Taxi Driver Online

Well that was a quick enough u-turn. But it remains to be seen whether drivers will be any better off, or if the £1,500 will just be deducted from any benefits they're claiming.


Update to taxi grant criteria

Published: 19 Jan 2021 13:02

More drivers to receive fixed costs grant.

Taxi and private hire drivers who have received state benefits at any time since March last year will now be eligible for a £1,500 business support grant as long as they meet the remaining criteria.

Business Minister Jamie Hepburn confirmed that the change would come into effect immediately to ensure that drivers on the lowest incomes can access support.

Mr Hepburn warned that UK Government Universal Credit rules mean that drivers could lose out overall if the grant is considered to be income by DWP. However, the change will allow people to make a decision based on their individual circumstances.

The Minister has written to the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions requesting a guarantee that taxi drivers in receipt of state benefits would not be penalised for receiving the grant, which is intended to cover fixed business costs.

Councils will start contacting eligible drivers this week to brief them on their potential entitlement and ask them to provide supporting information and bank account details. They do not need to apply, or contact the local authority.

Mr Hepburn said:

“This week local authorities will directly approach an estimated 38,000 private hire and taxi drivers inviting them to claim this grant, which is intended to assist with fixed costs and expenses.

“We have responded to the concerns of drivers and we have removed grant conditions relating to state benefits. However, we remain justifiably concerned that any payment would simply be deducted from an applicant’s benefits. That is why I am urging the Secretary of State to do the right thing by drivers on the lowest incomes.

“Without a change by the UK Government, making these payments would benefit the Department for Work and Pensions budget, not the drivers, and risk using Scottish Government resources in a way that fails to provide additional support to many taxi drivers struggling to deal with the impacts of the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic.

“We will keep drivers updated on the outcome of our engagement with the DWP."

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Full Letter to Thérèse Coffey, Secretary of State for Work and Pensions

18 January 2020

Dear Thérèse,

I write to seek your assistance in supporting licensed taxi and private hire drivers in Scotland.

Today the Scottish Government announced plans to triple previously announced funding from £19 million to £57 million, to provide a one off-grant of £1,500 per driver affected by the pandemic.

This week local authorities will directly approach an estimated 38,000 private hire and taxi drivers inviting them to claim the grant, which is intended to assist with fixed costs and expenses, including licence plate fees, rental fees and insurance payments for taxis not on the road.

In doing so we are seeking to supplement the support from other funding for loss of income available through the Scottish and UK Governments.

The core condition of eligibility for this financial assistance is that taxi or private hire drivers must be licensed for the period 9 October 2020 to at least 31 January 2021.

In addition we have asked local authorities to confirm that up to 31 December 2020 drivers:

• have experienced loss of income (50% of turnover, compared with 2019) and incurred overhead costs and expenses;
• are or have been working or available for work as a taxi or private hire driver; and
• are not in receipt of state benefits payments (Universal Credit, Statutory Sick Pay, Employment and Support Allowance, Job Seekers’ Allowance, Income Support) or have applied for but not yet started receiving Universal Credit at the time of applying.

I am eager to remove that final condition, but only if that benefits the drivers and not the DWP.

As you know, Universal Credit payments reduce as a person’s income increases so we are justifiably concerned that any payment would simply be deducted from an applicant’s benefits.

Without a change, making these payments would benefit the DWP budget, not the drivers, and risk using Scottish Government resources in a way that fails to provide additional support to many taxi drivers struggling to deal with the impacts of the pandemic.

As mentioned above this scheme is designed to help with fixed costs and is not intended to replace lost income, so I believe that it could be argued that it is inappropriate for this to be considered as income for the basis of calculating Universal Credit.

However, I would appreciate your confirmation of that point. I would ask you therefore to amend the criteria to ensure that drivers on Universal Credit can benefit from the full £1500 payment without it reducing their overall income.

As mentioned local authorities are in the process of making contact with taxi drivers about this support this week so clarity on the DWP position is required urgently.

JAMIE HEPBURN
MINISTER FOR BUSINESS, FAIR WORK AND SKILLS

Which is the basic problem at the heart of it all.

Anyway, apart from removing the benefits disqualifaction, can't see any change to the other details and eligibility criteria.

However, they seem to have added this, which of course is getting at how one source of cash could just be at the expense of another source of cash, and how complex and messy it's all getting

Interesting that they've changed this quickly enough, though, but have ignored the pleas from the fleet owners to include plateholders in the equation.

