Cheques and BACS
Many of you will remember me writing in the Chairman’s Report of last May that our Bank was beginning to phase out the process of cashing cheques for members at their own branches for any Dial-a-Cab credit work they have undertaken. The Banks are very keen to end this service due to the cost involved, however, it also entails a significant cost to Dial-a-Cab because not only do we have to pay for every cheque issued, we also have to pay an amount for every £100 of cash that is handed over. For companies to issue cheques to people that they might then go and cash is somewhat unusual and is only a service that they have provided for us under ‘Spanish Custom’ and they now wish to terminate this agreement.
   In that article, I requested that members consider having their credit money paid directly into their Building Society and Bank Accounts rather than having cheques issued to them and my request proved to be very rewarding, the result being that we now have less than 100 members who have their credit money paid to them by cheque. The amazing thing is that the majority of the 100, when they receive their cheque, then pay it into their account instead of cashing it anyway!
   So that’s the background and returning to the point, the Bank has said they will be phasing out the cashing of cheques by 1 April 2005. Consequently, if you are one of the members who are still paid by cheque, then you must inform either Nuala or Val in Drivers Services of your Bank or Building Society details so that we will have an account to deposit your Credit money into. I’d also like to remind you that should you clear a credit ride by midnight on Thursday and you are a weekly paid driver, then the money will be in your account on the following Friday.
   The Dial-a-Cab Credit Union, as you know, is a separate unit to the Dial-a-Cab radio circuit; however, I have been reliably informed that their cheque cashing facility will also cease on 31 March 2005. Please do not put it off; get in touch with Nuala or Val immediately and give them your Bank/Building Society details.

Concierge, Car Companies and Service.
I know much has been said and written in recent times regarding Concierge, Car Companies and the service we provide. Elsewhere in this issue of Call Sign, you will see that the Editor has asked me some questions regarding Concierge and hopefully the answers will help to quell some of the rumours and false information
that is being bandied about.

   Before I talk about Concierge, I would like to talk about the service we provide for Car Companies; I know it’s a bitter pill to swallow that we back up their service, but if we did not do it then the other two major radio taxi circuits would, so that leaves us in a bit of a predicament - damned if we do and damned if we don’t. The amazing thing is that the car companies still use us even at this time of the year and as you are aware, everything is at full meter fare and full gratuity. But following the excellent service that we provided over the holiday period, some of the car companies’ clients have approached us regarding opening an account directly with us instead of with the car company! It would appear that the car companies service at that time left something to be desired and most of the time the vehicle that was being supplied was from us anyway! Consequently, we have been approached about opening an account directly with those clients, something I do not have a problem with. I am hopeful that within the next few weeks or so, things will come to fruition.
   Regarding Concierge, I’ve heard so much rubbish and read literature that is totally untrue. However, there is a saying that I believe to be very apt - it doesn’t matter what the truth is, it’s what people believe that’s important! So I will endeavour to set the record straight and give you the facts.
   As most of you know, JPMC is one of the largest taxi users in London and was totally a ComCab account for more than twenty years. They did not use any other taxi suppliers, just car companies. Then a few years back, we managed to get into the account and built our share of the taxi usage up to 10% of the taxi account - after all, 10% is better than 100% of nothing. We have regular meetings with the Client and it became apparent that they wanted one Vendor to manage their whole account, including taking bookings, telephone/on-line, supplying them with one invoice, one set of Management Stats and to distribute the work equally among all the Vendors. We were not worried about distributing the car work to the car companies equally, after all, this was work they were doing anyway and the customer would still choose them regardless. What