Mobile elevated-platform supplier Lavendon Group, which trades as Nationwide Platforms, has terminated its five-year delivery and collection contract with Wincanton a year after it outsourced transport to the 3PL.

The contract, inked in November 2014, will be wound up by March of this year with the service returning in-house.

Lavendon said the move was a “joint decision” in response to Lavendon’s growth plans and its “development of an increasingly sophisticated customer service offering”.

Wincanton has been overseeing the collection of products from Lavendon’s 26 storage sites and delivering them to customers across the UK. Under the deal it was contracted to make 200,000 deliveries a year using a fleet of 124 vehicles.

Lavendon’s UK division has been struggling to improve rental revenue during the past year. A trading update issued in November showed year-on-year rental turnover increase in 2015 down by 1% although the group reported gradual improvement in revenue performance in Q3.

Lavendon Group said: “We confirm that Wincanton’s logistics contract with Nationwide Platforms, will come to an end by March 2016.

“In order to better support the group’s growth plans and the development of an increasingly sophisticated customer service offering, Lavendon and Wincanton have together taken the decision to bring the management and delivery of the transport logistic requirements for Nationwide Plat-forms in-house at Lavendon and under its direct control.”

A spokeswoman for Wincanton said: “The service, which began in January 2015, operated a UK-wide national planning service for Nationwide Platforms.

Following significant assessment it has been jointly concluded by both parties, given the diverse nature within the five regions Nationwide Platforms operates, that servicing the group on a national basis is less effective than operating independently as five separate entities.

“It has therefore been decided that the most practical solution is to migrate back to regional planning through Lavendon.”

Wincanton said Tupe would apply for existing employees, understood to include approximately 124 drivers.

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