Taxi Driver Online

A letter in the Tele tonight:

Right to sell

I AM a little confused about what the Dundee Wheelchair Taxi Association is trying to achieve.

The feedback is all about its unhappiness with the council because the association can only operate with wheelchair capable vehicles. Unless I am mistaken, anyone applying for the new-type hackney licence fully understood the conditions that were attached to the new-style licences.

The Dundee taxi trade is a divided community. Everyone should be sticking together to try to improve the business for the benefit of everyone.

An important issue that badly needs addressing is the sale of our licences. Unfortunately, we cannot sell it as a going concern. After having spent many years serving the Dundee public and looking forward to retiring, I feel I (and others) should have the right to sell my business like any other business person.

This would keep young men coming into the trade and eradicate the hired plate situation. — Saloon Sammy.

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Dundee rocks. Almost.

keep young men coming into the trade? surely having to pay a large fee for a license that the operator doesnt even own would put most off, if you want rid of all the hired plates wheelchair cabs for all would do it

I suspect there are still plenty young men coming into the trade, but I think he probably means young men willing to pay for his plate.

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Taxi Driver Online
www.taxi-driver.co.uk

there are a lot of young men and recently young women also some older people most are getting their badges through 203020 which means they were mostly people who were unemployed and now must drive for a pittance of a wage for a year before they can join a real office then earn
more money , i cant see any of them being prepared to add to the retirement fund of any cabbie who has decided to call it a day by giving him a wad for his plate, refusing to allow plate transfers was the only thing dundee council got right

I like the way he says that the new wheelchair taxis should have understood the conditions attached to the license, but then wants the rules changed for his license.

Typical do as I say, not as I do

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Taxi Driver Online
www.taxi-driver.co.uk

Being a saloon holder he would also have been aware that when the saloon plates were granted there was no limit, but that didn't stop them lobbying to get numbers capped, which happened.

So its a bit rich now complain that the wheelchair cabs are lobbying for change especially when he wants the corporate license rules changed himself.

What a numpty.

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Dundee rocks. Almost.

3 replies to the letter in the Tele:

Two-tier conditions


LETTER WRITER Saloon Sammy complains that Dundee City Council won’t let him sell his taxi “business”.

He is presumably referring to the licence plate, but the only reason this has value is because of more advantageous conditions attached to his licence than others.

Saloon operators can still run pint-sized, 10-year-old cars. New licence holders have to buy wheelchair-accessible taxis and do wheelchair work.

Saloon Sammy also rightly raises the issue of the illegal hiring of plates.

The council’s courageous decision to remove the cap on taxi numbers watered down the problem, but this issue is back because of the two-tier conditions.

These make it worth paying to hire a saloon plate on the black market rather than getting a new-type plate. — Sitting Bull.


IT WAS beneficial to the disabled that extra wheelchair-accessible cabs became available in Dundee.

However, with the opening of this list, the trade is having a hard time due to the large numbers plying for hire.

Dundee has a shrinking population and we now have more taxis per customer than any other town or city in Scotland.

The council must now either close this free-for-all or create an even standard by making sure all cabs are wheelchair accessible. — Blobby’s Mate.


LETTER WRITER Saloon Sammy wants the right to sell his business.

However, nobody can sell something they don’t own. The licence is council property.

His business only consists of the cab, radio, meter and sign, which can be sold at any time.

Saloon Sammy got his licence for nothing and now thinks he is entitled to ask for cash just so someone can do the same job he has been doing. — Free Plate.

http://www.eveningtelegraph.co.uk/outpu ... tters.shtm

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Dundee rocks. Almost.

Man have they got some weird names up there?

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IDFIMH

Good to see the issues debated in the local press though, where I work that would be about three year's worth of readers' letters

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Taxi Driver Online
www.taxi-driver.co.uk

Yeh put on their own plate £23,000,and sit on the rank and go home with a pittance????????????

Dont know about the bright but as far as I know when the Civic Government Act was passed transfers were banned to stop operators beneffiting from the artificial premium in areas where numbers were capped. If theres any other business asset such as a vehicle and goodwill then they can still be sold, but unless you have private clients or whatever then for the vast majority theres on goodwill its just the plate and vehicle that have a value.

Since window cleaner numbers cannot be capped theres no artificial premium. Pubs seem a bit inconsisent to me since they can be restricted to some extent, but its certainly the case that any premium is less obvious than with taxi plates.

As you know, transfers are allowed in some cities, but it all seems a bit dodgy - Patricia McWhatsit the council's head of admin said a year or two ago that allowing transfers would be illegal.

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Dundee rocks. Almost.

A couple of replies to that letter, one for, one against:


Two tier system

LETTER WRITER Sitting Bull is correct about the two-tier taxi system in Dundee making the illegal hired plate more popular than putting a new wheelchair accessible cab on the road.

I estimate I would be £60-a-week better off if I hired a plate.

Another factor is that drivers do not want to do wheelchair jobs. A lot of new taxi owners are already thinking of calling it a day.

If the council ignores the situation it will find it is back to having a city with hundreds of hired plates and a shortage of wheelchair taxis. — Free Plate.

http://www.eveningtelegraph.co.uk/outpu ... tters.shtm



Money isn’t there

DUNDEE TAXI drivers with disabled- accessible cabs are not refusing people in wheelchairs, as letter writer Sitting Bull implies.

However, many people with partial mobility refuse to go in wheelchair accessible taxis because getting into a seat in a saloon cab is exercise they need to keep on top of their disability. This is called democracy.

Also, wheelchair taxis are handy for groups of people to use, as well as the disabled.

There is no such thing as a two-tier taxi system.

The reason we have two types of cab is to give everyone, including the disabled, a choice.

The people who have wheelchair-accessible taxis are probably up to their neck in debt (their choice) to buy the vehicle.

The reason they are disillusioned is because they thought they would make a killing.

Dundee is a city of great poverty so the money isn’t there, not like Edinburgh or Glasgow. — Saloon Car.

http://www.eveningtelegraph.co.uk/outpu ... tters.shtm

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Dundee rocks. Almost.

So two blokes having to do the same job, yet one has to pay £10-15,000 more for his motor, isn't a two tier system?

Really !!!!!!

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IDFIMH