Buculei are disqualified from holding or obtaining any type of operator’s licence in any traffic area and (in Mr Buculei’s case) from being the director of any company holding or obtaining such a licence, pursuant to Section 28(1), (4) and (5) of the 1995 Act. The disqualification is for the period of 3 years, from 26 July 2025 to 26 July 2028.

Andrei Nasui has lost his good repute as a transport manager, pursuant to Schedule 3 paragraph 1 of the 1995 Act. Under paragraph 16(2) of that Schedule he is disqualified with immediate effect for a period of three years until 4 July 2028 from acting as a transport manager on any operator’s licence. If he wishes to act as a transport manager in the future, he must first retake and pass the transport manager CPC examination.

Background

Emitrans Ltd holds a standard international goods vehicle operator’s licence (OF2054723) for eight vehicles and eight trailers. Seven vehicles are currently specified on the licence, which was granted (originally for two vehicles) in April 2022. The sole director of the company is Constantin Buculei. The nominated transport manager from the grant of the licence until 1 March 2025 was Andrei Nasui. The transport manager since 4 April 2025 is Andrew Hartwell. The stated maintenance interval for both vehicles and trailers is six weeks.

DVSA investigation

On 16 December 2024 one of the operator’s articulated vehicles was stopped at the roadside by DVSA. One of the trailer’s tyres was found to have tread depth of well below the 1mm legal limit. The trailer (C393940) had been given a preventative maintenance inspection (PMI) two days previously when the tread depth of the tyre concerned had been recorded as 4mm [it had originally been recorded as being 2mm and someone had overwritten the 2 with a 4]. DVSA issued the trailer with an S-marked prohibition (denoting a significant failure in the maintenance system).

On 31 January 2025 another articulated vehicle operated by Emitrans Ltd was stopped by DVSA. A delayed prohibition was issued for a defective emission indicator lamp on the vehicle, and further delayed prohibitions given to the trailer for a defective parking brake and white indicator light. The driver defect report, completed earlier that day, showed neither the defective emissions light nor the white indicator.

On 22 February 2025 DVSA vehicle examiner Mervyn Lockwood visited Emitrans Ltd’s operating centre at Iconfield Business Park in Harwich (one of two operating centres on the licence, the other being Poplars Yard in Harwich). The outcome of his investigation was “unsatisfactory – report to OTC” for the following reasons:

the company was parking seven vehicles and seven trailers at the Iconfield Business Park operating centre, whereas it was only authorised to park four vehicles and four trailers there. A parking agreement with the landlord for seven vehicles and seven trailers was seen;

45 PMIs were looked at. The stated six week interval between PMIs had been exceeded on every occasion, normally by one to two weeks (although there was one gap of 16 weeks);

most of the inspections recorded no brake test at all. Some of them recorded road tests, without recording brake temperatures;

a tyre on trailer C333548 had been recorded as having a tread depth of 1mm at a PMI on 14 December 2024. The next PMI on 2 February 2025 recorded the tyre as bald;

the nature of the prohibitions and the defects identified on the PMI sheets showed that driver defect reporting was ineffective;

the stated maintenance provider, PRM Commercials, was not being used. Maintenance and PMIs were carried out by the director of East Coast Express Ltd, Andrei Nasui (also the transport manager on the licence), from his van at the operating centre. The vehicle examiner noted that multiple (7-8) vehicles/trailers were being inspected on the same day, which might reduce the quality of the inspections if repairs also had to be conducted;

no wheel change or wheel nut torque/retorque procedure was in place;

the transport manager Andrei Nasui was failing to exercise effective and continuous management, as the above shortcomings should have been apparent to him and he should have taken action to address them;

since VE Lockwood’s visit a further S-marked prohibition had been issued to vehicle SF16 VBY for excessively corroded brake discs. This was a long-standing defect which should have been identified and repaired at the previous PMI.

