Taxi Driver Online

A number of councils are switching from quantity to quality restrictions.

Can anyone tell us how they go about this?

The big fear in the trade generally is that binning quantity restrictions will lead to a Dublin situation, chaos.

But, surely it doesn't have to be like this?

Edinburgh already has a measure of quality control in the topo test. There are also training modules which are poor, but could be developed to enhance quality. But we wouldn't have to wait for their improvement before de-restricting, the topo test would serve the purpose of maintaining control.

De-restriction needn't therefore lead to the trade being flooded with taxis. All that would happen is for existing drivers to operate their own taxis, at times they would have worked normally anyway. And, given any increased financial burden, would work the peak periods giving customers an even better service. Both would be winners.

However, aren't owners the only chocolate in the forest. They're gonna be pretty hacked off. I can visualise the steam emanating from their ears, and the high volume expletives as they have to kick off their slippers on a cold winter's saturday night, leave the warm fire and sit in the saddle like the rest of us mere mortals. Heart bleeds or something comes to mind?

Anyway, can we provide the info to prove to the trade where chnage has still to happen that, non-working owners apart, the trade wouldn't descend into farce when change arrives? Income levels won't drop through the floor under a sea of competition.

I think many councils are doing it as a sort of half way measure, to help placate the existing trade.

If new entrants have to buy new, or nearly new, WAVs, whereas the existing trade can carry on with their Skodas, then that will/should keep down the number of new entrants.

Not a massive fan myself, and would much rather all drivers were treated the same, but at least with a qualitative restriction everyone can meet it.

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IDFIMH

I think as Dusty says in M&R, cabs don't drive themselves, so the restriction on numbers is only good for owners not drivers.

100 cabs being driven by 200 drivers will pick up the same amount of work that 200 cabs being driven by 200 drivers does.

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IDFIMH

But does it lead to a drop in Vehicle standards, our fleet is on average 4 years old, according to the Jacobs report, is there any evidence from areas such as Sheffield or Birmingham that Vehicle quality improves or even stays the same, I am sure I have read articles stating that this is not always the case ( over to you Fairway, you have a finger on the pulse of the nations taxi fleet )


If it does not lead to chaos why are so many areas, such as Sheffield now complaining about it, I have already ascertained that it does not seem to affect fare levels.

So how can you say that the trade would not descend into a farce, what evidence is there of this?

Is there not evidence to the contrary of that stance.

But surely vehicle age/standards is down to the council. If they allow sheds than that's evidence of poor enforcement.

There are a number of councils that insist on new vehicles for all new vehicle licenses, and all replacements. The problem arises when those councils allow drivers to keep those vehicles for up to 15 years. Birmingham being a prime example.

Surely it would be better if vehicles were licensed new if they were under 3 years old, and could be re-licensed up to 7 years old.

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IDFIMH

Those that are complaining, I suspect, are the ones that got their plates for nothing.

Perhaps some of the union leaders are nearing retirement, and want a nice lump sum from some poor sod.

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IDFIMH

I don't have any concerns for vehicle standards.

Here in Edinburgh our caring council forced owners of Fairways to ditch their perfectly good vehicles, used without problems since Noah was a lad, and buy into the TX range (Metrocab going through the pangs of insolvency at the time).

Now, while this may have been good news for the local LTI dealer, it cost Fairway owners a packet, particularly as council intervention had ensured that trade-in values for what were now unacceptable vehicles, went through the floor.

Interesting that the council told us that they had no choice, it was all the fault of some European legislation which forced them to do it.

So, how come Fairways can still be used everywhere in the country, apart from Edinburgh?

The taxi trade in auld reekie was shafted. If anyone can prove that it was because our council received a backhander let us know?

Continuing the aspertions, isn't it also interesting that the vehicle proposed for taxi use by a competitor to the LTI product has also been rejected by the council? I'm thinking vested interest again?

At the end of the day, crap like this is certain. Why is the taxi trade the only one which is not allowed to decide how it delivers the service to its customers? Why does it accept dominance from councils who don't invest in the taxi trade, yet control it? Why shouldn't only those who invest their capital and labour in the trade, decide how it is delivered? Seems so logical to me.

Anyway, when were councils good at running anything?

Exactly the point I was raising, you say 7 years old Jasbar says he has no concerns for vehicle standards

But what interests me is what happens after an area is de-limited, do people ( the ones who are already vehicle owners) purchase a new vehicle
or do they keep their fairways etc cause the "trades knackered".

Does it really matter, within reasonable constraints, whether new vehicles are bought every year or two? All this does is fuel the profits of the vehicle suppliers who maintain disproportionately high vehicle costs.

For example, compare the quality of a £30K+ TX and a comparably priced merc, or lower priced people carrier Of course, there are considerable production economies of scale with the merc, but most of the TX's components are bought off the shelf. Curious though isn't it that, if you know where to buy them, you can buy these parts from other production vehicles much cheaper than an LTI dealer will sell them to us. We're being brutally ripped off, the quality of vehicle and service we're getting is poor. (But, high vehicle costs do help to justify high taxi rentals.)

Consider the suspension system which dates back to the 1940's. It's not designed for modern day driving, certainly not the speed humps and poorly maintained roads we have to drive on.

