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Debit Card Charges
Why have we started charging for debit cards? Aren't these cards meant to be equivalent to cheques and processed in the same way? The 10% we charge is quite high compared with other retailers who charge nothing. Who gets this fee, the finance company or DaC? Can someone from the BoM please enlighten me?
Thanks for an interesting magazine...
Francis Robinson (G18)
Allan Evans replies: All Debit Cards carry a 10% handling fee and when one is processed, the clearing Bank will charge Dial-a-Cab a set administration fee for each and every card processed. The handling charge offsets any admin charges and the small amount remaining is retained by Dial-a-Cab to cover the cost of the transaction.

Mobile Phones
I thought only the membership could pass rules and the only rules that bind a member are in the rulebook (this has been brought up before, I say it again for the benefit of new members).
   Funny, is it not, as it is now an intrusion to the customer for a driver to talk on the phone. Remember a while back, it was an offence not to have the old voice communication on and babbling away when on an account ride! Was that an intrusion and distraction as you beetled down the motorway and old Gitlin was urgently enquiring - "Calling what's yer name, calling what's yer name, come in what's yer name - your customer has forgotten his passport."
   "Sorry, I didn't hear it as I was attending to my driving!"
   "Well you're on complaint matey boy..." Funny old world!
   Perhaps we should turn our radio communications off on an account ride, as we may be distracted by the beep, the entreaty of 'please readme I am communicating with you...' Maurice Haben G17
Tom Whitbread replies: As I wrote my views and opinions in last month's Call Sign, I will not go over the same ground again. But it seems very funny that after I wrote the article, the government and police have decided that from the end of the year, drivers will be prosecuted for using mobile phones whilst driving. But the thing that amazes me most is that some taxi drivers can see no further than their noses, they cannot see they are driving clients away from us to private hire. Why? Because of their bad manners and quite often bad driving whilst on the phone. By the way, I would like to put Maurice straight as he obviously did not read my article correctly; in bold print it said NEW PROCEDURAL RULE. Drivers do not have to vote on procedural rules, they are put in place by the Board to safeguard subscriber's work and the Society. I wish that drivers would understand it is not the Board versus drivers, we see the large overall picture and we try to protect your work. God, knows, we do not want to

lose anymore...

Bus Lanes, Parking Tickets and Everything...
Further to Doug Vogel's (R05) letter (July Call Sign), London Bridge north bound is signed buses and taxis on the first sign just by the traffic lights on the south side. Hammersmith has a sneaky way of issuing tickets, it uses cameras. I was given a ticket for stopping on a single yellow line whilst I took a letter in to a bank, which took all of two minutes. When you think about it, it can take a person longer than that to pay you off at times, so will they start giving tickets for that? I am amazed that with all the misinformation that the LTDA has been spreading, that they did not ask the trade to write to TfL to make changes to the hire car laws
which would have given more

DaC Work Experience

I would like to pass on my thanks through Call Sign Magazine to Lorraine Carruthers, Shelagh Adkins, Allan Evans and Tony Anastasiou (drivers reception), for allowing myself and my friend Gemma to be let loose in Dial-a-Cab, to carry out our work experience. This was hard work to start with but gradually got better and with the help from all at DaC, it was a rewarding and fun experience. We both felt that Dial-a-Cab was easy going, fair-minded but firm at the same time and a great place to work. Most people seemed to have a smile on their face throughout the whole day, which is a good reflection of the company. The two weeks we spent there were very beneficial and very satisfying.
I would like to thank, once again, everyone who made us welcome at Dial-a-Cab...
Laura McKenzie
Brixton SW9
Speed Trap Warnings
I still fail to see why the control room refuses to pass on details of speed guns at work. After all, if you go HERE  then you will find locations of mobile enforcement vans with details of dates and areas to be targeted. It seems that Transport for London can give drivers this information, but Dial-a-Cab cannot pass on similar information to its members.
Laurence Kelvin (W88)
My view on the subject is well known, having written the original article that started the debate in the March 2003 Call Sign (police stop DaC warning drivers about speed traps).
   However, I don't run the company! If I did, I might have to think differently. Would I consider a point of principle worth the possible sacrificing of a £50million a year business owned by its members? I'm sure there is a happy medium in the middle. I seem to remember in the early days that warnings went out without ever needing to mention police or speed traps. The return of the 'Blue Trees' Gardening Club perhaps? As you have mentioned a website Laurence, here is another. It contains the National Speed Offence Database and anyone can use it provided they apply for a login and password (available on the site): HERE. Let me know what you think ...Ed
The Best Ideas Are the Sleaziest! Allen Togwell recently asked drivers for suggestions as to how we could increase our workload. Having read the enclosed newspaper cutting, you can tell him to tear up all other ideas and to use this one.
TAXI RIDES
Cabbie Varga Arpad, 48, says business is booming since he started playing porn videos in his taxi in Gradea, Romania.
Gerald Webber (E01)
Thank you for that Gerald. There's room for a joke here but I'm just starting to enjoy this job! ...Ed