On 26 February 2025 DVSA traffic examiner Raymond Hawkins visited the operator. He scored the operator at 32, significantly above the threshold of 11 which triggers a report to the traffic commissioner. The reasons for this very high score were:

training not documented. Drivers apparently carried out their CPC training in Romania;

only a visual check of driving licences was made. All drivers had Romanian driving licences;

all drivers were “self-employed” or “limited company” drivers, thus not under the direct control of the operator;

there was no system in place to monitor drivers’ hours; there was no evidence of any drivers’ hours infringement reports having been produced;

there was no evidence of any downloading of drivers’ cards prior to a download on 23 February 2025 immediately prior to TE Hawkins’s visit;

no missing mileage reports were available;

working time was not being recorded correctly and Mr Buculei was unsure of the reference period he was using;

11 serious drivers’ hours infringements and two most serious infringements (MSIs) had been committed during the period 2 December 2024 to 26 February 2025 by the director Constantin Buculei himself.

TE Hawkins concluded that “the operator lacks the fundamental transport knowledge required for compliance”. “I have serious concerns regarding public safety if this operator is allowed to continue operating in their current state. There appears to be little regard for policies and procedures”. TE Hawkins noted that transport manager Andei Nasui had not been present during the visit: Mr Buculei told him that he was working in London.

On 25 February 2025 Mr Nasui wrote to VE Lockwood, saying that he did understand his role as transport manager and had always done his best to give advice to Constantin Buculei whom he described as his friend. It was only after the prohibition on 16 December 2024 that Mr Nasui had become aware that Mr Buculei had been ignoring drivers’ reports of defects, instructing drivers to drive unroadworthy vehicles. On one occasion Mr Buculei had instructed a driver to use a vehicle which had just failed a brake test. Drivers were frequently employed for short periods of time and their cards were not downloaded. They had also driven on occasion without their cards inserted into the tachograph unit. Mr Buculei himself had numerous infringements for exceeding daily driving time and for taking insufficient daily and weekly rest but he had point blank refused to do anything about this, saying that it was none of Mr Nasui’s business. Mr Nasui had now written to Mr Buculei saying that he would resign as transport manager if his advice was not followed.

On 1 March 2025 Mr Nasui resigned as transport manager after he was told by a driver that a warning light in the cab had come on and that one of the company’s service providers had advised the vehicle should be taken out of service as it would attract a prohibition if stopped by DVSA. Mr Buculei had overruled this and told the driver to continue with the vehicle. Mr Nasui also said that Mr Buculei had not told him about the visit of TE Hawkins: if he had known about it he would have attended.

Public inquiry

In the light of the DVSA reports both the company and transport manager were called to a public inquiry. Call-up letters were sent on 12 May 2025, citing Section 26(1)(b), (c)(iii), (ca), (e), (f) and (h), Section 27(1)(a) and (b) and Section 28 of the 1995 Act.

The public inquiry was held in Cambridge on 17 June 2025. Present were director Constantin Buculei, former transport manager Andrei Nasui, current transport manager Andrew Hartwell and solicitor Tim Ridyard, representing the company. An interpreter was also present at the hearing to assist Mr Buculei.

Further information

In advance of the inquiry I had received a submission from Mr Nasui. He stated that:

he had first challenged Mr Buculei at the end of 2023 about non-compliance in the light of drivers’ hours infringements, the fact that many drivers were not having their cards downloaded, and the suspicion that vehicles were not being properly maintained. Mr Buculei had promised to follow his advice;

the fixed penalty issued on 16 December 2024 to the driver with the illegal tyre had highlighted the fact that the driver did not have a UK address. He (Mr Nasui) had investigated further and found that drivers were all Romanian nationals with no UK address, taking their weekly rests in their vehicles at the operating centre in Harwich. He strongly suspected that the drivers did not have the right to work in the UK.

Mr Nasui had introduced the Tachomaster analysis system which Mr Buculei had been reluctant to accept on grounds of cost. Mr Buculei had refused to pass on infringement reports to drivers. He had also refused to pay for a driver defect reporting app.

