General   (General discussion, talk about anything.)

Ena

In one word it is 'Logistics' taxi drivers are now delivering goods instead of people, parcels, food etc because goods don't fart in your vehicle, throw up, run away without paying, and in general are a pain in the arse, and that is just the women

Ex taxi drivers delivering goods can use their own vehicle, the only requirement being that they must have business insurance.
If they went back to taxiing, the fixed running costs for a Private Hire Vehicle are about £3000 a year, it is more for a Hackney Carriage, and on top of that you have your vehicle purchase and maintenance costs.

Then yoo have to go and do the bloody job, and put up with all the crap from people, and I don't just mean your customers, yoo have folk like Whupsy having a go at yoo too

On top of all that AGMA/Wigan Council are bringing in a new set of common rules and standards for taxis in Greater Manchester, inclooding Wigan, and from December 1st this year, three weeks from now, anyone wanting to licence a Private Hire Vehicle/Hackney Carriage in Wigan will have to have a vehicle under four years old, and it must be able to comply with the Greater Manchester clean air zone regulations, imagine how much that is going to cost someone, and they are doing that after the decimation of the taxi industry by Covid, which going off the daily infection rates, is far from over, and as regards existing vehicles, and the clean air zone, and charge for none compliant vehicles, that as been delayed by a year to April 1st 2023 because of Covid, and they have agreed to pay a small grant towards the cost of a replacement compliant vehicle, but that will be no where near the cost of such a vehicle.

So as regards meself and the taxi industry in Wigan, it was 'Goodbye and Farewell and Achoo'

I miss it as much as I would miss having a boil on me bum