Cockney Rebel...er reject, but not as rejectable as some
Overhaul time again.
overhaul on the taxi has been and gone but not without a smattering of stress on yours truly. I put the cab into the garage early for a bit of bodywork to be done. Nothing to do with accident damage but rust on the bottom of the doors. The cab
livelihood is in the hands of an examiner at SGS on whether he’s having a bad day or not, maybe I ought to get that rust sorted out good and proper. I did question my own sanity on why I was bothering and how many cab drivers had looked at the rust on the bottom of their doors as it appears to be a problem with almost every TX taxi I’ve seen and wondered if they would have bothered to put the cab into the repairers as I did. The rust to be fair was only on the driver’s door and the front near side wing, but knowing
wait a minute... it’s not like I don’t look after my cabs, especially the bodywork because my cab is a white one used for weddings throughout the year. It’s
Mercedes going along to SGS with a bit of rust and trust me it was minuscule and the examiners fail the car. Well don’t worry chaps; it only happens to taxi drivers. Private Hire would be allowed to carry on working, unlike taxi drivers. It’s a bleedin’ scandal they rust so quickly and I do know of some who have had rust sorted in a few months of picking up their cabs from new. Anyway, once the bodywork was done it was taken around the corner for the mechanical.
renewed the road tax to start on the 1st March and had the tyres checked. The meter was changed and to this day I cannot fathom why we need to change the meter at the overhaul and then when the tariff increases but hey ho it’s only our
My appointment was for the 24th
and I want you to try and think what it might have failed on...Yes it failed. Some of you might have spotted my mistake. I
the new road tax to the cab but apparently
40
whatsit and DVLA couldn’t give a monkies uncle they failed the cab on three things from what I’ve been told and one of them was the road tax wasn’t current. I should have left the old tax on the screen which
new one that started on the 1st
bloody pathetic. To be fair it also failed on the headlight alignment and a check strap on the rear near side door. Now, I couldn’t send the cab back to SGS because I had destroyed the old road tax and they wouldn’t pass the cab until the 1st
March.
If that had been a Private Hire vehicle he would have been back at work ten minutes after the car had failed and that’s a fact.
is when our taxis go into any garage to have work done that costs an arm and a leg not only do we have to take it to a taxi garage, private hire can take their vehicles anywhere they choose, but we are at the whim of any grumpy examiner who might feel like failing as many cabs as he thinks and subsequently are putting our mortgages, cab payments into jeopardy. It’s not the same in private hire. I’m sick of the list of defects given to drivers that might or might not fail at SGS because the examiner has got the hump either with the garage because they might have rocked the boat somewhere, or their pension is suddenly not worth what they thought it was. It’s all ifs and buts and maybe and
we should go down the same route as private hire and have two MOTs a year. They keep telling us we do the same job so start treating us accordingly. What will happen when the SGS contract runs out is anyone’s guess but my money is on two
the same as any high street garage that
Yellow badges are still at it.
Yellow badge drivers are still driving into London and stealing the work from their green badge colleagues. In my view they are no better than minicab touts who infest the streets of London with impunity knowing they have a small chance of ever getting caught. Minicab touts make the
given the amount of cars supposedly licensed and are making a mockery of the
March. How
regulations given to private hire regarding touting. One strike and you’re out. What a
that green badge drivers may have to display a green TfL logo with the individual driver’s badge number in the front and rear windows. As if we haven’t enough stickers and rubbish on our windows. Incredibly yellow badge drivers will not have to display any logos telling anyone they are yellow badge drivers stealing work out of their area. Many are ranking at Waterloo
along, and that’s not very often, or they are asked to go somewhere they haven’t
If they want to ply for hire in town then get their fat lardy arses onto the green
they know enforcement is scant to say the least. If the enforcement is as bad as it appears then is it no wonder London is running alive with touts who could end up with far more serious crimes such as drugs, terrorism and rape. If a hotel porter is giving exclusively rides to the airport for a back-hander then should they also
because they are calling a vehicle by phone to pick up their clients. According to TfL statistics, around eight serious sexual assaults are committed in minicabs every single month. If funding was really
not constantly hitting the areas where this scum hang it up lying in wait for some mug
Either way, since Mary Dowdye came to
and I repeat nothing has changed. There are still eight serious sexual assaults every month now as there were in 2007. The key here is enforcement and nothing will change unless they are out on the streets nicking the touts who wait in the streets for a punter to come stumbling past. The police are no better and prefer to walk in the opposite direction rather than stop a tout from at best carrying someone without a licence, or insurance, or worse they could be potential terrorists or rapists.
eye to certain minorities who are either
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