McGill’s of Inverclyde has reported a rise in turnover from £35.3m to £38.3m in 2015, with pre-tax profits also increasing to £3.6m from £3.2m the previous year, the BBC reported.
The firm said that cheaper petrol and diesel costs were encouraging more drivers to use car, which was slowing journey times and forcing the company to put on more buses. This had offset the advantage it might have had from cheaper fuel.
The cost to the business of disruptive weather was also highlighted in its accounts.
The McGill’s workforce increased between 2014 and 2015 from an average of 681 to 787.
The company’s accounts stated: “Record low fuel prices at the forecourts saw an increase in car usage and congestion which, allied to the need to increase the number of vehicles to maintain timetables in congested towns, the lower fuel price benefit to the business was not realised.
“The new Queen Elizabeth University Hospital was opened in May 2015. This caused a significant increase in the cost of operations, to divert the many routes that previously by-passed the old hospital, into the new hospital. These factors combined to cause an underlying drag on performance.”