Part of me would be more than happy to have the budget divvied up to plateholders rather than badgeholders. There's around 38,000 badges in Scotland, but something like 24,000 plates, so if the budget was divided up among the plates rather than badges I'd be getting almost £1k more

On the other hand, that would mean thousands of badgeholders would get nothing, while fleet owners currently getting nothing would become eligible for five-figure sums

So it's swings and roundabouts, but somehow I can't see them now saying to rental drivers that they're ineligible for the £1,500 they were eligible for yesterday.

So I strongly suspect they won't be changing the basic eligibility from badges to plates now.

But I wonder how many of the 38,000 badgeholders will actually claim? I think the 38,000 figure will be from the Scottish Transport Statistics, so a couple of years out of date. So I'm guessing quite a few badges won't have been renewed last year, particularly the one-year badges, although obviously a higher proportion of the three-year badges will still be valid, even if there's no intention to use them again.

And stuff like turnover and overheads/expenses becomes a bit more difficult if it's a rental or 60/40 driver, or whatever

In fact I'm guessing something like half of all badgeholders don't actually run a vehicle. And they're also more inclined to have other jobs, or are semi-retired, or whatever. Or working on the side

So whether they'll all be claiming is an interesting question

I think I've read in a couple of places that the take up of the SEISS grant wasn't as high as the Gov thought it would be, so it wouldn't be a huge surprise to me if the Scots grants was a long way off the 38,000.

_________________
IDFIMH

Yes, and it might have a lot to do with what the councils ask for in terms of evidence on turnover etc.

I think badges in Dundee peaked at over 1,700 quite a few years ago, but dropped to something around 1,300. Not sure precisely why, but wouldn't be surprised if that happened when the application forms started asking drivers for their tax reference and NI numbers

So I suspect for those kind of reasons many badgeholders will give the application process for this grant a massive body swerve

On the other hand, £1,500 is a good skelp of money not to bother about, especially as for legit drivers it should be little more onerous than the SEISS application process.

Of course, for drivers who aren't legit the SEISS thing was a bit more black and white - if you hadn't declared your taxi earnings to HMRC then you couldn't apply - end of.

For this grant, though, things aren't so clear cut, since the basic eligibility is just being a badgeholder.

So it may come down to what other evidence councils require to see. And it's looking like to a degree that will be down to individual councils. But it should all become clearer in the next few days...

Well nothing on Fife Council's licensing page and no emails, so unless a letter arrives by snail mail tomorrow then looks like it'll be next week until we hear anything about the application process

But Dundee has an online application process up, and it looks pretty straightforward. Basically it looks like a box ticking/self-certification process for applicants, ie you just state that your turnover has dropped 50% etc. You don't have to provide any proof, by the looks of it.

But obviously I didn't complete the whole form, so they might ask for evidence later in the process, so who knows? Sure I read a couple of days ago that one council wanted a scan of a recent bank statement for a start, but maybe that's just to verify bank details, so not clear what other evidence they may want.

And, of course, each council will have their own process, so some may just be a question of ticking a few boxes, and agreeing to a declaration, while others might ask for more concrete evidence.

But from what I can see, the Dundee form is little more onerous than the SEISS application, so to that degree won't act as much of deterrent for drivers who maybe have something to hide - effectively all you need is a badge and bank account.

On the other hand, remember that Dundee asks for tax and NI numbers when applying for a badge, so to that degree badgeholders will have already faced that hurdle.

Anyway, no doubt it'll all become a lot clearer in the next few days.

https://my.dundeecity.gov.uk/en/service ... pplication

It was actually North Lanarkshire where I saw the bit about the bank statements, although their process isn't up and running properly yet.

But note the requirement for the NI number

And the final paragraph about perhaps requiring 'additional information' to 'validate' the application


Not that I'm anticipating any problems myself, but as it stands I wouldn't even be able to complete the North Lanarkshire application - I do my banking online, so my paper statements are 'turned off', and they don't send out statements unless you ask for them.

Of course, I'm sure they'd accept other evidence in that case, but I prefer these processes to be as smooth as possible

I've received the application form for the Scottish grant but it doesnt explain much.

heres an extract:

"Up to 31 December 2020, have you experienced a loss of income as a taxi or private hire driver (50% of your turnover, compared with 2019) and incurred overhead costs and expenses?

