Taxi Driver Online

Dear Sir/Madam



I hope you all had a good break during summer term. A new term is almost upon us!



The Compliance Team have taken on two extra members of staff, and with restrictions easing, WE will be conducting more spot checks.

These will be at both Special Education Needs (SEN) and Mainstream (MS) sites on Contract and are conducted with the support of the DVSA and Local Licensing Authorities.



In a five-week period we had 28 compliance issues and these are the main 4 areas we are seeing when we are conducting a spot checks.





1 Not doing or being able to evidence a Daily Walk around Check has been done – 5 Points

2 Failure of a Driver or PA to wear their County Blue ID Badge – 5 points

3 Failure to Display Livery of the Company awarded the contract – 5 Points

4 Failure to display or know the Route Number of the contract – 3 Points



Each contract awarded through the DPS starts with zero points. Points are awarded depending on the area of noncompliance and are awarded on a rolling programme of 18 months. If any contract reaches 25 points the contract can be Terminated and we can look at suspending or removing your company from the DPS. Clearly this is not something we want to do, so we thought it would be useful to highlight to you the main areas where points are awarded to prevent any compliance action.



I have attached a copy of the DPS Terms and Conditions for you to read and refresh. I would recommend that you as a minimum you read Pages 65 to 77 which details all areas of non-compliance and Pages 78-84 which includes a Table of the points awarded to each area.



You will be contacted in the near future by one of the Compliance Officers, to carry out a Systems check. It is a condition of the contract that you attend a Systems check either virtually or in person. This is for your benefit to ensure compliance is being upheld with the County Councils terms and conditions.



Can you please ensure all of the Drivers and Passenger Assistants have had a copy of the Drivers Handbook and Passenger Assistants Handbook, read and understand their role whilst working on a Staffordshire Contract.



We would like to thank all your Drivers and Passenger Assistants for all of their hard work whilst working on School contracts. Its important to note that the vast majority of our School contracts operate to a very high standard and your staff have an excellent working relationship with the passengers. I hope that this email advising of an increase in future spot checks will ensure that the high standards are met by everyone to ensure a level playing field.

I would like to thank all of your staff in advance for the cooperation they show us, the DVSA and Local Licensing Authorities during our checks.





Yours faifully.

_________________
Of all the things ive lost, i miss my mind the most

two badges?

From 4 April 2022 you have responsibility to provide a HMRC tax check code in certain circumstances e.g. you have held a licence with another Licence Authority or have held the same type of licence that ceased to be valid less than a year ago. Please refer to GOV.UK website addresses to view the HMRC guidance about tax registration obligations and clarify your position:

_________________
Of all the things ive lost, i miss my mind the most

So a sheet of paper with a few ticks on will no doubt suffice.

_________________
IDFIMH

We used to have sheets for the drivers but they just ticked the boxes at the end of the week, however it did mean that if a car had a dodgy tyre we could have words with the driver who had just ticked the box without checking.

_________________
Grandad,

they swooped 2 years ago, told us to keep a record, never been asked again

_________________
Of all the things ive lost, i miss my mind the most

Expect more of this type of stuff.

Once regulation starts as it did quite a while ago now when requiring licenses to work it only progressively gets worse. Have you noticed it never gets easier or more convenient year after year as a licensed driver?

The over regulation will continue until more and more people get fed up with the bureaucracy and extra costs needlessly imposed and leave the industry.

When there is a severe shortage of drivers or the Private Hire industry raise their costs significantly both as a consequence of less drivers/competition and also due to councils extra costs of doing business then they might make some much needed changes.

Until that happens expect more interference on what type of vehicle you can use, what you need to do to the vehicle before it's "fit for purpose", on what information they require before licensing you, the costs of getting your license and expect long waiting times to receive your licence especially if you are a new applicant.

The council licensing departments will get bigger and bigger and therefore their costs will increase which in turn will require higher fees from the industry to fund their salaries and pensions.

The "rules" will get more silly on what they deem "fit and proper" as you have probably seen with the recent points on the licence restrictions etc.

Eventually, they will hit a wall where there are not enough drivers to get sufficient revenue from to cover their costs (many councils don't even cover their costs today) and they will be unable to raise their costs any higher to the industry without losing the majority of what will be left of the industry at that point in time.

By then the public will probably have adapted to the less than adequate service such as long waiting times and changed their habits as a consequence.

Seems as though much of what I have just said is occurring in Sandwell:

https://content.yudu.com/web/43sy4/0A43 ... gin=reader

_________________
Of all the things ive lost, i miss my mind the most

Most there are Wolvo plated

_________________
Of all the things ive lost, i miss my mind the most