Are more hackney carriage taxis required in North East Lincolnshire? Probably not based on an in-depth survey carried out earlier this year. However, the decision will rest with councillors at a licensing meeting later this month. Below is a section of the report on the contents of which they will make their decision.
Customer Feedback
For this survey, a total of 200 interviews were obtained.
In terms of overall use of licensed vehicles, the largest proportion, 37% said they never used them. 22% said once or twice yearly with just 4% saying three or more times weekly.
This resulted in an estimated usage level of 1.4 licensed vehicle trips per person per month.
In 2016, 41% had said ‘less than once a month’, suggesting perhaps a reduction in usage since that time.
In terms of local differences, 42% never used licensed vehicles in Cleethorpes with 35% in Grimsby.
Cleethorpes respondents said 63% could not remember when they last used a hackney carriage but this in Grimsby was 32%.
Eight people said why they would not use ranks. 75% said they used the bus instead, whilst the remaining 25% said using ranks was too expensive.
People were asked to rate various aspects of their recent trip ‘in a taxi’ (having been asked to focus on hackney carriages).
Half those interviewed provided a response.
All responses apart from one (with respect to price), saw the highest score being ‘very good’.
There were no elements that scored ‘very poor’.
Vehicle aspects scored best, with vehicle repair scoring marginally higher than cleanliness.
Neither of these aspects scored any 'poor' or 'very poor' scores.
The driver elements also scored highly, although each had a very small element of ‘poor’ score, but never higher than 3% (for driver appearance).
Driver behaviour had the highest positive score, with knowledge of the area the lowest (but still 50% said ‘very good’).
Comparing areas, Grimsby respondents generally had a wider range of appreciation, with most Cleethorpes responses being either 'good' or 'very good', apart from driver knowledge of area which saw 29% in Cleethorpes say it was 'average'.
As is often the case, price was the key item people were less appreciative of.
Just 20% felt price was ‘very good’. 38% said ‘good’, 36% 'average' and 6% said 'poor'.
However, even this aspect though clearly not scoring as highly, had no ‘very poor’ scores.
Grimsby respondents were generally less concerned with price than those in Cleethorpes.
Overall, this suggests a very well appreciated licensed vehicle service in the North East Lincolnshire licensing area.
All those responding felt safe using daytime licensed vehicles, with a slight reduction to 96% feeling safe at night.
Trade Feedback
For the study, 545 letters were issued.
This covered all drivers, both hackney carriage and private hire.
The response was 6%, which is good and reasonable, albeit less than the 12% from the 2016 survey.
All responses were received by Monday 16th March before any impacts were felt of the coronavirus and therefore all results are fully valid in the context of the overall survey.
The level of responses from both parts of the trade means that relatively realistic comparisons can be made between the general statistics obtained from each part of the trade.
Hackney carriage drivers had much longer lengths of service – nearly 14 years compared with just under 10 for the private hire respondents.
Longest service was 28 years for hackney carriage and 18 years for private hire – both good levels of experience but again suggesting more for the hackney carriage element.
When comparing working weeks, the average days and overall spread of days’ work for both parts of the trade was effectively the same at around 4.7 days each.
A third of hackney carriage drivers said they worked five days whilst this proportion of private hire said they had worked six days, with a further 28% saying five days.
However, 13% of hackney carriage drivers said they worked seven days compared to just 6% for private hire.
The quoted hours worked suggested overall longer hours for private hire in terms of the maximum worked (67 hours compared to 60), and also on average private hire worked more hours (42 compared with 35 hours).
The main issue affecting when people worked was family commitments (29%) followed by equal shares (18% each) for working busy times, avoiding disruptive passengers, and simply ‘preference’.
9% said their working hours were affected by them sharing a vehicle with just 2% avoiding heavy traffic.
The hackney carriage respondents were almost evenly split between those that took pre-bookings and those that did not.
This suggests a relatively high proportion of hackney carriages remain independent and effectively principally rank-based for their hires.
On the private hire side, 78% accepted pre-bookings suggesting the remainder must be niche operations focusing on guaranteed work for specific clients.
Key issues related to the shortage of space for the popularity of the Station rank in Grimsby, but other issues were also raised.
One said the Sea Road ranks in Cleethorpes had not been re-marked.
Another said there were not enough spaces when ranks were operating in High Street and Market Street, Cleethorpes.
Many responses were given in regard to how drivers obtained business.
For the full sample and all responses, telephone gained 25%, ranks and phone apps 22% each, hailing 16% (very high) with school contracts 9% and other (half of which were direct office bookings), 5%.
The only option that anyone said they got all their bookings from was the five who said they depended totally on an app.
None of the other options, including rank and phone, gained such total dependence.
71% of respondents felt fares were about right. 23% felt they should be increased and 3% said reduced.
94% of those responding felt the number of hackney carriages should continue to be limited.
This included all but one private hire who did not respond, and one private hire that felt the limit should not be retained.
This is a very high support for the limit albeit less than the 97% in 2016.
Many suggested how this benefitted the public.
Two suggested it enabled people to get to know the current trade by keeping the trade stable and giving long-term experience in the driving fleet.
Many said it kept congestion from getting worse but suggested there were already too many vehicles and that congestion issues were already severe.
Many confirmed there was no need for more vehicles.
• Various other comments were provided.
Many said there were too many vehicles and one suggested private hire vehicle numbers should also be limited.
One raised issues that they thought others overcharged and that customers told them that regularly.
Another wanted action about too many customers leaving without paying their fare.
One asked for more help with moving to electric vehicles.
The report adds: In summary, a good level of response was obtained.
* The licensing and community protection committee will meet on Wednesday of next week (September 9).
