WOLVERHAMPTON PHV SIGNAGE
DfT RESPONSE TO iCARS (SWALE) LTD CONCERNS OVER REMOVING SIGNAGE FROM PHVs
Last month we published a letter from the owners of iCars (Swale) Ltd to Louise Haigh MP, Secretary of State for Transport, in which they expressed their concerns about the DfT’s Best Practice Guidelines, issued in November 2023, which have been cited by City of Wolverhampton Council as the reason for implementing new policies relating to door signage.
Operators of Wolverhampton-licensed private hire vehicles must now remove all door signage, although a small logo can be retained on the back of vehicles. DfT appears to think that this will make customers safer, reduce public confusion between taxis and PHVs and make it harder for bogus PHV drivers to operate.
Neil McLennan and Janice Crawford, owners of iCars (Swale) Ltd, set out in their letter compelling reasons to dispute the DfT’s reasoning, which can be read here:
https://shorturl.at/sshvj
iCars has now received a response to their letter from the DfT, which we have reproduced below.
Department for Transport Great Minster House 33 Horseferry Road London SW1P 4DR Tel: 0300 330 3000 Web Site:
www.gov.uk/dft
2 September 2024
Neil McLennan and Janice Crawford iCars (Swale) Ltd Dear Mr McLennan and Ms Crawford,
Thank you for your emails of 2 and 5 August to the Secretary of State for Transport about private hire vehicle (PHV) signage. Ministers receive many thousands of items of correspondence each year and I hope you will appreciate that it is not possible for them to reply to each one personally in addition to discharging their other ministerial duties. Your letter was passed to the Taxi and PHV Policy Team and I have been asked to reply.
The recommendations made in the Department for Transport’s Best Practice Guidance
issued in
November 2023 were following a public consultation that sought views on PHV signage among a number of issues on the regulation of the sector. A summary of the responses to the signage proposals and the Department’s conclusion is available from the consultation outcome page. It was recognised that there is little consensus on the best approach to take on PHV signage. The final recommendation to
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licensing authorities seeks to enable the public to identify a licensed PHV from an unlicensed vehicle but also to assist the public if differentiating between PHVs and taxis.
The Guidance recommends that licensing authorities’ PHV signage requirements should be limited to the authority licence plate or disc and a “pre-booked only” door sign. It discourages requirements by licensing authorities to display operator signage but says that where there is an exclusive relationship, a licensing authority should consider permitting the display of operator details in a discrete manner (for example through small branding on the rear of the vehicle), so as to not undermine the overall objective to differentiate the two services. The guidance does also recommend that licensing authorities should not permit roof signs of any kind on PHVs and should require all taxis to display a ‘taxi’ roof sign/box.
I note your concerns about the impact on vulnerable customers. The public is safest when they verify the details of the vehicle and/or driver before entering the vehicle. Assuming that a vehicle is theirs simply because it displays the name or logo of the operator with whom they are booked could lead to them trying to get in a vehicle that has not been assigned their booking. If multiple passengers are waiting for a vehicle from an operator, they might all reasonably assume any vehicle is for them; they would need to check with the driver or rely on other unique information such as the
OCTOBER 2024 PHTM
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