Article: Up-front taxi fare night trial to fight evasions

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Up-front taxi fare night trial to fight evasions

Up-front taxi fare night trial to fight evasions
Article from: The Courier-Mail

By Peter Morley

October 02, 2008 12:00am

UP-FRONT fares for night-time travel in taxis will be trialled in a Queensland provincial centre from December 1 in a bid to curb fare evasions.

But the Taxi Council - which has organised the three-month trial - is not convinced that it will be the answer to the problem.

"We could find that it means a drop off in receipts - if takings fall by 5 per cent, cabbies will be worse off," council spokesman Blair Davies said.

From yesterday, up-front fares became mandatory in Victorian taxis between 10pm and 5am.

Mr Davies described the step as a knee-jerk political reaction to fare-evasion protests by cabbies in Melbourne.

But because fare evasion accounted for about 60 per cent of complaints from Queensland drivers, the trial was agreed to.

It will be held in a non-tourist area in southeast Queensland in conjunction with Queensland Transport and police. Mr Davies would not identify the location.

But the council can already foresee difficulties for drivers.

Mr Davies said regular customers might feel offended by having to pay up front and credit card payments could be an issue.

"What happens if a card is swiped for $20 and the fare comes in at $21 or below that figure," he said.

But he said the industry was prepared to give the scheme a go in a further bid to reduce problems in taxis.

"In Brisbane, cabs have security cameras and there are secure ranks. And courts are beginning to tighten up with fines for some incidents," Mr Davies said.

"Now we are working our way towards preventing some of these things from occurring and, of course, fare evasion is the No. 1 issue for cabbies.

"We hope the trial will turn up data that the fare evasion situation improves but we are not entirely confident.

"The taxi industry is a very personalised service and we just cannot simply depersonalise it just because there are a couple of grubs out there."

Existing Queensland law allows drivers to demand up-front payment if there are concerns about a prospective passenger's ability to pay. "But a cabbie who does that could find himself facing discrimination allegations," Mr Davies said.