DVSA vehicle examiner Mervyn Lockwood submitted an updated report based on the operator’s recent maintenance records (since his visit). He reported that roller brake tests were now being carried out, although not sufficiently laden as the print-outs showed insufficient load on axle 2 (and sometimes axle 3). PMIs continued to record driver detectable defects which drivers should have identified on their walk-round check: e.g. emissions warning light on (on two occasions), a tyre at 2mm and a trailer with no tail lights working. There had been a recent immediate prohibition issued to vehicle SF16 VBY on 26 April 2025 for a deep cut to a tyre with cords exposed.

Traffic examiner Raymond Hawkins also provided an update. Driver licence check details were missing for four drivers (including Mr Buculei); tachograph data was missing for ten drivers who had been employed in recent weeks; director Constantin Buculei was continuing to commit numerous and frequent drivers’ hours offences. No vehicle download or missing mileage reports had been provided. There were significant gaps in both driver information and supporting documentation: as a result it was not possible to make a complete or accurate assessment of compliance.

Evidence of Constantin Buculei

Mr Buculei said that he now employed three drivers on a PAYE basis and produced evidence showing that they were each paid £1,000 per month (and so under the threshold for paying income tax). I asked about the allegation made by Mr Nasui that drivers were not resident in the UK. Mr Buculei said that they had settled status in the UK and that he had always checked this. He said he would provide evidence of such checks after the inquiry [he has failed to do so]. Drivers had wanted to be used on a “limited company” basis because they did not want to pay any tax.

He had attended a new operators seminar run by DVSA in 2022 but had not gleaned much from it. He had depended completely on his transport manager Andrei Nasui to ensure that the operation was compliant. He had seen Mr Nasui once or twice a month for a few hours. Mr Nasui was responsible for the vehicles’ maintenance schedule: it was he who had planned inspections every eight weeks rather than six. Mr Nasui had also advised him to cease doing roller brake tests on vehicles, as they kept failing. So he had stopped. Some of the gaps in the PMI record were explained by the fact that he had not wanted to show them to DVSA because they were completed incorrectly.

Mr Nasui had told him that it was all right to park seven vehicles at the Harwich operating centre, even though it was only authorised for four.

I asked Mr Buculei why he had taken no action about the tyre on trailer C333548 which had a very low tread recorded on 14 December 2024 and had been bald at the next inspection on 2 February 2025. Mr Buculei could not remember. For the tyre on trailer C393940, which had been recorded as 2mm (but overwritten by someone as 4mm) on 14 December 2024 and found to be illegal two days later, Mr Buculei said that he had thought there would be time to replace it over the Christmas holiday.

Asked about his drivers’ hours infringements, Mr Buculei said that many were a result of his leaving the card in overnight on other work. Slowly he was starting to understand everything. He accepted that in March 2025 he had told DVSA that he would shortly be attending an operator licence training course (OLAT) but that he had not subsequently done so: he was awaiting the outcome of the inquiry.

Evidence of Andrei Nasui

Mr Nasui said that Mr Buculei had originally been a friend. He was an owner driver who knew nothing of the regulatory requirements. Mr Buculei had frequently failed to follow advice, pleading lack of money. Mr Nasui had advised him to have a tyre contract: Mr Buculei had said this was too expensive. He had also refused to have vehicles given a PMI every six weeks on grounds of cost. When the tyre issue had been identified in December 2024 Mr Buculei had told him first that new tyres were on order, then that these tyres had not turned up. Mr Buculei had refused to have vehicles roller brake tested, again on grounds of cost. He had not applied to increase authority at the operating centre because he did not want to pay for the advertisement.

Operator response

These allegations were denied by the operator. Mr Ridyard stated that it was highly unlikely that the transport manager had known nothing about the shortcomings until February 2025. Mr Nasui had only made his accusations and resigned once DVSA had become involved. Mr Buculei had never refused to do brake tests for financial reasons. He had asked Mr Nasui whether he needed to apply to increase the number of vehicles based at the Harwich operating centre to seven and had received a negative reply.