Back to the point, here in Edinburgh vehicles are subjected to the most rigorous test. In effect the taxi coming out of the Taxi Examination Centre is minted, mechanically almost as sound and certainly as safe as the day it was bought. Even the interior and body work are subjected to high standards. This would not change with de-restriction. Nor would we wish it to.

However, I'm concerned with the shape of the trade after de-restriction.

The licensed taxi trade is under assault from private hire, taxibuses, urban buses etc, all of which seem to enjoy much more relaxed regulation than we do. This gives them a clear competitive edge as evidenced by our shrinking market and their rapid expansion - private hire in Edinburgh has doubled over four years from 300 to over 700, with a hackney fleet of 1260 taxis. Projected over the next four years, given Edinburgh trying to restrict our numbers, the private hire fleet will dwarf us.

If we are to readily compete, we need to relax the vehicle types permitted to operate as licensed taxis. While this would not be mandatory, it would allow taxi operators to exercise choice in the vehicles they use and the service they deliver to customers.

It would also serve to bring lower costs to those operating their taxis singly. It would reintroduce real competition into the taxi vehicle supply market as current suppliers would have to reassess their charges for vehicles, , repairs, servicing etc. Owner/drivers would benefit, as would customers with controlled fares.

It is this levelling of the playing which I would like to see in place before we move from quantity to quality restrictions.

How much do the Mercs cost?

27-28k for a Merc, 33k for an Icon.

Doesn't that mean we could all be driving icons?

A Skoda may be many things, an Icon it is not.

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IDFIMH

Some in England that are derestricting are certainly introducing an element of quality control at the vehicle level, but I haven't heard of anything systematic at the driver level, which is a shame. Also, it's usually a case of WAVs for new plates and the same old saloons for the existing plates (the vast majority of recent derestrictions were mostly saloon previously, I think). To me it just seems like taking the easy way out, because it takes the WAV pressure off and lessens the flak from the existing saloon plates, because there are less new taxis than there would be if a truly level playing field had been introduced.





I think the Dublin situation was overdone, but that's hardly surprising.




The problem with a lot of these taxi courses that are floating around is that they are of the 'turn up and you'll pass' variety, thus they hardly stem numbers. Of course, whether numbers are restricted or not, there's always pressure from owners to make it easy for new drivers to enter the trade, and only where vehicles are mostly single driver is their a greater impetus to stem the flow of drivers, London being the classic example.

In others, paradoxically after derestricting there's often pressure to make it easier to get a drivers badge, since owners suddenly can't get drivers and that applies to the new plate holders as well as the old. I think one of the Dundee drivers mentioned a trend of that type in Dundee recently - clearly, in terms of overall numbers of cars on the ranks, increasing the number of drivers would just exacerbate any increased numbers cause by derestriction.

Looking at the high driver/cab ratio in Edinburgh there would probably be pressure of this type, since obviously the vast majority of owners are used to having cars double or triple shifted.

I was interested in the reports in the Edinburgh press a few years ago about dumbing down the topo test and then there was the introduction of the new modules etc.

What I couldn't quite understand was that one the one hand it some were pressing for it to be easier to get a badge, whereas others were claiming that the new modules would have the opposite effect - but I also think I read that the modules were in fact intended to make it easier, possibly because a watered down topo test was part of the new regime?

Thus, do the posters from the Edinburgh trade think it's easier or more difficult to get a badge these days as compared to before the new regime was introduced?

I think I read in a recent post that one driver thougth that there were a lot more drivers in the trade, and this could help explain the apparent downturn in work for the blacks, and this he put down to the college course?




While taxi vehicle numbers can clearly increase considerably, the less often mentioned number of drivers often changes by a considerably smaller number.

For example, I think there were 6 drivers per car in Dublin, so clearly taxi numbers could have increased substantially without increasing actual supply.

By the same token, since there are around 3,500 taxis in Edinburgh, if each driver chose to run his own vehicle then there could be almost three times as many vehicle but no difference in the numbers on the streets at any point in time.

The big unknown is the shift from PH. In Brighton, for example, the two sides pass the same topo and driving tests, so there's every reason to suggest that most PH would shift to taxis if given the chance (except to the extent that new taxi plates are likely to be WAV, unlike the current fleet, which is mostly saloon). Of course, in Edinburgh, because you are all PB WAVs then the vehicle shift from PH to taxi would be less marked, and obviously there's also a difference in the criteria for PH and taxi badges.

Thus it's impossible to quantify how big the shift from PH to taxi would be - it depends on the local licensing regime.

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Taxi Driver Online
www.taxi-driver.co.uk

There may be some connection between restrictions and vehicle quality, but it's tenuous at best, and if there is a problem with quality then that's just down to lax regulation.

On the other hand, there's plenty of evidence that restrictions do not lead to quality, such as Blackpool, which has historically had higher plate values than Edinburgh, but the worst of the Edinburgh fleet represents the norm in Blackpool, at least in terms of vehicle age.




Of course they'll complain, even if the premiums have gone they'll still hope to get them back again. The truth is often less dramatic than what we're led to believe.



Most areas of the country aren't restricted, and they are hardly a farce, although I'm sure there's room for improvement.

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Taxi Driver Online
www.taxi-driver.co.uk