On 26/04/2016 14:29, Roland Perry wrote:

In message , at 13:27:32 on
Tue, 26 Apr 2016, David Walters remarked:
O. K. How about this then? A young mother is at work and
receives a phone call from her son's school. He's had a serious
accident and needs to be taken to a doctor and then probably
home. Obviously the mother needs to get to the school as
quickly as possible. Neither bus nor train will get the job done
so she needs a cab. She's in the suburbs where black cabs are
rarely found, so a minicab is the obvious mode of transport.

Are they really so rare that you couldn't phone for one and have it
arrive as soon as a minicab? The places I've lived outside of London
with a mixture of hackneys and minicabs it's been just as simple to call
one of the former as the latter.

I just tried to order a cab to my home in the suburbs of North
London using the Hailo app and it says there are no drivers currently
available. Perhaps that isn't the best way of ordering a Taxi though?

I'd try whichever outfit I got my last taxi receipt from.

Your last *minicab* (private hire) receipt from, is what you mean.
David's point - and I've experienced much the same with Hailo - is that
there are not lots of taxis (Hackney carriages) floating around the
suburbs and districts ready to do ordered pick up jobs. (Around some of
London's districts there will be, but there's a lot of London out there.)

In Greater London, a taxi is a taxi, and a minicab is a private hire
care is a minicab, but they are very distinct things.