Evidence of Andrew Hartwell

Mr Hartwell referred to the S-marked prohibition of 17 March 2025 (the corroded brake discs). The previous PMI had been carried out by PRM Commercials seven days previously and had failed to identify the issue. A copy of his email of 19 March 2025 to PRM complaining about this poor service was in the inquiry bundle. PMIs had since been moved to DJC Commercial, a large workshop. DJC was a highly-respected reputable company which had said that they would not “stand for any nonsense” from the operator. Drivers were trampers and ideally an electronic app system would be used for defect reporting. On drivers’ hours, Mr Hartwell intended to download driver cards weekly, although he would like to move to remote downloading. He accepted that there had been no downloads of vehicle units “for a while”. He was still working on the torque/retorque policy. He valued his good repute and would walk away if Mr Buculei failed to heed his advice.

Financial standing [closed session]

REDACTED

Closing submissions

Former transport manager Andrei Nasui said that he would never again allow himself to be controlled in the way he had been by Mr Buculei.

For the operator, Mr Ridyard said that Mr Buculei accepted that the buck stopped with him. He had been let down by his former transport manager Mr Nasui, although it was accepted that he should have managed Mr Nasui better. Immediately on being visited by DVSA Mr Buculei had sought the help of a transport consultant to put together a response to the DVSA reports and had appointed a new, better-performing, transport manager who would not stand for any nonsense. Drivers had been employed on a PAYE basis and the number of vehicles operated now reduced to four (other drivers had refused to work on a PAYE basis and had left). Mr Ridyard considered that I could trust Mr Buculei to comply in the future. It was the operator’s first inquiry and there was no previous history of non-compliance. Undertakings were offered for an audit in six months’ time, for Mr Buculei to attend an OLAT course, and for evidence of financial standing to be provided in three months’ time.

After the inquiry Mr Nasui sent in documents which showed that:

the landlord of the Poplars Yard operating centre had emailed Mr Buculei in July 2024 to inform him that drivers should not sleep in their vehicles as this was a breach of the terms of the lease. They had slept in their vehicles at the weekend;

drivers had signed for receipt of a document entitled “drivers’ duties and undertakings” setting out their responsibilities on 22 February 2024.

A copy of Mr Nasui’s documents was sent to the operator’s legal representative for comment. There has been no reply.

Findings

After considering the evidence, I make the following findings:

the company lacks effective and stable establishment in that it has not fulfilled the requirement set out in paragraph A1(2)(c )(ii) of Schedule 3 to the 1995 Act that it have a place in Great Britain with a number of drivers proportionate to the number of vehicles operating from that place. For one thing, until very recently it has not employed drivers at all. For another, the “limited company” drivers that it has used appear not to be based in Great Britain: they drive under Romanian driving licences and carry out their CPC training in Romania. No evidence of their right to work in the UK was presented. Mr Buculei undertook to present evidence of his checking of drivers’ settled status after the inquiry but failed to do so.

the company lacks the appropriate financial standing (Section 27(1)(a)) of the 1995 Act refers). The Upper Tribunal has made it clear that financial standing is not a one-off requirement to be met only when applying for an operator’s licence or on renewal: it is a continuing requirement which must be met throughout the life of the licence (2013/048 Jane Townsend). Only since the £40,000 overdraft facility was agreed at an unspecified date in May 2025 has the operator been able to demonstrate sufficient funds to support eight vehicles.

the company’s vehicles have been issued with five prohibitions – two of them S-marked - out of 17 encounters (Section 26(1)(c )(iii) of the 1995 Act refers). The S-marked prohibition for illegal tyre tread depth on trailer C393940, coming two days after a PMI identified low tread depth, is particularly reprehensible. It is clear that the operator did nothing to address the urgent issue of a tyre rapidly approaching illegality.

the company’s servants or agents have been issued with fixed penalties (Section 26(1)(ca) refers). The driver of the vehicle stopped on 16 December 2024 was fined £200. Another driver was fined £200 on 26 April 2025 for a serious drivers’ hours offence.

the company has failed to fulfil its undertakings (Section 26(1)(f)) refers) –

to ensure the lawful operation of vehicles. The operator has exceeded its authorisation at the Iconfield Business Park operating centre at Harwich.