Lou Dunn
Please convey my sincere thanks to all the subscribers on Dial-a-Cab for their letters, cards and messages of sympathy on the recent passing of my father, Lou. As you know, he had a wonderful evening at the recent DaC 50th anniversary Dinner and Ball and couldn't stop talking about it. He was very proud of the fact that he

was one of the first owner-drivers to be on radio and he was a London Taxi Driver through and
through for almost fifty years. One of his delights was to read the trade papers and especially Call Sign. He will always remember yours (Alan) and Brian's kindness when he visited Dial-a-Cab HQ and also Nuala and Val in Driver's Services who gave Dad the biggest smile I have ever seen on him!
Gerry Dunn MBE (S84)
Mark's Suggestion Box?
Alan, some time ago you researched and wrote a short history of Dial-a-Cab. It showed how DaC had grown from its very humble beginnings, to the sophisticated technology now being used with GPS, etc. At the time, I suggested in a letter to the then-Editor Jery Craig, to use it as an Advertorial-type booklet for passengers to read in the back of the cab. Although it's probably a bit late (I'd have expected the Marketing department to use our 50th anniversary in some way, shape or form), a short pictorial booklet similar to the Annual Report, from then to now shouldn't be asking too much, should it? Ideally, it would've been in co-ordination with a revamp of the circuit's logo and image, to freshen up the fleet - something that should
be a feature of the Marketing department and it's budget over a regular time period. However, it's more likely the person responsible, is "out to lunch" searching for "the guy walking up and down Oxford Street with the placard proclaiming the End of the World is Nigh" (Allen Togwell, July 2003 Call Sign), trying to get him to amend his board and add: "SALE! Fixed priced rides with DaC!" You've gotta laugh...
Mark White (B86)
   Brian Rice replies: Mark, I think I am going to have to intervene here because the diatribe that is going back and forth between you and Allen Togwell is getting personal and may I say just a little boring. I was hopeful that the days of 'scoring points' had long passed. Regarding our logo, the last thing that I would wish to do is tamper with it after we have spent the past six years endeavouring, with some success, to make our logo recognisable and identifiable to Dial-a-Cab. After all, when was the last time huge brands such as Coca Cola, Mars, Colgate or Colmans changed their easily recognisable identity? Well they haven't, because once you get there - you keep it. Unless, of course, you change from the Post Office to Consignia - and then if it doesn't work you change back to the Post Office - and that cost them millions! Finally Mark, regarding a pictorial view of DaC over the last fifty years to keep in the back of our cabs, it is an idea, but in my view, like changing our logo, not a good idea.

Call Sign Winner - and Loser!

Many thanks for the book I won in the July Call Sign competition. I'm in a bit of a mess this morning so your phone call letting me know I was a winner really cheered me up. I was really chuffed because I don't normally win things! Then like an idiot, I went out and had an accident, which was my fault - my first one in 7 years. Now I feel really gutted. What's my insurance going to be like? Is it worth claiming or should I pay it out of my own pocket? So my thanks for the win, I'm now going away on holiday. I've now got no cab but at least I've got Alf's book to read on the beach. You're a star Al...
Steve Brown (D67)
I'll make sure you lose next time Steve! Enjoy your holiday ...Ed

Where's Call Sign?
I have been using your research facility on the Call Sign website and have found it to be invaluable in my project on London's taxi system. But the site seems to have been taken down. Will it return?
Aaron Smeltzing
UCLA, California
We had a problem for two weeks in July, but the Call Sign website now been fixed and is back online ...Ed

August 2003 Call Sign Home Page

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