A patient transport firm serving two major teaching hospital groups gave its customers just six hours’ notice it was stopping services, the trusts said.
SVL Healthcare Ventures emailed Guy’s and St Thomas’ and King’s College Hospital Foundation Trusts at midnight on 27 August, saying it was discontinuing services, reports HSJ.
Kroll Advisory were appointed a week later as administrators to the business, whose accounts are overdue.
Information at Companies House published last April and covering the year to April 2022 showed a turnover of £10.5m.
The two trusts serve a south east London population of 2 million, as well as specialist service patients from across the UK.
As recently as August, the company won a contract with the Bristol, North Somerset and South Gloucestershire system, which has also had to source other providers.
SVL said in the summer it carried out 500,000 non-emergency patient journeys a year across the UK.
In a report to the trust’s board on Thursday, KCH chief executive Clive Kay said: “An interim solution is in place that has allowed some continuation of service. Capacity, however, is limited and is more expensive than previously, so provision is only available to patients for whom there is no other alternative in with national guidance on transport eligibility.”
In a joint statement, the trusts said services were now being provided by companies HATS, BEARS, On Cue and Essentia in the interim.
A spokesperson said: “Our staff worked tirelessly to ensure continuity of service for the vast majority of patients, and we are both working at pace to finalise a long-term alternative provider of these services.
“Colleagues at King’s Facilities Management [a subsidiary of King’s College Hospital FT] are working with Guy’s and St Thomas’ (who were also part of the contractual arrangement with SVL Healthcare) to secure a longer-term solution.”
SVL Healthcare Limited’s managing director, Benjamin Wren, was paid £386,000 in 2022, the most recent annual accounts said.
The company and its administrators have been approached for comment.
Annual accounts data for 2022–23 showed NHS trusts and foundation trusts spent £706m on patient transport.
Date: 7 October