Taxi Driver Online

We have derivers here who charge less than the metered fare and then tell customers that they are being ripped off by the drivers working to the meter.

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Grandad,
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A realist?

Anyway, seems Mr Sneckie at it again, but trade more generally look like they're opposed. Again


Taxi boss calls for fares to rise by fifth in the Highlands

https://www.inverness-courier.co.uk/new ... th-186749/

CUSTOMERS in the Highlands could be facing a whopping rise in taxi fares of more than 20 per cent, the Inverness Courier can reveal.

The boss of one of the city’s biggest cab companies says the rise is justified because the last increase was in 2017 and that came after a seven-year fare freeze.

Raymond Munro employs 40 drivers at Culloden-based Sneckie Taxis and says the rise is necessary to cover the ever-increasing costs of running the business.

His proposal, as part of a Highland Council consultation on fares, would see the current daytime per mile rate rise from £1.80 to £2.20.

The last increase, in April 2017, saw the saw rate rise from £1.40.

Mr Munro said rates had remained frozen for seven years before that and believes his proposal is not unreasonable.

Currently, a standard two-mile journey costs £5.80 in the Highlands compared to £5.40 in Perth and Kinross, £5.60 in Aberdeen, £6.35 in Edinburgh and £6.60 in Moray.

If approved, the new rates would be imposed from April.

Mr Munro said: “We are currently 15th in Scotland for the level of fares charged and this increase would take us to the same level as Aberdeenshire.”

A poll carried out by the Inverness Taxi Alliance (ITA) showed 94 per cent of drivers were against any increase in fares next year.

Chairman Andrew Macdonald said: “The view of the alliance is any increase is foolhardy at this stage.

“The public is deserting the taxis in droves because of the prices.”

A consultation carried out ahead of the fares increase in 2017 saw taxi drivers similarly divided, with those in Inverness calling for a rise while others in areas such as Caithness against the move.

One regular taxi passenger, Alasdair Fraser, from Inverness, said the proposed increase represented a “sharp rise”. He added: “It would certainly make me think twice about some of my journeys.”

Highland Council will make its recommendation to the next meeting of the Highland Licensing Committee on December 3 before it goes out to wider public consultation.

Possibly the same drivers who say that when they're discounting fares, yet charge the full fare to unsuspecting punters like tourists?

That certainly seems to be the way it works around here

Mr Macdonald also had this to say in the other article about the rank closure:



So echoes of the scenario in Barrow. Not sure what the views of the other firms are, but Ubaro in Barrow and Sneckie in Inverness both pushing for tariff increases, while those representing who I'm guessing are more at the grassroots end of the trade effectively saying the rises are unsustainable.

Seems to be a similar scenario here in Fife, although it's complicated by the fact that the main trades are in Kirkcaldy, Glenrothes and Dunfermline, which are the biggest towns, but might as well be Aberdeen, Dundee, Glasgow or Edinburgh as far as people like me are concerned. I certainly know more about how the trade works in these bigger cities (and the major players operating there) than in those other Fife towns that we share a tariff with

Anyway, it's a week until our mega one hundred yard reduction in the flagfall is implemented, so it'll probably take a couple of hours to get the meter changed on Sunday, then it's a twenty mile round trip to Cupar on Monday to get the meter tested.

As someone who's never promoted or asked for a fare increase (I always think the tariffs are a couple of years ahead of where they should be) it's all a mega-pain at the best of times. But this 100 yard decrease in the flagfall is particularly doing my nut in this year

Every little helps.

Got to be 20p a job surely?

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IDFIMH

Average 13p a job on T1

But what'll pi$$ me off is that the job I do most often from the rank (a student run, which it's not unusual to get three or four of on the bounce, or even for these runs to comprise the majority of the shift) is a £5.55 job on T2, which *just* clicks over on the current rate, so it's not going to change on the new rate

And I don't normally charge the 5p anyway, because I can't be bothered rummaging for the 45p, so that's going to pi$$ me off even more

I find the assertion that Fort William is less affluent than Inverness a little surprising given that there are two large employers there plus a very healthy tourist industry and with around 10000 population not much unemployment I would think

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