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Brian Walters, BFI Programme Unit writes:

There have been serious problems with the level of service provided by Securicor, and since John Badham left these problems seem to have worsened. On 18 October Christine Woodhouse [BFI bookings], Phil Hills and Lorraine Salter [BFI print despatch] and myself had a meeting with Stephen Howard, a Development Manager at Securicor.

Stephen acknowledged that there had been some problems and plans to visit a number of organisations to get an idea of what people feel needs to be done. He hopes to start work on getting a system in place where film boxes can easily be identified by drivers and therefore improve the level of service.

We have not as yet had a follow up meeting but hope to have one later this year. Up to now though, nothing has improved.

The CEA [Cinema Exhibitors' Association - UK representative organisation for theatres] has sent out 'print report sheets' to cinemas, which are to be filled out when prints are not delivered on time. These should be sent to John Wilkinson at the CEA, who is liaising with distributors, and to Lisa Doherty, who handles complaints, at:

Securicor Cinema Department
Sutton Park House
15 Carshalton Road
Sutton
Surrey
SM1 4LE

I hope to have a meeting soon with Stephen Howard and am also keen to invite Lisa Doherty and Emma Roberts from the Securicor Cinema Department. There is no adequate system in place whereby cinemas can get compensation for prints not being delivered in time for a screening, an issue we are keen to raise at the meeting. This needs to be rectified as soon as possible so Securicor realsise just how much their poor service is costing cinemas. I'll keep you informed of further developments.

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I wonder what this 'system' for enabling Securicor's drivers to spot the film boxes will be? Teaching them to read?!

You really know how to start my week !

In our office we try not to use "The "S" word" before the third cup of coffee!

You only don't have problems with them because you are a single screen, showing a small number of films per week. Take the number of times they mess you around, multiply it by the number of screens and different features shown at your local multiplex and you'll soon see why wrong/late/missing deliveries are a huge and potentially expensive problem for cinemas. Ok this analogy isn't statistically perfect, but you see my point?

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They would have been made down, except for the fact that we actually phoned Securicor, asked them if they were on crossover and needing to be picked up that day, they'd say "no, just going back to Perivale" so they might not be done straight away, and so would follow a nasty phone call from whichever cinema asking where the heck their print was!

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Our first,knowing,run in with EPM was the other week when they called me on a Thursday to set up a crossover for the print of The Hired Hand. Our last show was on Monday 8.15pm and they asked that it be left out for 9am collection the following morning.The confusing thing about this is that we usually get crossover requests from the distributor not the transport company. They eventually picked it up around 2.30pm.No documentation or receipt. Then 2 days later they sent another driver in to pick up the same print plus two others we have never seen to crossover to Sheffield Showroom for Friday!

As for crossover drivers not providing receipts, I eventually printed out my own receipt slips which had boxes for the film title, print number, destination cinema (full address), time and date of collection and full name/company of person collecting. I wouldn't release a print without either the Securicor generated paperwork (e.g. an entry in the Perivale book or one of their separate consignment slips) or one of my own slips. At least if the film did then get lost, we had the paperwork to prove that it wasn't us who lost it.

I'm waiting for Securicor to deliver a copy of a Bollywood feature 'Pitaah' for screening tonight and tomorrow at 6.30pm...

Its nearly 4pm, and despite calls to the distributor and the local Securicor depot the print still hasn't arrived, but they've kindly informed me that 'its definately on its way'

If it doesn't arrive soon I'm probably going to have to show Harry Potter instead...

on the subject of crossovers, I get a few of them, usually arthouse material, and crossover or not, always break down the feature and box it up following its last screening, and then leave it out labelled up for the next cinema if I've been informed where its going...

Recently Securicor have collected prints labelled for crossover early the next morning, when they've made a film delivery, and have then come in before lunchtime to collect it again, usually with a comment of 'They've been told not to collect those sort of films...'

for example, we finish with 'The Piano Teacher' this Thursday, for crossover to the Ultimate Picture Palace in Oxford, playing the 19th Feb (Thank you for the info Artificial Eye, you're one of the few film distributors that bother to tell cinemas about crossovers)
The print will be ready for pick up after midnite, and I expect that it will have been collected Friday morning with next weeks deliveries...

no doubt I'll get yet another second visit...

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There must be more to life than Film and Rugby...

If it doesn't arrive soon I'm probably going to have to show Harry Potter instead..."