Taxi Driver Online

Taxi drivers in Brighton may have to accept cashless payments



TAXI drivers will be required to accept cashless payments from passengers if councillors vote through a rule change this week.

The proposed new rule would reflect the increasing use of card readers by cabbies and would come into force on Sunday 1 May.

It is not the first time that Brighton and Hove City Council has considered forcing cabbies to accept card payments as a condition of their licence.

But as more people use cards or phones to pay for goods and services, some in the taxi trade have spoken out about passengers being turned away because they didn’t have cash.

The Brighton and Hove Cab Trade Association asked the council to consult the trade again about the rules governing payments.

And the results reflected the association’s own poll of members, with the majority backing the change, according to a report to the council’s licensing committee.

The report said: “It has been reported to officers that it is common for passengers to be turned away from ranks for wishing to pay by card and having to try several vehicles before being able to find a driver willing to take a card payment.

“This could be seen as a public safety issue especially for vulnerable passengers unable to obtain a taxi ride home and putting them at risk especially at night.

“It is also alleged that refusing a payment card is a way to ‘cherry pick’ by refusing short journeys.

“Covid-19 has accelerated the use of card payments during the pandemic as a protection measure against the disease and even fever passengers now carry cash since this matter was last considered by members.

“This does not appear to be an issue with private hire (pre-booked drivers) who use payment apps or are linked to operators that can take card payments.”

Some cabbies objected to being forced to take payments by card or phone, especially because some parts of the area have poor or non-existent phone and wifi coverage.

Some said that the proposed change would mean that the taxi trade was being treated differently to other businesses that accept only cash – and that they should all be free to choose.

Other objections included the cost of the transactions, with drivers worried about having to pay hundreds of pounds a year in charges.

Another driver said that card payments could take three days to reach their bank account while costs such as fuel – like cash – were immediate.

Andrew Peters, from the Brighton and Hove Cab Trade Association, said: “It is very unfortunate that we still have an issue within (the) trade on the ranks where it is more often than not that drivers who use certain popular ranks are turning people away when potential customers are seeking to pay by card.

“It is a common occurrence which not only annoys potential customers at the ranks but also fellow cab drivers who provide a card payment facility who may be further back in the queue.

“A potential customer may try the first couple of taxis on the rank seeking to pay by card and then just give up and walk away.”

The association conducted an online poll of drivers and said: “Of the 70 drivers who took part, 53 voted in support of compulsory card payments being a condition of licensing and 12 voted against this.”

The council’s consultation with the trade received 23 responses in favour of the change and nine against.

A decision is expected at the Licensing Committee meeting which is due to take place at Hove Town Hall at 3pm tomorrow. The meeting is scheduled to be webcast on the council’s website.

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IDFIMH

The committee papers for the cashless payments item and others can be found here. https://present.brighton-hove.gov.uk/ie ... 0434&Ver=4

The proposed fare review is also on the agenda. The trade has proposed 3.5%, which was first proposed when inflation was just under 3.5%.

However I have a suspicion the council will reject the trade's 3.5% proposal.

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IDFIMH

Sorry, but realistically you'd have to be relying on foodbanks or worse for that to be a huge issue. I'm hardly awash with cash, but a couple of days delay until the cash clears is nothing, and it at least saves me the trip to the bank, so to a degree it actually helps things along.

That said, I do prefer cash, and agree with all that the drivers are saying with regard to charges and clunky technology etc. (Not to mention the tips thing )

But the clock isn't going to be turned back, readers and charges are relatively cheap now, and making them compulsory will get rid of many of the current problems with cherry-picking and lost customers etc.

And it will probably get to the stage when, like here, drivers will simply be losing so many jobs they'll have to get them anyway, and making them compulsory in the formal sense will stop the cherry picking even when all drivers have them, but they only 'have' them when it suits


And the driver may well have a card reader anyway, but when it's a half mile job they don't have one, but if it's a 10 mile job the reader miraculously appears

Or if they're at the back of the rank they'll happily accept a short run they'd refuse if in pole

Read the article this afternoon on the Argus website, and the first poster was a member of the public who thought it all meant that the trade would only be accepting card payments in future, and no cash allowed

the problem with card payments is that the customers often have no other means to pay if the card is declined

I estimate that I lose 100 to 200 pounds a year through this because they know if they've offered to pay and their card is declined there's nothing much you can do

the card companies can charge back to you if you accept a stolen or fraudulently used card even though you probably have no way of knowing but won't do anything if a payment is declined you lose both ways that's why many drivers prefer cash

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Taxis Are Public Transport too

Join the campaign to get April fools jokes banned for 364 days a year !

