Taxi Driver Online

Press sweating this a bit - much ado about not very much, as far as I'm concerned, although the driver's excuses are a bit hard to credit. But doubt working a couple of days after a missed test will make the world fall down.

Don't think the driver kissed ass sufficiently, but he got away with it


Rogue Aberdeen taxi racked up 40 illegal weekend fares after ‘missing warning email’

https://www.pressandjournal.co.uk/fp/ne ... xi-driver/

Majid Ali said he was asleep following a night shift, and had no idea about the message saying his car needed an inspection.

An Aberdeen taxi driver has been given a formal warning after taking on 40 unlawful fares earlier this year.

Majid Ali’s taxi inspection certificate expired earlier this year, meaning he wasn’t allowed to get behind the wheel again until it was checked and deemed roadworthy.

But he continued to use the car to transport customers – despite being warned not to do so.

Aberdeen City Council’s licensing team had emailed him about the potential risk of continuing to drive the vehicle – but Mr Ali claims he missed it as he was sleeping.

The breach was brought before the local authority’s licensing committee earlier today.

Pleading for leniency, a defiant Mr Ali insisted that the council “should have phoned him” rather than sending an email.

The miffed cabbie questioned why the council “couldn’t leave a simple voicemail” when his father in war-torn Kashmir manages to call.

Why do taxis need inspections?

Policy states that taxis must undergo two inspections a year.

This ensures vehicles are in a safe condition to be used by the public.

After a successful inspection, each licence holder is given a pass certificate that has an expiry date.

Mr Ali’s previous document expired on January 9.

The council advised him the following week that his certificate had expired and he should stay off the road until his vehicle was re-inspected.

Aberdeen taxi driver ‘didn’t notice email’ about re-inspection and the illegal fares

However, Mr Ali undertook 40 hires between Friday, January 20 and Sunday January 22 anyway.

Extra charges are applied to taxis booked at the weekend.

The local authority sent him an email at 11.45am on Friday, January 20, which he missed as he was “asleep after finishing a night shift with Rainbow City Taxis”.

He said he didn’t notice the important message until Monday, when he immediately stopped using his car.

“I read my email and at the bottom it says that ‘you are not allowed to use your car, it is a criminal offence’,” Mr Ali told the committee.

‘My father in a warzone rings me, but council can’t leave a voicemail?’

As pass certificates have expiry dates, councillors questioned if Mr Ali had any reminders in place about them.

But he argued the local authority needed to do more to alert him instead.

“The council never rang me, they just sent an email.

“I’m putting my hands up that it’s my responsibility to check emails but I’m just saying a phone call would help, or even a voice message as everyone else rings.

“British Gas rings me, my father from Kashmir in a warzone rings me, but Aberdeen council can’t leave a simple voicemail?”

He added: “I never read the email, that is my fault.

“‘I’m not pinning that on anyone but I think the licensing officer should have given me a phone call or even left a voice message.”

Aberdeen taxi driver’s licence could have been taken away over illegal fares

Councillors were given three options to address the breach. They could have issued a formal warning, suspended the licence, and had the power to revoke it.

But council licensing solicitor Sandy Munro told the committee he didn’t believe the case was severe enough to need a revocation. He explained that would typically be used as a “last resort” for very serious breaches.

Mr Munro asked members to consider whether the breach and Mr Ali’s explanation for it warranted a suspension or if a warning would be enough.

Councillors agreed the offence wasn’t enough to warrant stripping the cabbie of his licence.

Councillor Marie Boulton believed a formal warning was suitable, along with a reminder that the conditions of his licence were Mr Ali’s responsibility.

She said: “I don’t take it lightly when there’s a breach of conditions because I think they could have quite serious consequences.

“On this occasion, a formal warning will be sufficient and we take no further action after that.

“But it wouldn’t happen again if he appeared before us.”

Members of the committee unanimously agreed to issue the warning, which will remain on Mr Ali’s record for the next two years.

Had that been our council he would be an EX driver by now !

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lack of modern legislation is the iceberg sinking the titanic of the transport sector

Drivers need to take responsibility for their actions, or in this case their inactions.

His license had an end date on it, that hasn’t changed since he got it.

Councils have no legal duty to inform anyone that their license is running out, they only do that as a courtesy.

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IDFIMH

Maybe depends on the precise procedures, Sussex.

It doesn't say his licence had ended, just that one of his six-monthly inspection certificates had ended. So prima facie your point looks fair enough, but I wonder what the precise procedures were?

As I've said before, our annual compliance tests have nothing to do with the plates dates, and are done en bloc.

Every year Fife Council sends out a letter telling us to attend for test at a specific time and date.

About twenty years ago, a year or two after they'd introduced this new system, I had an angry 'fleet supervisor' on the phone, literally shouting at me because I'd hadn't turned up for the test.

I told him I had no knowledge of a test date, and hadn't received a letter. Luckily, in those days the letters were sent recorded delivery, so after he eventually put the phone down, I never heard another peep about it. Either the letter hadn't been sent out, or Royal Mail had no record of delivery.

Nowadays they've stopped sending the letters by recorded delivery, but now that I have an idea how it all works, I'd contact them if I hadn't got a letter and date for the inspection when I thought it was approximately due (all the cars are generally done in March and April, I think). However, if it was a new driver unaware of the procedures, then if a letter went astray then there's a fair chance he'd miss the test, and I'm not sure I'd blame him personally.

To be fair, I think the driver here is just spinning a line, but it would be interesting to know precisely what the council's procedures are for this kind of thing. And if it's a six-monthly test then presumably he was no less safe than in areas with only annual council inspections

On a similar point, over the years one major source of problems here in Fife has been, er, communications problems between the licensing function and the 'fleet operations' people who do the tests and plates etc.

Case in point - my car was tested in March, and I was relieved to get a first-time pass, particularly as there's a £100 retest fee, an extra interim test and possibly an automatic appearance before the licensing committee (although I think they've maybe dumped the latter procedure now).

Anyway, a few weeks later a minor panic when I got this email from the council:



Wondering what this was all about, and worried that I was missing something, I emailed back immediately, and specifically asked them if the email had been sent in error:



So do you think they answered my specific question? You decide...

Maybe the giveaway was in the highlighted text in the original email. Reads like fleet services lost their records, so they sent an email to *everyone* in the hope that would flush out those who were due to have their bodywork repairs checked