We were about to embark at Dover, when (Mike
Hughes) came up to me and whispered:

For those who don't know about such things, you will often find
that many PH companies

Lets test these claims...

use drivers who have not taken the extensive 'knowledge' test;

But are often training for it while earning and learning as TfL licensed
PH Drivers

do not have to take any additional driving test;

Nor do Taxi Drivers.

may in fact be driving without a UK driving licence

Unlikely, as a part of the licensing process is to check the driver is
legal to drive in the UK, and has valid licence, insurance and CRB.

frequently charge more than the metered taxi fare.

PH Vehicles are not allowed to put meters in their cabs. As a result,
they charge by mileage.

You can;t really use the old lies about Minicabs now they are all
licensed by the PCO, and lies like yours make i more likely I would use a
Minicab, not a Hackney, if I need a cab in London.


--
Paul Cummins - Always a NetHead
Wasting Bandwidth since 1981
IF you think this http://bit.ly/u5EP3p is cruel
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In message , Paul
Cummins writes
We were about to embark at Dover, when (Mike
Hughes) came up to me and whispered:

For those who don't know about such things, you will often find
that many PH companies

Lets test these claims...

use drivers who have not taken the extensive 'knowledge' test;

But are often training for it while earning and learning as TfL licensed
PH Drivers

There are *some* but they are a very small percentage

do not have to take any additional driving test;

Nor do Taxi Drivers.

Wrong. Taxi drivers are required to take an additional driving test
before they get their licence. This includes the correct procedure to
accommodate wheelchair users. PH drivers take no additional test at all.

may in fact be driving without a UK driving licence

Unlikely, as a part of the licensing process is to check the driver is
legal to drive in the UK, and has valid licence, insurance and CRB.

They do not require a UK driving licence until they have been in the UK
for 12 months - there is no additional test to get their licence.

As for CRB checks, it is not possible to check back for those who are
newly arrived in the UK, yet they are granted licences.

frequently charge more than the metered taxi fare.

PH Vehicles are not allowed to put meters in their cabs. As a result,
they charge by mileage.

Which is more likely to be higher that the meter rate. Minimum fare for
the best known minicab firm is £12.oo minimum fare for a taxi £2.40. The
majority of day time fares are less than £10 so using a minicab will
cost more - and they can't legally go into bus lanes, or through Oxford
Street.

You can;t really use the old lies about Minicabs now they are all
licensed by the PCO, and lies like yours

What lie?. If you are at a nightclub in London you'll find that the
prices they quote are higher than those for taxis. They are also
uninsured if they pick up from the street i.e. their insurance is ONLY
for pre-booked jobs.

make i more likely I would use a
Minicab, not a Hackney, if I need a cab in London.


That is your choice, but when you're sat in traffic or diverted due to
road works, or many of the various events that the roads are closed for,
especially with the Olympics coming up, don't expect the Satnav users to
know how to get around the closures.

You could ask the lady who, after 3 hours of going round the centre of
London in the minicab booked by the company she was visiting, ended up
ion tears as he just couldn't get her the hotel - a simple 10 minute
journey for me as I knew how to get around the roadworks.

As I said it's your choice.

--
Mike Hughes
A Taxi driver licensed for London and Brighton
at home in Tarring, West Sussex, England
Interested in American trains real and model?
Look here http://www.flickr.com/photos/mikehughes2011/

In message , at 10:24:23 on
Thu, 7 Jun 2012, Mike Hughes remarked:
You could ask the lady who, after 3 hours of going round the centre of
London in the minicab booked by the company she was visiting, ended up
ion tears as he just couldn't get her the hotel - a simple 10 minute
journey for me as I knew how to get around the roadworks.

That happened to me in Washington DC. A taxi from the airport ended up
going round the block three times without getting any closer to our very
centrally located hotel, so we got out and walked the last hundred
yards.

And I had the same problem in Sheffield earlier this year - the road
pattern has been completely changed since my satnav's database. I went
round three times trying to find out how to get to The Crucible, before
giving up and walking the last 400 yds. (Every route I tried ended up
either at a "buses only" or a "pedestrians only" blockade).
--
Roland Perry

We were about to embark at Dover, when (Mike
Hughes) came up to me and whispered:

Wrong. Taxi drivers are required to take an additional driving
test before they get their licence. This includes the correct
procedure to accommodate wheelchair users.

Wrong. This is not a "Driving test" as the DSA do not implement it.

It is a Conduct test.

AS for the rest of your drivel, why don't you try going into somewhere
like, say, London Executive in Great Suffolk Street, tell them you are a
Licenced hackney driver wanting a job, and see how quickly they show you
the door. I doubt you'd be going slow enough to notice there's a floor...

--
Paul Cummins - Always a NetHead
Wasting Bandwidth since 1981
IF you think this http://bit.ly/u5EP3p is cruel
please sign this http://bit.ly/sKkzEx

---- If it's below this line, I didn't write it ----

Wrong. This is not a "Driving test" as the DSA do not implement it.

It is a Conduct test.


It's sometimes hard to tell on Usenet who is right and who is wrong so,
having had a few minutes spare to waste, I did a little digging.