That's going to happen whether readers are mandatory or not.

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IDFIMH

I've vowed to never follow committee meetings live as some ill-informed councillors drive me f***ing mad, and the outcome is generally what everyone expects anyway.

But I had a long job at the time and the punter was interested too so we both listened, and shock horror some ill-informed councillors drove me f***ing mad.

They passed the card readers unanimously, but a couple were concerned that the policy also included a cash ban.

Yeah right the trade is chock a block full of drivers that hate cash.

As for the fare rise, my suspicion was sort of correct, they passed the 3.5% unanimously, but also passed a 5% rise that was proposed by the Reds and the Blues, but only just.

The Greens voted against it, except the Green Chair who abstained.

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IDFIMH

Taxi fares look set to rise in Brighton and Hove

https://www.brightonandhovenews.org/202 ... -and-hove/

Taxi fares look likely to rise by 20p a mile – or about 5 per cent – after councillors voted for an increase in line with inflation.

Brighton and Hove Cab Trade Association requested the rise because the price of petrol had gone up 18 per cent since the last fare review in August 2019 and diesel had gone up 9 per cent.

A 14-day public consultation is required by law before the proposed fare rise can take effect, with no date yet set for the higher fares to come in.

A report to members of Brighton and Hove City Council said that previous increases used a formula based on fuel prices, other vehicle running costs and regional pay rates.

The formula did not take into account the growing number of electric and hybrid vehicles which cost more to buy but had lower running costs.

Trade representative Andrew Peters wrote to the council’s Licensing Committee on behalf of the Brighton and Hove Taxi Trade Forum.

Mr Peters said: “Licence fees are set (to rise) at 2 per cent per year and the council has implemented a 4.99 per cent in local council tax for 2021.

“Additionally, having come out of the period of the pandemic, there is now a great shortage of drivers where either drivers have retired or they have decided not to return to driving a cab although may still remain licensed.

“It should also be noted that the council’s set tariff of fares do not allow for what is known as ‘surge pricing’ which can double and even quadruple fares at ad-hoc times using a well-known national app.”

The reference to Uber reflected the fact that council has no power to set fares for private hire vehicles which have to be pre-booked and which cannot use ranks or be hailed.

Independent councillor Kate Knight said that she was concerned about the effect on people on the lowest incomes who needed a taxi to get to hospital or the doctor.

She said: “I represent Moulsecoomb where there is one of the lowest percentages of residents owning a car anywhere in the country, let alone in the city.

“It’s also an outlying district, so it’s difficult to get into town. The bus service is not particularly reliable once you move away from the city centre.”

Councillor Knight said that the burden would fall on those who could least afford the increases.

Green councillor Marianna Ebel said that only London or areas with airports had higher fares. She said: “The cost of living here is incredibly high already – and we don’t have the London salaries.

“People sometimes rely on taxis, not just for convenience. People with disabilities rely on taxis and are often on low incomes.”

Labour councillor Jackie O’Quinn said that the trade had originally sought a lower rise but inflation was expected to reach 7 per cent this spring.

She said: “We’ve all seen how prices have gone up at the pumps. This makes a great difference.

“For the taxi trade, that impact is huge. The inflation for them is much higher than general inflation would be because the price of oil has gone up so much.

“It’s always been a process of catch up. It is always a bit behind on these things because it takes a long time to go through the process (of putting up fares).”

Conservative councillor Dee Simson said: “In the past, I’ve made noises about how high we were in terms of taxi costs.

“We are and always have been supportive of our taxi trade in the city. We’re very proud of it and we need to maintain it.

“We’ve had issues over the years with other operators coming in, app-based operators who have affected our local tax trade. We don’t want to see the demise of that.”

Labour and Conservative councillors amended the proposed rise at the Licensing Committee at Hove Town Hall to reflect the higher inflation forecast.

The committee voted six to five in favour of consulting the public about the revised proposal, with Green councillor Lizzie Deane, who chairs the committee, abstaining.

If the higher fares are approved, Brighton and Hove will have the eighth-highest fares out of 325 councils. They are currently the 12th highest.

Good job someone in Brighton is highlighting the driver shortage there

I think if you are an operator, or a hackney owner looking for journeymen, then there is a shortage.

If however, you are an owner that is the only person who drives his car, or a journeyman, then there are more than enough drivers in the trade.

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IDFIMH