Taxi Driver Online

Ascot racegoers set to face increased taxi fares

https://www.maidenhead-advertiser.co.uk ... fares.html

Punters planning on hailing a council-licensed taxi could face a 50 per cent increase in their fare at Royal Ascot this year.

Revellers hopping into the back of a hackney carriage from the racecourse rink may be set on a higher tariff as part of a Royal Borough trial.

The decision, which is still subject to consultation, was supported by most of the councillors present on the borough’s licensing panel on Tuesday evening.

The move came after hackney carriage drivers said they could sometimes queue for a long time to get to the racecourse during June’s event only to get a passenger who does not travel far and end up with a low-paying fare.

Royal Borough rules mean that hackney carriages must charge a fixed rate for day trips wholly in the borough.

Their drivers want to use a higher tariff, normally used between 11pm and 6am, which is 50 per cent higher than tariff one.

“We do want the drivers to pick these people up and not be frightened off because tariff one is not enough for them to actually go there,” Cllr Asghar Majeed (Ind, Oldfield) said.

But Cllr John Bowden (Con, Clewer East) said he could foresee problems with the increase, and was the only councillor present to oppose the higher tariff when the panel went to vote at Maidenhead Town Hall last night.

“It is going to cause problems and the biggest one being (customers will be upset and argue to taxi drivers) ‘I only paid this from Windsor to Ascot in the first place’.

The fare change will only be in force for the council-licensed taxis. Private hire and ride-hailing apps like Uber set separate rates.

A consultation is due to be run on the higher tariff before it is introduced and a review of whether the higher tariff worked will be held by the licensing panel after the race.

Speaking after the meeting, the chairman of the RBWM Taxi Association, Mohammad Yasin, said: “All the drivers are quite happy because they were looking for it for a long time.”

He said most fares will be groups who would split the cost and that passengers’ main priority was to ‘go home quickly’ and that private hires can also charge customers higher prices at the event.

He added that he hoped in the future the higher tariff would be extended to all of Ascot during race week.

Royal Ascot starts on Tuesday, June 18.

This is quite interesting, and something I've always meant to look into, but never got round to it. But there's no special tariff in Fife when the Open Golf Championship is on in St Andrews, for example, and as far as I know there's no premium in Edinburgh when the Festival is on.

But to be honest the arguments presented here seem no more compelling than that because Royal Ascot is on higher fares should be charged, with no real economic basis.





So little evidence drivers being frightened off because T1 insufficient (in fact quite the reverse if they're "queueing for a long time"), yet that's used as a justification for a 50% premium

I think drivers are fully entitled to earn a decent living.

But ripping off people with a 50% increase during the day of a race meeting is not reasonable.

But what happens with calendar control meters? Or will everyone including shoppers have to pay that hike?

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IDFIMH

Royal Ascot attracts punters with money and also the ten bob millionaires. If they don't want to pay the correct fare there's always the bus.

Well it seems that the fare hike was more about the length of time to get *back* to the rank rather than how long drivers were waiting *on* the rank.

Which to me doesn't ring true to a degree, because if they're taking a long time getting back to the rank then that's presumably at the end of the day when approaching the event, when presumably most of the traffic is going the other way, in which case getting back to the rank presumably not so much of a problem.

To be fair though, obviously I don't know the traffic arrangement there, and from experience of the likes of the Open in St Andrews and T in the Park I know that all sorts of daft and frustrating traffic anomalies can arise.

On the other hand, this kind of thing often looks like a few extreme and unrepresentative scenarios being used simply to justify a fares hike because of increased demand.

Taxi fares from Royal Ascot set to increase by 50 per cent as Royal Borough of Windsor and Maidenhead approves price hike

https://www.bracknellnews.co.uk/news/17 ... rice-hike/

TAXI fares from Royal Ascot to destinations within the Royal Borough will go up by 50 per cent this June.

This could mean a fare from the event to Windsor increases by more than £10.

Councillors confirmed the move after taxi drivers complained about the ‘45 minute to an hour’ drive to get back to Ascot Racecourse taxi rank after returning from another journey.

According to a council report, if drivers take a passenger a short distance they will “not make a reasonable return from that fare” given the time it takes to return to the rank.

One taxi driver, who has been taking racegoers back and forth from Ascot for ten years, told councillors the current rates drivers are allowed to charge was “not sufficient enough”.

He added: “It doesn’t reflect what we should be charging them. This is a race that comes once in the calendar year and for us it’s a big thing as we can make money from this.”

A number of councillors got behind the plans after hearing taxi drivers make their points, with councillor Hari Sharma saying: “I’ve been in this area long enough – I know there is a real difficulty when you pick up passengers from Ascot and bring back to either Maidenhead or Windsor.”

Drivers will only be able to charge the increased rate from the designated rank and some councillors voiced their concerns about potential arguments between visitors and drivers.

Cllr John Bowden said: “I think it’s going to cause annoyance to the individuals there and there will have to be a police officer there to deal with the forthcoming problems of the cost.”

Despite this, councillors voted for the changes, which will be subject to a two-week consultation period first

Residents can send letters of objection or support to the council in this period, but should no objections be received, the plans would come into force in time for this year’s Royal Ascot, which runs from June 18 to June 22.

Increased fares will be introduced on a trial basis at first, with feedback being reviewed by Royal Borough of Windsor and Maidenhead (RBWM) councillors in July before a decision is made on whether to carry on with the price hike.

That's kind of the thing I can't understand - according to Google these are 11 mile and 7 mile runs, which seem decent fares to me - the original article said:



To me a "passenger who does not travel far" sounds more like half-a-mile or even a mile, not ten miles or whatever.

Or maybe ten miles *is* a short fare when Royal Ascot is on