Modern Slavery Statement
Who we are and what we do
The Rivus story began in 2019, when private equity investors Aurelius acquired BT Fleet Solutions. Since then, we’ve worked relentlessly to provide unbeatable fleet management support to our customers.
Aurelius also acquired Pullman Fleet Solutions in November 2020. Before the integration with Rivus, Pullman was the largest independent provider of commercial HGV maintenance and fleet management in the UK. Combining the strength and expertise of Rivus and Pullman together makes us a driving force in the UK fleet management industry.
Our policy on Slavery and Human Trafficking
Modern slavery is a crime and a violation of fundamental human rights under the Modern Slavery Act 2015. It takes various forms, such as slavery, servitude, forced and compulsory labour and human trafficking, all of which have in common the deprivation of a person’s liberty by another to exploit them for personal or commercial gain.
Rivus operates under a zero-tolerance approach to modern slavery and is committed to acting ethically and with integrity in all our business dealings and relationships, and to implementing and enforcing effective systems and controls to ensure modern slavery is not taking place anywhere in our own business or in any of our supply chains.
Rivus endeavours to ensure that there is no modern slavery or human trafficking in our supply chains or in any part of our business. Our workplace policies and procedures demonstrate our commitment to acting ethically and with integrity in all our business relationships and to implementing and enforcing effective systems and controls to ensure slavery and human trafficking is not taking place anywhere in our supply chains.
Our values are underpinned by a set of corporate policies supporting our commitment to high ethical standards and doing business with integrity, including this Modern Slavery & Human Trafficking statement reinforcing our commitment to ensuring there are no instances of forced labour, slavery or human trafficking in our business or supply chain and helping our people to identify these practices.
Our People
The majority of our team are UK-based managerial or office-based employees, garage/workshop/mobile technicians and associated roles.
In order to manage and minimise the risk of human slavery or forced labour situations occuring in our direct workforce, we implement the following actions:
All new employees are carefully vetted including where appropriate DBS checks and right to work checks. All of our employees are paid at least the National Living Wage and are paid through the company’s payroll systems via bank transfers.
Our People strategy assists to ensure that we treat all colleagues with respect and in a professional and compliant way. This strategy includes our EPIC values (Excellence, Professionalism, Innovative, Collaborative) and is underpinned by the Rivus Behavioural Framework; our Diversity and Inclusion Policy; and Employee Wellbeing programmes and support.
Our Whistleblowing Policy encourages all our workers, employees, customers, and other business partners to report any concerns related to the direct activities, or the supply chains of, our organisation. This includes any circumstances that may give rise to an enhanced risk of slavery or human trafficking. Our whistleblowing procedure is designed to make it easy for workers to make disclosures, without fear of retaliation.
Procurement and Supply Chains
Our tier 1 suppliers are predominantly UK based and fall into the following main areas of supply:
- IT equipment and services;
- Garage & Workshop supplies – including vehicle parts & consumables, garage consumables, workwear, H&S equipment and so on;
- Third-party garage & repair services;
- Breakdown recovery services;
- Office equipment & consumables;
- Vehicle providers / manufacturers / rental services;
- Financial services providers;
- Utilities;
- Cleaning services (vehicle and building);
- Recruitment services and temporary staff;
- Professional services (e.g. legal, accountancy, insurance brokers and other professional advisers)
- Employee benefits providers.
We are committed to ensuring that our suppliers adhere to the highest standards of ethics. Suppliers are required to demonstrate that they provide appropriate safe working conditions; treat workers with dignity and respect; and act ethically and within the law in their use of labour. Serious violations of our supplier code will lead to the termination of the business relationship.
We have begun the implementation of a new comprehensive e-Sourcing contract and supplier management suite into the business. This helps facilitate early management intervention of our supply base by asking suppliers to complete pre-qualification registration. Supplier onboarding automation takes suppliers through a due diligence process, that’s based on our business critical questions to identify any risks in the supply chain. This includes risks associated with Modern Slavery and Human Trafficking.
Planned developments
We will continue our roll-out and implementation of the new e-Sourcing contract and supplier management suite into the business, and use this as a key driver to improve and monitor risk and compliance. This will be aligned with applicable reviews of our standard contractual terms that require our suppliers to commit to contributing to the prevention of modern slavery and human trafficking.
We plan to update our internal training and awareness materials in order to improve the knowledge and awareness of our staff to recognise warning signs of Modern Slavery and how to report any suspicions not only within our organisation but also in their dealings with any external party in our supply chain.
This statement is made pursuant to section 54(1) of the Modern Slavery Act 2015 and constitutes our slavery and human trafficking statement for the financial year ending 31st December 2022. The statement was signed by Victoria Knight – Chief Executive Officer on 17th June 2023