In Belfast, who you gonna call? fonaCAB!
Sometimes a company has so many strings to its bow, so many strands to its story, that you’re not sure where to start, or what the most inter- esting aspect is. With Belfast’s fonaCAB it would be great to go into depth about the company’s family back- ground (current owner William McCausland is the second generation of owner) and the roller- coaster ride which saw it shrink from 70 cars in the 1960s down to just 12 through the Troubles in the 1970s. But when you speak with William, one word stands out above all others: “professionalism”. Everything about fonaCAB says that this is a company run the right way, and that’s what we really want to convey here. fonaCAB is one of Britain’s largest fleets with almost 500 vehicles. William McCausland is the owner and runs things alongside General Man- ager Simon Sims and a huge team of almost 80 staff – not including drivers. This is a serious business! How do you get a fleet of 500 cars? Acquisitions are a large element, but resourcefulness helps too. In 2006 fonaCAB found that their require- ment for vehicles less than four years old (far stricter than the legal requirements) was caus- ing issues for drivers who couldn’t necessarily afford to buy a new vehicle, and weren’t in a position to obtain finance. Rather than relaxing their standards, fonaCAB thought outside the box: they partnered with Skoda to introduce a ‘Rent To Buy’ scheme enabling drivers to source their own vehicle through fonaCAB. “We now have over 150 vehi- cles on the fleet through this scheme,” explains William. “It helped us raise vehicle standards for customers; added a service to our drivers; and our fleet grew.” Such thinking is typical of fonaCAB, which has always been about the customer. “We have always had uniformed drivers, but we also do specialised call centre customer service train- ing,” William continues. “A well trained driver or member of staff is much more effective”. Assisant General Manager Joanne McGleenan has been the driving force behind the training available to both staff and drivers, with bespoke training for drivers recently upgraded to a level 2 qualification through the ‘Open College Net- work’.
“Three years ago we achieved the
Investors In People award, which has just been increased to Bronze level,” William explains. “There are only three taxi companies in Britain with this, and we’re the only one in Northern Ire- land. We have won the Department of Employment and Learning Partnership Training Award, as well as the GoSkills Company of the Year award.” “We have always been focused on service,” William continues. “We fully support the drivers, but they have to buy into our approach. We have customer service principles which everyone has
to follow. We have robust training and a com- plaints policy – although we don’t get many – and any issues are dealt with within a day.” Bold statements, but William can back them up: “We installed Trapeze’s SMS feedback system, and they say they have never seen feedback like ours. It’s 95% positive; sometimes not a single negative comment in a day.” Not bad consider- ing fonaCAB do 40,000 jobs per week. “Good comments are fed back to the driver or member of staff, but when it’s bad we act on that as well,” William finishes. This conveniently brings us on to the technolo- gy behind fonaCAB: their Auriga dispatch system by Trapeze. “In 1998 we hit a wall: it was like a glass ceiling in that you couldn’t grow beyond around 110 cars without a data system,” William explains. “We looked around and went with Auriga.” Auriga (now Trapeze of course) and fonaCAB have prospered together – the fleet increasing from 110 cars to 500 in 14 years. “You could not operate 500 cars without a system,” William insists. “We are always striving for our service to be proper and correct – and it all hangs on our dispatch sys- tem.” “We put everything in our system,” William begins. “It tracks all the driv- ers’ documents and licences to ensure all is correct. The system gives us
complete control, which is essential if you’re customer focused. We use Driver Shift Manage- ment to ensure we have cars out when we need them, and GPS makes us more efficient. Textback allows us to improve service. There are always new tools to help us improve, and keep ahead of the competition.” Now without wishing to get too technical, William also waxes lyrical about a couple of seemingly innocuous elements of their Trapeze system. Firstly, something called ‘subzones’, which mean they can ensure a more efficient dispatching system: “We don’t want a one size fits all solution,” William explains. “Subzones mean there’s no compromise: each part of a street dispatches exactly how we need, so that the closest car gets the job.” And the other element is the Auriga system’s ‘Scheduler’: a complex piece of code which is what makes the system appear to actually ‘think’: “We have different dispatching routines for different times,” says William. “In rush hour we pull cars the opposite way of the traffic, so drivers don’t get stuck in jams. And at pubs clos- ing time we don’t want all our cars in the suburbs: we want vehicles in town where they are needed. We ensure a car returning to the centre won’t be sent a job behind them; that job is better dealt with by one further out. All this is important for customer service as it reduces waiting times.” The system actually replicates the kind of think- ing a human dispatcher would do – and fonaCAB have as many of these routines as they want, switching between them as required. Intel- ligent Dispatch is what Trapeze call it, and it certainly sounds very clever.
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Additionally, fonaCAB have Trapeze’s flagship Eclipse unit in all 500 cars. “It’s more conven- ient; the screen is larger; it looks more professional; and it has GPRS Fallback for back- up,” William continues. “The internal mapping was important, and ‘Out Of Car’ is attractive for drivers.” And fonaCAB have just added Trapeze’s iPhone Booking App to their collection: “In this day and age, everyone has iPhones,” William says. “Peo- ple who have them love their Apps. Tracking your car as it collects you may be a novelty, but it will get people to use it a couple of times – and then you’ve got them as a customer.” All this paints a picture of a very healthy compa- ny, and the results bear it out: “Things are very difficult in the economy, but thankfully with recent acquisitions and focus on the customer we’re holding good numbers,” William says. “This year, week on week, we’re very nearly matching our peak. I think a lot of people are struggling, but we’re working hard to succeed.” And before we leave, William provides a glimpse of his plan for the FonaCAB’s future, which comes across as something of a motivational ral- lying call: “We will improve every aspect of the company,” he insists. “Not just to the customer, but the driver too. The driver is our customer as well, and our main source of revenue. So I want to look after the drivers. That’s a big focus: to see if there are new initiatives we can do to help out, make their work easier and more pleasant.” “We don’t do everything right; we can always improve every single day,” William concludes. “You’ve got to be hungry every day. I’m the sort of guy that if I come in and a lightbulb is out, I can’t leave it. I monitor everything, and leave nothing. There’s always room for improvement.” With that approach it seems inevitable: fonaCAB is only going in one direction.
fonaCAB Belfast Address: Telephone:
209 Knock Road Belfast BT5 6QE
02890 333333
Year firm started: 1962 No. of vehicles:
c.500
Types of vehicle: Private hire: mainly saloons
Licensing Authority: Dept of the Environment Booking system: Phone system: Radio System
Trapeze - Auriga Samsung Tait
PHTM AUGUST 2012
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