As regards the term "driving test", it is used both in the underlying
legislation (the London Cab Order 1934
(1934 No. 1346)) and colloquially by TfL and the DSA for what taxi
drivers in some areas are required to undertake.

Turning to who carries out the test/assessment/whatever, TfL think they
have a contract with DSA to design and carry out the tests; and DSA
think they run them and invite people to book them on their website.
See eg
http://www.dft.gov.uk/fyn/practical.php
http://www.tfl.gov.uk/businessandpar...ire/17726.aspx)
http://www.tfl.gov.uk/assets/downloa...ase-in-VAT.pdf

Of course I may well have missed something but at that point I moved on
to waste my time on other things
--
Robin
reply to address is (meant to be) valid

We were about to embark at Dover, when (Robin) came up
to me and whispered:

As regards the term "driving test", it is used both in the
underlying legislation (the London Cab Order 1934
(1934 No. 1346)) and colloquially by TfL and the DSA for what
taxi drivers in some areas are required to undertake.

and it's broadly the same application process for Taxi and PHV licensing.

http://www.tfl.gov.uk/assets/downloa...river-operator
-and-vehicle-licensing-guidelines.pdf

Including the requirement to hold an EEA licence, have a CRB check and,
if previously living abroad, to supply a "Certificate of Good Conduct".

And any licenced hackney driver would know this, as he has to jump
through exactly the same hoops as a PHV driver, ad has done for more than
10 years. So any Hackney Carriage driver claiming otherwise is either 10
years out of date or deliberately stirring **** to cause Fear,
Uncertainty and Doubt.

"Look at us - we're proerly checked and licensed" - Just like John
Worbouys was:
http://www.google.co.uk/url?sa=t&rct...cd=2&ved=0CFgQ
FjAB&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.telegraph.co.uk%2Fnews%2 Fuknews%2Flaw-and-order%
2F5194618%2FBlack-cab-rapist-serial-sex-attacker-John-Worboys-jailed-indef
initely.html&ei=sUDRT42GKeO-0QXcnZAy&usg=AFQjCNHC14Uwpy5Hkv06xui4Y24ilT4h1
g&sig2=8byObS7w5qG6cZkVt3EB3w

--
Paul Cummins - Always a NetHead
Wasting Bandwidth since 1981
IF you think this http://bit.ly/u5EP3p is cruel
please sign this http://bit.ly/sKkzEx

---- If it's below this line, I didn't write it ----

And any licenced hackney driver would know this, as he has to jump
through exactly the same hoops as a PHV driver, ad has done for more
than 10 years.

"Exactly" apart from (in London) "the knowledge" and from the test by
the DSA (if you do now accept that it is a test and by the DSA)?

--
Robin
reply to address is (meant to be) valid

In message , Paul
Cummins writes
We were about to embark at Dover, when (Mike
Hughes) came up to me and whispered:

Wrong. Taxi drivers are required to take an additional driving
test before they get their licence. This includes the correct
procedure to accommodate wheelchair users.

Wrong. This is not a "Driving test" as the DSA do not implement it.

Get your facts straight. It is a DSA test - failure means that you don't
get your licence.

It is a Conduct test.

AS for the rest of your drivel, why don't you try going into somewhere
like, say, London Executive in Great Suffolk Street, tell them you are a
Licenced hackney driver wanting a job, and see how quickly they show you
the door. I doubt you'd be going slow enough to notice there's a floor...


--
Mike Hughes
A Taxi driver licensed for London and Brighton
at home in Tarring, West Sussex, England
Interested in American trains real and model?
Look here http://www.flickr.com/photos/mikehughes2011/

Mike Hughes wrote on 07 June 2012 10:24:23 ...
In .domain, Paul
writes
[snip]

make i more likely I would use a
Minicab, not a Hackney, if I need a cab in London.

That is your choice, but when you're sat in traffic or diverted due to
road works, or many of the various events that the roads are closed for,
especially with the Olympics coming up, don't expect the Satnav users to
know how to get around the closures.

True, but don't assume that it's always the taxi driver that has the
knowledge. In my last two cab journeys, both involving heavily
congested roads, the minicab driver (Monarch Radio Cars, W4) was superb,
both in driving skills and knowledge of the street network. By
contrast, the taxi driver with an all-London badge, hailed on the street
at Edgware Road H&C station, needed advice from me on 4 separate
occasions because he evidently had very poor knowledge of West London.
--
Richard J.
(to email me, swap 'uk' and 'yon' in address)

We were about to embark at Dover, when
(Richard J.) came up to me and whispered:

True, but don't assume that it's always the taxi driver that
has the knowledge.

To be fair, it's the Bike couriers that have the best knowledge.

I proved this in 2005/6 when I had to regularly be in offices just off
Old Street by 10am on a Saturday, and was regularly parking my car
outside the door at 9.55, having left Basingstoke at 9am and stopped at
Old Street McDonalds on the way.

And I hadn't done Courier Work in London for over 8 years at that point.

--
Paul Cummins - Always a NetHead
Wasting Bandwidth since 1981
IF you think this http://bit.ly/u5EP3p is cruel
please sign this http://bit.ly/sKkzEx

---- If it's below this line, I didn't write it ----