to ensure that drivers report defects in writing. It is evident from the DVSA reports that drivers were failing to identify obvious defects which were subsequently discovered at PMIs or at roadside stops;

to keep vehicles fit and serviceable. As well as the trailer which received the S-marked prohibition, there was a further trailer identified as having a very low tyre tread depth at its PMI on 14 December 2024. The tyre was found to be bald at the next PMI in February. Quite clearly, the company had simply continued to operate it, regardless of road safety. In addition, vehicles and trailers were not given any meaningful brake tests until the DVSA’s visit in February 2025;

to ensure that rules relating to drivers’ hours and tachographs are observed. DVSA’s encounter report shows that, from 10 roadside encounters during the life of the licence, drivers were found to have committed a drivers’ hours offence on five of them. One of the drivers was Mr Buculei himself. At the most recent stop, on 26 April 2025, the driver Bogdan-Ioan Giurgiu was fined £200 for failing to take minimum daily rest by between one and two hours. Moreover, as TE Hawkins’ report makes clear, missing mileage reports were not and still are not being generated, and many drivers come and go without ever having their cards downloaded.

the company has failed to fulfil the promise, given on application, that its vehicles and trailers would be given safety inspections every six weeks (Section 26(1)(e) refers). Vehicles and trailers have instead been inspected at eight week intervals, although this has clearly been insufficient to prevent vehicles and trailers from falling below Construction & Use standards before the next PMI.

Former transport manager Andrei Nasui is not of good repute (Schedule 3 and Section 27(1)(b) of the 1995 Act refer). He has clearly failed to exercise the required continuous and effective management of the transport activities of the business. Under his watch the stated PMI intervals were exceeded (and it was his company which was carrying out the maintenance!); authority at an operating centre was exceeded; vehicles which he had identified as approaching unroadworthiness continued to be operated; multiple drivers’ hours offences were committed without infringement letters being given to drivers or any disciplinary proceedings held; many drivers never had cards downloaded at all. Mr Nasui said that he first complained to Mr Buculei about this non-compliance at the end of 2023: why he should then allow it to continue for more than 12 months until DVSA visited in February 2025 is beyond me. Mr Nasui completely failed to ensure that the undertakings on the licence were kept, a fundamental responsibility of a transport manager. Evidence that he provided drivers with some guidance on 22 February 2025, almost three years into his tenure as transport manager, and on the day of the DVSA vehicle examiner’s visit, is insufficient to counteract these failings.

the operator Emitrans Ltd and its director Constantin Buculei are not of good repute (Section 27(1)(a) of the 1995 Act refers). The operator has failed to fulfil multiple undertakings that it gave when applying for the licence. It has cut corners on maintenance (extending the intervals between PMIs, failing to repair safety critical defects, and failing to carry out meaningful brake tests); it has largely ignored the drivers’ hours rules to the point where the DVSA traffic examiner had “serious concerns regarding public safety”; it has used Romanian-based drivers over whom it (and the regulatory authorities) have little control. The company’s modus operandi has posed a substantial threat to road safety and to fair competition against those operators who do comply. Good repute cannot be retained in these circumstances;

I have not made any separate findings relating to Section 26(1)(b) and (h). Any findings I would have made under these sections have already been covered in the findings above.

Balancing act

I weighed up the negative against the positive issues. On the negative side were the above findings. On the more positive side were:

an average MOT first time failure rate of 20% (two failures from 10 presentations). Although this is worse than the national average (11%), the vehicles failed each time on glass and view of road, and passed after rectification at the station;

a new transport manager who has started to introduce improvements, although much remains to be done to bring the operator to a satisfactory degree of compliance, as is evident from both the vehicle examiner’s and traffic examiner’s updates (see paragraphs 12 and 13 above);

the fact that three drivers are now employed on a PAYE basis (although I also find that this has been done on a cosmetic basis, with the PAYE salary designed to come just below the level where income tax is triggered – this is highly unlikely to be the drivers’ true level of pay);

