Taxi Driver Online

Scottish Borders council will be meeting shortly to discus whether to increase the operators and drivers licence fees, no one has been notified, and they have just recently licenced 14 more saloons as taxis, that makes at my last count 87 with rank room for 18, it is getting beyond a joke here.
I hope Jd can try to do something to help
The fee's at the moment stand at £162 per year for an operator and £69 per year for a driver, so if you need an operators licence you also need a drivers badge on top so that's £231 per year for nothing, we have asked in the past if they will include the drivers badge along with the operators licence at no extra cost, as they get exactly the same details on the forms they supply and it only costs 50p to make one up.
We have also asked them to make the drivers badge run for 3 years, and they did not have a clue how to implement this. perhaps JD could enlighten them (Please) we have also asked for a breakdown of the licence fee's but nothing is forthcoming

The three year badge thing is quite simple, instead of issuing one a year, they issue one every three. i.e. next time you re-license they CRB everyone, and then they need not re-license or re-CRB for the next three years.

As for the increase in fees, I'm assuming the act says that any increase must be advertised, as happens down here. If they must advertise and didn't then they are acting outside the law.

If they have advertised then appeal/object against it, and ask for the justifications for the increase.

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IDFIMH

There is a full council meeting today to decide how much more they want to skin us for, I await with bated breath,.
They need to address the fact that there is now over 80 taxis and nowhere for them to rank up, and get the shambles of the taxi rank sorted, we have asked time and time again to make it compulsory for anyone who wants a cab to take the first one one the rank, as we are all the same price ffs, but all we get is its the punters prerogative, and its a faking nightmare over the weekend when the clubs come out, someone will be knocked down soon and then the driver could be attacked

Can't see what the problem is with implementing three year licences - we have a choice in Fife of one year or three years, and the three year plate saves around £100.

Some LAs have an option, while others only allow three year licences AFAIK.

Show them the page on this site that has all the Scottish fees on them - it can be found via the site's home page.