A hackney carriage vehicle with sign on door and someone with a mobile phone standing nearby
New signs for taxi car doors

New signs will appear on car doors of taxi and private hire vehicles.

Tonbridge and Malling Borough Council is taking action to ensure a safer taxi experience in the borough. New signage on taxi and private hire vehicles will make it easier for people to report concerns, provide reassurance that standards are being monitored and help customers feel safe.

The borough council is one of the first authorities in the country to adopt this approach, which comes after reports of taxi drivers at Tonbridge Station refusing short-distance fares and turning away passengers without cash, sometimes leaving lone women stranded at night. Under licensing regulations, taxi drivers must accept the first fare that hails them, no matter what the distance. In several cases complainants could not recall the vehicle plate numbers meaning the council had no way of addressing the issue with the drivers concerned.

Licence identifications are currently on the rear of vehicles, which are less visible to people using taxis. The new signs will appear on the side of vehicles and will feature a QR code for passengers to scan with their phones to report any issues directly to the council’s complaints webpage. This aims to simplify the process of reporting problems and identifying vehicles and drivers.

Des Keers, the council’s cabinet member for Community Services said “We are committed to ensuring high quality, safe taxi services across our borough and making licence numbers more clearly visible is just one way of doing that. While most passengers don’t have issues, we also want to make it easier for those who do to report it so we can investigate and take appropriate action.”

The new signs will roll out to more than 500 registered private hire and hackney carriage vehicles from early November.

 

Published: Wednesday, 23rd October 2024