Required answers:

I have experienced a loss of income up to 31 December 2020 and incurred overhead costs and expenses
I have not experienced a loss of income up to 31 December 2020 and incurred overhead costs and expenses"

Are they talking about Gross Income (Fare Cash taken) or are they talking about Loss of Income (Pre tax Profit).

On the Scottish Government website they Talk of a 50% loss of Turnover not Income and those are not the same thing.

And what of an Employed driver..they don't use the term Turnover?
Any of you chaps know what they mean?

Surely they have details of bank accounts of anyone doing Council contracts, I myself would not give them a copy of my bank statement, name, account number and sort code is all they would get.

If only someone could invent a machine that could print out those statements.

_________________
IDFIMH

The Scottish Governement actually used the same wording, as you stated here:

viewtopic.php?f=2&t=36538#p406326

'Loss of income' is a bit vague, so I think they're just defining that as at least 50% drop in turnover, which is why it's in brackets after the words 'loss of income'.

Turnover is a more specific word, which simply means top line takings or cash for the day for the average driver. Any invoiced runs could reasonably be included when you do the work rather than when you receive the cash, if that helps.

So if you had £40 cash runs and a £50 school run on a particular day, your turnover would be £90, even if you didn't receive the school run cash for another month or two.


If you mean a proper PAYE employee then that's an interesting question, and the questions give the impression that all drivers are self-employed.

If there are PAYE drivers around then loss of income would relate to wages or salary, presumably, and of course in that case there would be furlough payments, and it might get tricky.

But looking at the questions I'm thinking they're assuming all drivers are self-employed. Certainly not many PAYE drivers around these parts.

Of course, a PAYE driver wouldn't have incurred overheads in the normal sense of the word, presumably, which maybe suggests it's only targetted at self-employed drivers.

Indeed, if they are doing council contracts. And my council will have my bank account details from my council tax and license payments.

But obviously it's not as straightforward as that for everyone, and they'll need the details to safeguard against fraudulent applications. They'll want to match up the name on the bank account with the badgeholder.

And even if one part of the council has your bank details, I don't think another part of the council can simply access that to check the details. Data protection, Chinese walls and all that kind of stuff.

Indeed, even if I had paper statements I wouldn't send them a copy of the whole lot either. I'd blank out the transactions - suspect that all they're after is to match up stuff like the name, address, account number and sort code to the badgeholder's licensing details.

You mean a PRINTER

Oddly enough, I don't have a printer. Actually I do, but never use it, and don't intend spending £billions on new ink cartridges if I can avoid it. I go whole years without printing anything out, and usually borrow someone else's if necessary, but that's obviously more difficult with Covid.

Funny thing, but in the early days of computers and the like, when printing was more of a novelty, I must have printed *thousands* of pages every year, and now it's down to zilch.

Must have bought my first printer in the 1990s. Printed off tens of thousands of pages, I'd guess. Bought my second printer maybe around 2009. Suspect total printing just in the hundreds of pages, and it's sat idle for pushing ten years now, I'm guessing.

Anyway, if there was something online for my bank account, I would do a screengrab rather than print something out.

Funny thing, though, I was looking last night, and there's nothing obvious like a simple bank statement showing name, address, account number and sort code together, which is I suspect what the council will want. Or they may not actually want a statement like North Lanarkshire.

But I'm sure I'll get round it somehow, even if that's what they ask for

Actually found the Fife Council stuff on the general business support page, and it says it's planned to go live from Monday

Looks pretty much the same as the other stuff I've seen, but no mention of an NI number.

And the bank account evidence it asks for is worded slightly different to North Lanarkshire, as highlighted:


It's actually easy enough to download pdf statements from my bank account, so that'll maybe do the trick. One of these things that's staring you in the face but you miss it

Note also this stuff about matching information with housing benefit and council tax benefit records etc.

And fraudulent claims etc.

Note another condition that seems to have appeared - you can't claim the grant from more than one authority

Bit of a no-brainer that, I suppose, but maybe when they were drawing up the rules they hadn't evisaged that drivers might have badges in two separate council areas, and might thus claim two grants

Not many, I suppose, but hardly unknown either.

In fact back in the late 1990s, I must have had valid badges in Dundee and Fife at the same time, although I can't recall the details now, and certainly never worked in both areas at the same time