Why Us ?

First and foremost - Because we are legal! Furthermore we are a local, reliable, well established French registered company with offices in the French Alps in the heart of the area we service operating French registered vehicles driven by English and French speaking drivers employed under a French contract fully declared and paying taxes in France.

Why not others? First and foremost - Because they are not all legal! Copied below is an extract from an article in the French newspaper Le Dauphine reporting on a court case in which an illegal competitor was convicted but somehow continues to take bookings via their web site(s). Meanwhile dozens of VTC (private hire) operators from all over Europe and other areas of France, many of whom are not authorised to operate in this area, are slowly but surely being clamped down on by the local authorities but in the meantime these operators are putting the livelihoods of local, legal operators at risk.

We would be grateful if would take this into consideration when deciding who to trust your money with.

Thank you for your consideration.

The Mountain Express Team.

Extract from article in Le Dauphine translated by google for your convenience (we do not therefore accept any responsibility or liability for any inaccuracies). For information a VTC is a private hire (transfer) operator;-

The case of VTCs from the East before the Court of Appeal

Sentenced in Albertville, the leaders of the organization pleaded their acquittal before the appeal court.

Their company offered transport between the region's airports and the ski resorts of the Alps at more than competitive rates... Geneva - Courchevel, for example, at the time of the events, at 220 euros compared to 410 euros by taxi. Vehicles rented in Poland, very flexible drivers recruited in the Baltic countries, an Alps2alps booking site domiciled in London, payments transiting through Central Europe through a nebula of companies made this system very lucrative…

After road checks in 2020, pointing out irregularities on vehicles, a long investigation was carried out by the gendarmerie, the labor inspectorate, Urssaf, the tax services on the satellite companies of a holding company, Amitour, employing between 50 and 60 drivers in Savoie and Haute-Savoie for several dozen trips per day. It resulted in the arrest on March 8, 2022, then the referral to the correctional court, in Albertville, of four key figures of this organization, for “concealed work in an organized gang” and “money laundering in an organized gang”. This was the largest and seventh case of Latvian VTCs handled in Tarentaise.

The investigation services had concluded that the employment of drivers was in breach of French law. Detectable, in particular, according to them, by the lack of correspondence between the number of drivers who had been the subject of a prior declaration upon hiring and that appearing in the nominative social declaration, a monthly personnel register. The evaded social contributions were estimated at 202,809 euros over the three-month period retained by Urrsaf.

Guilt contested by the main protagonists: On September 9, 2022, the court found guilty and sentenced the main investor of the company Amber Transfer SAS, a Latvian businessman domiciled in Switzerland, head of the reservation website, Raitis Bullits, to 36 months in prison, 16 of which were firm, and a fine of 200,000 euros, the "appointed manager", Aliaksandr Novik, to 24 months in prison, 9 of which were firm under electronic tag and a fine of 100,000 euros, the "supervisor" to 12 months in prison suspended and a fine of 10,000 euros, the company Amber Transfer SAS, liquidated in 2023, to a fine of 200,000 euros and acquitted the man responsible for the daily monitoring of the drivers.