Wigan hosts to fight Punch beerflow bid

A licensee has slammed Punch over its insistence on beerflow monitors being installed at his pub. Terry Hurley claims lessees are being reduced to the status of "battery hens" due to the company's bullying approach.

Hurley, of the Beech Tree at Beech Hill near Wigan, said a letter "out of the blue", giving him seven days' notice that Brulines engineers would be installing cellar beerflow monitors, was typical of Punch's dictatorial attitude.

He said other Punch lessees in the area, a number of whom still have old Greenalls agreements, have vowed to fight the company's plans.

"This is another example of [Punch's] dictatorial attitude," said Hurley. "Beerflows are being forced on us without any proper negotiation. It was only after the letters arrived that we got any sort of dialogue out of Punch.

"The business relationship manager told us, in typical confrontational style, that we could not do anything about it."

He added: "The staff here are all family and I do not need a machine to tell me what beers are going well and what time of day certain brands sell best."

Punch said that BRMs had discussed the issue with the Wigan licensees and it was confident the agreements allowed the equipment to be installed.

It insisted that the systems give both it and the lessee vital business data and is not solely to detect buying out of tie.