Taxi Driver Online

Sheffield woman's frustration as City Taxis stops her from pre-booking a cab because of her wheelchair

A Yorkshire woman in a wheelchair has spoken out about the alienation of being a less able-bodied person after being dismissed by a transport company.

Dee Smith attempted to order a Wheelchair Accessible Vehicle (WAV) three hours before she needed it with City Taxis but was told the service wasn’t available to disabled wheelchair users.

City Taxis says it was unable to take pre-bookings for wheelchair vehicles, as it would ‘need to check the availability of the vehicles in the area’. The firm therefore asked Miss Smith to call back 30 minutes prior to needing a taxi.

Miss Smith, 25, from Stocksbridge, Sheffield, called the firm on May 8 to book a taxi to take her to a routine appointment at the Northern General Hospital.

She was diagnosed with Friedreich’s Ataxia (FRDA), at 19 years old, and like many other disabled wheelchair users, relies heavily on reliable transport in order to get around Sheffield.

She said: “I’m a human being in a wheelchair, there’s nothing else to it - but you do feel very isolated and the only one in the world who is in a wheelchair.”

Miss Smith said she was left to feel like she was "causing a problem on purpose".

Explaining City Taxis' decision and policy, business development director Paul Gosney said: “The reason we are unable to take advanced pre-bookings for WAVs is that the driver partners are self-employed, and we can not guarantee they will be available at the requested time.”

City Taxis has 350 WAV taxis in their fleet, spread across its six locations: Barnsley, Chesterfield, Derby, Dronfield, Rotherham and Sheffield.

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IDFIMH

The trouble is if the firm accepted the booking and no driver would do it they're stuck . I'ts the conundrum so many firms face when wheelchair jobs pay less than 7/8 seater jobs drivers will always want the better job

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lack of modern legislation is the iceberg sinking the titanic of the transport sector

I agree, however the firm does have 350 of them, or so they say.

Maybe this super dupa firm should buy some WAVs themselves and employ drivers to meet that demand when it arises.

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IDFIMH

I would imagine it would be very difficult to have some drivers on PAYE whilst the rest are self employed

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lack of modern legislation is the iceberg sinking the titanic of the transport sector

Depends on the size of the firm.

All firms have work they struggle to clear. Smelly punters, small jobs, WAV jobs etc. I think it makes perfect sense to employ one or two drivers to clear that work.

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IDFIMH