Taxi Driver Online

As a driver of a private hire firm that would like you to work 24 hours a day, I would like a limit set on the driving hours in the same way that is set for HGV drivers.
I stand accused of being part of a "kniting club" by the owner of the firm that I work with. (taxifast in Plymouth) It just so happens that by being a member of the so called "kniting club" (this just means that us drivers collect together at night, waiting for jobs) that I have learnt that most of the drivers are the same as me, in that after driving for 10 or so hours, most of us make silly mistakes like driving through red lights, all be it at 12 + in the morning when there is no one else on the road. It is that fact, (no one else on the road) that I at least have done it, many times, thinking after having gone through, Oh [edited by admin]. LOL
Most of the guys in our firm that I have talked to, have all picked up the points on their licences in the early hours.
When I get tired, I go home and bugger the shift. 12 hour shifts, do it if you want, but lets check your reflexes etc after it.
jake

I couldn't agree more Jake, and I think in time we will be restricted in some way, to a set number of hours.

Some may not like it, and it will be a devil to enforce. But I think it could work to our advantage.

That's of course if it stops the part-timers from working in our trade, if they already hold a full-time job.

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IDFIMH

Hi jake

i'm not a member of the 'knitting club' cos i dont sit waiting, if im more than car 3 im off to a different zone. i know some drivers who are happy to sit in town waiting, but not me. i know what you mean, weekends in particular (and mondays and wednesdays lately) its really busy and taxifast would like drivers to stay on and do more hours, its just not possible to cover all the work and i normally end up letting the computer dump me, and then logging off instead of trying to radio in to tell them im going cos i know the office would try and get me to do 'one more job'.

anyway your self employed so its up to you how many hours you do. no one is forcing you to do a 12 hour shift. that goes for each and every self employed driver all over the UK.

There has been talk before of how unsafe it is do to long hours and of course no driver, taxi, HGV or joe public should do 12 hour stints day after day. i'm sure if the EC have their way they''ll all have us doing 35 hours max.

i guess i must be one of the few whos one and only speeding fine was when i was an 18years old newbie driver! but i guess thats cos i know where the cameras are and dont take the [edited by admin] while driving quickly at night.

i thought you where going to bristol jake?

Isn't this the same company bringing in guys from Eastern Europe cos he can't get enough drivers to cover the work.

Whilst I agree that long hours is an evil that needs to be sorted, I can also see the argument of the operator. Though I wouldn't want anyone to feel I was agreeing with Mr Preece.

Drivers shif patterns need to be co ordinated to ensure there are at least some drivers there at quiet times and for example on a saturday you have some starting earlier and finishing sooner, other starting later and finishing later.

That way you can control demand. By employing drivers I have a graph showing exactly how many cars I have on road for any hour of any day.

But I also insist guys do an 11 hour max shift and have at least 11 hours between any two shifts. That isn't good enough, but it is a start.

It is also important to monitor drivers other activities. If a guy is working 48 hours a week for you, but got three other jobs he is more dangerous than a guy doing 72 who goes home each evening and watches the tv for an hour before hitting the sack.

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A member of the Hire or Reward Industry

Funny that some people commend restrictive practices on one hand then condone them on the other.

As SteveO quite rightly pointed out drivers control the hours they work, operators should be aware of when their drivers work and take work according to how many cars they have on shift, I start and finish at roughly the same time every shift I work and the clerks know when I'll be in and what time I want to get away home.

Sorry but you are quite wrong.

There is a shed load of difference between the flawed stupidity of quotas, and the restriction of working hours for safety reasons.

I wonder how many of us would feel safe if our family was being driven home by a driver who is near the end of a 15 hour shift?

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IDFIMH

I waslistening to a driver saying how he did 21 hours with two 40 minute breaks last friday.

He went home at 03.00 on Saturday morning and was back again at 10.00 for 16 hour shift.

But he said it was ok because he didn't start til 13.00 on the Sunday.

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A member of the Hire or Reward Industry

It ought to be organised better than this.
long hours kills family life, and drivers if this is anything to go by.

make no wonder Preece cannot get drivers.

The Department for Transport has just issue a consultaion on the Working Time Directive, http://www.dft.gov.uk/stellent/groups/d ... 32431.hcsp

It looks like because the taxi and PH trade aren't 'passenger vehicles' (meaning a motor vehicle which is contracted or adapted to carry more than eight seated passengers in addition to the driver) then we can carry on working for as long as we like.

Now whether that's a good thing or not, is another matter.

Alex

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Alex,

I read that exactly the same way, unless of course you employ the drivers, in which case new EU regulations will come into force.

Regards

Eric

The EU have stated that all workers in the EU be subject to maximum working hours.

The argument offered from the trade is that we are not always driving and time spent between jobs should be considered as rest periods. I don't think this will be considered by the WTD commission as they aren't only considering driving times but overall working time, and thats total time spent working.

I have heard it said that it would be impossible to enforce, I have heard people comment on who would pay to get specialist instrumentation fitted to the cars to monitor and record.

I think that they will work with taximeter companies and produce a taximeter that will record amount of time working, possibly even with a program which will disable the meter after a certain ammount of time.
These new meters could also record other information, for other government departments, the Inland Revenue for example, with a printout at the end of each working day to be retained in the same way as the HGV/PSV tachograph.

Maybe your right and it will never apply to our trade, although I do think that if these changes are introduced there will be more benefits to the government than just complying with the WTD.

for your imformation a HGV driver can work a maximum of 84 hours a week every week with a max of 56 hrs a week driving over 6 days.
i used to drive HGVs for a living and sometimes did them sort of hours,
since i started driving a private hire car i now do about 48 hours a week working sometimes a few more if i do a fifth shift which would only be about 5 hours,
if you want to start putting a lmit on what you can work like what happened with HGV drivers, your gonna be expected to work them week in week out, and earning less than a tesco shelf filler per hour,
this is one of the reasons i have stopped driving trucks for a living.
there is the 48 hours rule coming out next year which is going to affect wages for employed drivers.
but dont worry it is going to affect self employed drivers in the near future as well.
restricting what you can earn

has it not been stated yet that in a perfect world we'd do 40 hours per week, get holiday pay and all the other bonuses and the sun would shine each day (day off naturally).

Unfortunately the only way to do this is to increase our charges, hail hail the £20 minimum fare.

until then i refuse to give the public the service they deserve and will continue to do my 28 hours per week.

incidentally,

I got married by a judge, I should have asked for a jury.
Groucho Marx

regards

Captain cab

Charlie the paperlad wrote:



EU regs will only apply to Employed drivers not self employed, well not yet anyway

The 'not yet anyway' bit is spot on. But I'm not so sure a max working week need be so bad.

There is a view that it will lead to us being busy when we are working, thus having less time sitting around doing f*** all.

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IDFIMH