Taxi Driver Online

First I've heard


Taxi fares set to rise in Fife to tackle ‘ever increasing’ costs

https://www.fifetoday.co.uk/news/politi ... ts-3826920

Taxi fares are set to rise across Fife

The Regulation and Licensing Committee will consider a proposal to increase the flat fare from £3.20 to £3.60.

Additional yardage will also go down from 900 yards to 600 yards at stages one and two.

The proposal came from sub-committee meeting of councillors, officers and taxi associations held in Kirkcaldy Town House last month.

Businesses said the increase was unavoidable.

A report to councillors stated: “The sub-committee noted that the associations previously commented that it was essential for them to obtain an increase in fares on an annual basis to allow them to keep up their ever-increasing costs.”

It took the view the proposal was fair to both operators and passengers - if approved it would come into effect early in December.

Councillor’s will have the final decision on the rise.

This seems to be based on what's in the agenda papers from a forthcoming licensing meeting, at page 19.

https://www.fife.gov.uk/__data/assets/p ... _FINAL.pdf

Apart from the slightly confusing terminology ('flat fare', which is basically the flagall fare, and 'additional yardage', which is the flagfall distance) obviously the flagfall distance is coming down 300 yards on on both the main tariffs.

But it reads like the T1 flag is going up 40p, but nothing on the T2 flag

However, the proposed tariff card (page 26 on the agenda papers) shows the T2 flagfall increasing to £4.50 (from £3.95)

So the agenda paper (and the newspaper report above based on it) totally omits that, and since it's a quite straightforward matter, that seems a bit odd.

Anyway, obviously a reasonable rise in both T1 and T2 flagfall fares and a reasonable drop in both flagfall distances mean fairly hefty increases on all shorter runs. But, of course, with no increase in the running mile charges, once it's past half a mile or so the increase is fixed at 80p on T1 and £1 on T2, so it's not much of a rise on the longer trips.

Which I'm actually reasonably happy with, although I certainly wouldn't suggest an increase myself, particularly as they'll be implemented in December when the heating bills really start to rocket

But the big pain for me is that the T2 flag will be £4.50, so it's still going to be landing at 10p above the pound, ie £5.10, £6.10 etc. I'd much prefer it landing on 20p, as it did quite a few years ago now (and which meant you didn't have to carry change in coins any smaller than 20p )

But at least it's an improvement on the £3.95 flagfall and landing on 15p, 35p, 55p etc above the pound

And wouldn't be surprised if the T2 flag has been at £3.95 for ten years now - I think they left it there to avoid the meters showing £4 (so why not £3.80 and adjust the distance accordingly?) and every review since has just left it there and decreased the flagfall and/or increased the running mile instead.

Anyway, changewise 10p is better than 5p, although not as good as 20p, but what a time to finally have the meters showing more than £4 on the normal T2 flagfall

And the change thing is mainly an issue with students, but most of them pay by card now, so to that degree the 5p/10p/20p thing was increasingly irrelevant anyway.

Think I've changed my mind about it all.

On all but the very shortest runs, on T1 they'll go up 80p a pop. This will mean £7.60 for the two-mile T1 run, thus position 30 on the PHTM tables

On T2 the council's figures say the rise is £1 a pop. But that's an average, and my figures show some runs will go up £1.15.

(The council just uses a crude running mile figure, which might be mathematically correct as an average, but doesn't reflect how in reality the meters clock up 20p over a certain distance, and aren't constantly increasing by each penny as the car moves along.)

So most T2 runs will go up 95p, while a minority will go up £1.15, which is why the council's figures show a £1 increases across the board.)

So, for example, a 0.7 mile run, which takes literally two minutes, will jump from £4.55 to £5.70

Which is over 25 per cent

And all this would happen in December, when the pessimist in me sees demand collapsing as the energy bills come home to roost

I'm fine with a flat increase which is thus loaded onto the shorter runs, but I think this is too much. Maybe 60p or something like that (on both T1 and T2) would have been a better bet.

By the way, if my link didn't work yesterday then maybe this one below is better, because I'm sure the whole nation wants to have a look at the agenda paper

The fare stuff is right at the end.

https://www.fife.gov.uk/__data/assets/p ... _FINAL.pdf

I use to be concerned about high increases as opposed to smaller increases on a more regular basis.

But the prices Uber get away with, during unsociable hours, has made me change my mind.

Most Uber punters are under 30, and it seems to me they couldn't care less what they pay as long as they get home.

I would say during surge times Uber drivers are earning a minimum of £50 an hour. So quite why the traditional trade worries about an extra £1 here or there, f*** knows.

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IDFIMH

Fife taxi fares to rise by 12.5% as running costs soar

https://www.thecourier.co.uk/fp/news/fi ... axi-fares/

Bit that I find strange is the start date, 5th of December. Three months' time.

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IDFIMH

You mean in terms of the timeframe, or the time of year it's being implemented? They've always implemented any fare increase on the first Monday of December, or thereabouts, at least as long as I can recall

Yes, the timeframe does seem quite long, but I think they just like to get it all done and dusted with plenty of time so that the notices can be advertised, then there's the time allowed for appeals to the Traffic Commissioner, then the meter agents can get their stuff ready etc.

And they certainly seem to be quite set in their ways with the procedure of all this, with the usual list of consultees etc. But certainly no sense of urgency


As per my reply a few weeks ago, those who pay the Uber surge are a very niche market, whereas the council HC tariff here in East Fife affects *all* of the local market (particularly since we have no real PH sector here), for good or ill.

So no doubt on occasion here a small number of people would pay a significant premium to get home at a very particular time. But for the majority of the time, and for the majority of customers, I'd guess a pound or so on the bread and butter runs will have consequences in terms of demand, particularly with all the other competing prices rises people are having to deal with, and the energy price shock in particular

But at least it looks like the energy price rises won't be as big as they looked like they might be at one point, so the knock on affect on the taxi trade might not be as significant as I thought it might be.

And roll on next year's tax 'conditionality' checks for badge renewals, which might help make the fare rises more sustainable from the supply side

Both.

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IDFIMH

I'm not so sure about that.

Uber surge to all customers at certain times of the day, usually 9.00pm to 5.00am, as well as other times when it's busy.

Wouldn't call that niche.

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IDFIMH

On the other hand, Uber users are a sub-set of the wider market, and those paying the surge are a sub-set of Uber customers, ergo...

And, of course, the surge is predicated on the basis of deterring normal customers from using Uber, so to that extent it's a niche market by definition, to a degree at least.

Of course, it depends on the size of the surge, but if the whole of the local market was able to replicate the Uber surge then I suspect there would be a lot fewer surges, and the surge price wouldn't go so high anyway.

And another thing about the surge is that it's a very short-term thing, while council tariff rises are a longer term issue, and the affect may be to lose customers altogether, and also to end up with more drivers in the trade, so to that extent it can be self-defeating.

Of course, to the extent that shortages in the wider labour market (in the post-Brexit, post-lockdown) environment) are affecting the supply of new drivers to the trade, then that is certainly making higher official tariffs more sustainable. Ditto the likes of the new tax checks.

So the supply side certainly making higher tariffs more sustainable, in the short to medium term at least.

On the other hand, demand side issues (like the cost of living stuff and economic slowdown more generally)
is detrimental to making official tariff rises sustainable. This might be particularly evident during the winter months when the energy price spikes will become more apparent. But thankfully Liz Truss's new price-capping scheme should alleviate the worst affects of that, but we'll see