On balance, I conclude that the negative factors heavily outweigh the positives. The operator has been highly non-compliant for almost all of the life of the licence, with (insufficient) improvement measures only starting to be taken in the last three months. It is clear to me that Mr Buculei embarked upon his goods vehicle business with little or no idea of the rules and regulations involved and little willingness to be guided by his transport manager. I find it highly unlikely that he was advised by his transport manager not to apply to increase authority at the Iconfield Business Park operating centre, or advised that an eight week interval between PMIs would suffice, or that roller brake tests should cease. But even if he was, he should have been aware of an operator’s basic obligations from his attendance at the new operator seminar in 2022 and from the licence undertakings which he personally signed. I find that Mr Buculei has taken a cavalier approach to the roadworthiness of his vehicles, to the legality of the employment arrangements concerning his drivers and to adherence to drivers’ hours rules, with serious potential consequences for road safety and fair competition. On several occasions, he has taken deliberate decisions to continue using vehicles which were unroadworthy (the two trailers in question).

I conclude that the operator falls in the “severe” category set out in the Senior Traffic Commissioner’s Statutory Guidance Document No.10 – as there have been deliberate acts compromising road safety and the operator has permitted driver offending (not least Mr Buculei’s own drivers’ hours infringements).

Priority Freight and Bryan Haulage questions

I asked myself if I could trust this operator to be compliant in the future (the Priority Freight question). The answer is an emphatic no. Mr Buculei has shown that he is prepared to put financial considerations and operational convenience before safety and compliance with the law. I have no confidence that he will change in the future, even with the assistance of a more hands-on transport manager than Mr Nasui.

A negative answer to the Priority Freight question tends to suggest an affirmative answer to the Bryan Haulage question of whether the operator deserves to go out of business. Because of the serious nature of the shortcomings found by DVSA, and their extended duration, I conclude that it does.

Decisions

Operator licence

I have concluded that the operator lacks effective and stable establishment, financial standing and good repute. Revocation of the licence is therefore mandatory under Section 27(1)(a) of the 1995 Act. I am also revoking it under Section 26(1)(c)(iii), (ca), (e) and (f) of the 1995 Act. Owing to my lack of trust in the operator’s willingness or ability to run a compliant operation, I am allowing less than the usual 28 days for the revocation to take effect and in the meantime am curtailing the licence to its current operational level of four vehicles. The revocation takes effect at 0001 hours on 26 July 2025.

Disqualification – operator

For the reasons outlined above, and having performed the same balancing act, I conclude that both the company and director Constantin Buculei should be disqualified under Section 28 from holding or obtaining an operator’s licence in the future and (in Mr Buculei’s case) from being the director of any company holding or obtaining such a licence. In deciding upon the length of the disqualification, I have taken account of paragraph 108 of the Senior Traffic Commissioner’s Statutory Guidance Document 10. This states that, for a first inquiry, a disqualification period of between one and three years could be the starting point. However, it goes on to state that in severe cases where, for example, the operator knowingly operates unsafe vehicles, indefinite disqualification may be merited. As discussed above, the conscious operation of unsafe vehicles has been the case here. On balance, I conclude that a disqualification period of three years, at the top end of the scale for a first public inquiry but less than the starting point for knowingly operating unsafe vehicles, strikes the right balance. Emitrans Ltd and Constantin Buculei are disqualified for three years from 26 July 2025 until 26 July 2028.

Disqualification – transport manager

Having removed his good repute, I must also disqualify Andrei Nasui from acting as transport manager on any operator’s licence (paragraph 16 of Schedule 3 refers). He has said that he advised Mr Buculei on many occasions what he needed to do but that his advice was thwarted. Whether that is true or not hardly matters: even if it is, it should have been obvious to Mr Nasui, if he had been exercising the required degree of continuous and effective management, that his instructions were being ignored or countermanded by the operator. But Mr Nasui completely failed to exercise the required degree of continuous and effective management and was seemingly content to remain on the licence without inquiring any further until DVSA’s investigation brought matters to a head. For the same reasons as apply to the operator’s disqualification, I am disqualifying Mr Nasui as a transport manager for three years, until 3 July 2028. His neglect has enabled a seriously non-compliant company to operate heavy goods vehicles for almost three years.

If he wishes to return to the industry as a transport manager thereafter, a necessary rehabilitation measure will be to retake and pass the transport manager CPC examination.

Nicholas Denton

Deputy Traffic Commissioner

4 July 2025