Taxi Driver Online

Hi,

My name is Mark Waddington and I am setting up a small business trading in car cameras.

I've been looking into getting feedback from professional drivers of various types of vehicles including
Driving instructors, bus drivers, lorry drivers and the police and I am wondering if the car camera is of use for taxi companies / private hire drivers.

My site - which is still growing is at http://www.carcamwarehouse.com contains the kind of cameras I am currently dealing in - and there will be a new one later this week which supersedes those on the front page.

Are these of any use to the taxi industry for recording events inside/outside the cab? I would appreciate your thoughts if you have a spare moment.

Regards
Mark

If it would knock something off my insurance I'd have one in a heartbeat

The ones you are selling for £49.99 can be found here for £21.98. http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/IR-6-TFT-Colo ... 4ab8f69d18

Hi,

Yes - I think there is an insurance company now doing 15% off if one of the cams is installed - I will check it out for you.

Ebay - yes - around 10,000 chinese factories make that camera and others - they look the same - and thats about it

20 squid will buy you one which lasts two recordings (if lucky) - trust me ive lost a lot of cash on ebay......

As it happens though - that cam is so old now that the quality is just not up to standard now - the new one ive got on its way (hopefully have them tomorrow) far exceeds anything onsite at the moment and will be about 50 to 60 depending on memory.

Really though - ebay high tech product aside - are car cams useful to taxi firms/drivers?

Thanks for the reply.

I'm normally one who's quick to criticise anyone who comes on here advertising, but after having a quick glance at your homepage it looks like you may actually have a product that I'd be interested in !

Can't speak for others but my requirements are ; small, records sound, night vision, battery powered, good quality pictures (especially at night), reliable and most importantly cost. I know you can get all this in expensive custom built systems but the one thing that has put me off buying is having to pay £400+ for a decent system or less than £100 for one that just is'nt any good. So if your doing a decent camera that meets my requirements for less than £70 youv'e got my interest. The only let down is the abscence of a system with front and rear facing cameras to record both inside and outside the vehicle.

Just a couple of questions, how long do the batteries last from a full charge whilst recording ? If I was to purchase one of your cameras but wasn't satisfied with it would I be able to return it for a full refund within a certain amount of time, or would you be prepared to let me 'borrow' one for a couple of weeks to test ? If it's any good I'll be the first on here singing its praises.

Hi Sasha,

Thanks for your time.

Yes - I understand your angle on "advertising". I hate doing this aswell given that I am also the owner of a very heavily spammed forum or two myself.

My query here was not for advertising - more for research into the potential for a "market" and whether or not it may be worth investing in paid advertising in newspapers somewhere down the line with adverts which are aimed at professional taxi drivers.

So with that - you can hopefully see my angle at this point - its a relatively new business I am looking into - seeing whether it is worth expanding or trying to do so.

It is infact so new for me - that I do not know whether my latest camera (not onsite yet) will actually meet your needs. With that in mind - I will send you one to use as you would require to use it - in the hope that you would be kind enough to give your time on here to either praise or slate it At the end of the day - it will either work for the industry - or it will not. With positive feedback, I could retain features on future designs, and with negative aspects, I could try to incorporate the required changes into future designs.

So - with battery charge an unknown as I havent got these until tomorrow, this is the camera I can send to you for your testing. You will need a class 10 4gb SD card for it - all I ask is that you get hold of one of these as I dont have any spare at the moment. If you PM me your address to which I can send the cam you can then take it from there and see how it goes.

I think that the question that we all should be asking is not, do they work, BUT:

Will such evidence stand up in Court?

The answer must not be "I think it will" but be backed by a Barrister who confirms that The Data Protection Act will not make such photos inadmissible: That answer must be either: "Yes it will or No it won't."

_________________
Don't dream it ~ Be it.

Hi Eddie.

Two aspects I think. One would be accident evidence and the other could be a "bad" passenger if you were recording inside.

I dont know - maybe others do. For videoing people in your cab - I suspect you would need a sticker somewhere telling them that for safety the cab is recorded?

Externally - maybe someone here knows of an instance where video evidence was used in an accident?

I don't think that there would be any argument, that a forward facing Camera is Legal and that any evidence it gathers is admissible in Court.

My reading of The Data Protection Act is that even a Notice outside the Cab is not sufficient.

But then I have no specialist knowledge and it's around 6 years since my Registration with the DPA lapsed.

_________________
Don't dream it ~ Be it.

Eddie - are you saying that there is no way (due to DP) that a cab can have a camera in it which faces outwards or inwards?

Im just a bit confused as to what you are saying.

At the end of the day - if thats the case then I may aswell give up now!!

I am saying that, as far as I know, anyone can record what happens in the area immediately in front of and behind, their vehicle, with no problem.

However, recording the Actions of any Passenger and the use that that recording is put to, is covered by The Data Protection Act. The data (the pictures or movies) need to be Encrypted so that no unauthorised person can view them and the Key to that Encryption can only be held by a Person, or Organisation, that is Registered with/by the DPA. Registration is not that expensive, but you do need to be an expert Form Filler.

I think that the law says, regarding an internal camera, something along the lines that:

Were the presence of such a camera is not correctly advertised or its data encrypted, it would be a criminal offence for you not to delete the data, at the Passenger's Request.

_________________
Don't dream it ~ Be it.

If you plan to sell to the Trade ~ Have a chat with the Data Protection Agency. It'll cost you nothing.

They were very helpful when I needed their assistance.

_________________
Don't dream it ~ Be it.

I think what Eddie is saying is, "anything held on magnatic data is covered by the Data protection act".

Hi Mark, thanks for the offer of sending me one to test -I'll contact you in the next couple of days with my details. I'll be happy to report the results of testing on here, but be warned I'll be brutally honest, if it's a steaming pile of cack I'll say so

Looking at the new model it states a recording charge of 60 minutes which is a bit low, could do with a longer battery life ideally 5-8 hours, but I suppose it could be turned off between jobs or when not driving. What's the battery life on the K2000 is it any longer ?

I had my eye on the K2000 because it looks really small and wouldn't take up too much room on the windscreen/dash, is the new model smaller/bigger ? Out of the two I think I actually might prefer the K2000, have you yourself tested both - is there any real difference ?

Finally if I may criticise the videos on your webpage, all they are is footage of the cameras facing forward in daytime. I'd have liked to see footage of both day and night scenarios whilst the cameras facing forward and an in-car view. Recording of front and rear seat passengers at night is my biggest priority. Also footage of the camera itself in place on the windscreen/dash would be nice to give an idea of its size and looks.

That K2000 does look a nice unit. I've found this review of it on youtube - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DsNGpbrk ... re=related
From another review I found it appears that there are fakes versions of this around so beware where you get one from.

The only thing that puts me of it is that it is LED lights and not IR, so I'm not sure about using it for recording the interior of the car at night.