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No increase! The last occasion member’s subscriptions were increased was in September 2008. It has been customary in recent times to have a small increase in line with inflation from time to time, however, the BoM are aware that business is not as good for members as it has been in previous years, consequently we are reluctant to increase your subscriptions. There have been significant cost reductions carried out by the BoM during the past eighteen months in an attempt to reduce our operating costs and with some success. So much so that we are in the position to grant your staff a small percentage increase in their salaries without making an increase to member’s subscriptions. The increment will be effective as from 1 April this year. The BoM discuss annually whether or not the Society is in a position to grant a salary increase to staff and for the past fourteen years - excluding last year - a raise in line with inflation has been granted. Of course, we only raise subscriptions if it is felt to be absolutely necessary and fortunately this year, due to extremely prudent housekeeping, there will not be an increase in member’s subscriptions. However, should circumstances deteriorate rapidly (which I hope they don’t), then the situation would have to be reviewed. Taxis and private hire... |
 you read the story, it is self-explanatory. Initially I was a little concerned at the content, but Robert has assured me it has been sanctioned by their legal advisers who are quite happy with the content. In a nutshell, Glasgow Taxis completed approximately 15,000 trips per month for the NHS, however, the account went to tender and the bottom line was the account was going to be split around half each between a private hire company and Glasgow Taxis. As you can imagine, the management of Glasgow Taxis were a little perturbed at the situation and decided to call a meeting of members to discuss the situation. Unlike us, Glasgow taxis do not have postal voting and any decision taken was decided upon just by the members present. According to Robert, not all members attended, consequently some members that held very strong views regarding not working with the private hire company were very vociferous and the majority of members at the meeting voted to give the NHS twenty eight days notice that they intended to withdraw their service to them. This decision was obviously taken in the hope the NHS would capitulate and Glasgow Taxis would retain all the work. However, things worked to the contrary and the NHS accepted their 28-days notice. As a result, the private hire company now have the whole account and Glasgow Taxis have nothing. There is a moral there somewhere; it’s all very well having very strong views on an issue, but we must always remember we are in the service industry. Just as we have the choice of who we service, clients always have the choice of what mode of transport they will use |
and in the majority of cases, they will
not be dictated to by a vendor - especially if that vendor is also more
expensive. The second article was in regard to a letter we received from an account we had serviced for many years. They had a change of management and the man at the top decided that he did not just require taxis, but cars as well and he was only interested in giving the work to a company that could provide both. Contrary to what many believe, we do not supply cars to clients unless they are such a large customer that in order to retain a huge amount of taxi work, we supply cars from vendors of their choice when they require them. This particular account in question, although not huge, was a very nice one to which we supplied an exemplary service, but to no avail. We still lost the account because we were not prepared to supply exactly what they required. They wanted just one vendor to supply taxis and cars and not have to deal with two vendors, two invoices and two management stats. But I’m sure you are not surprised by this turn of events as I’ve been warning of this particular scenario for some considerable time. Yes, it’s all very well the taxi trade saying they will not work with private hire, so long as they are prepared to lose work. I know there are some - especially outside our Society - that accuse me of being a friend of the private hire industry, but I have to be pragmatic and do what I consider to be best for the majority of members and the Society as a whole. In other words: I’m damned if I do and damned if I don’t! Finally, I would like to reiterate the above two scenarios were included because the Editor wanted them and for no other reason. However, from my point of view, I am pleased with that because I believe both articles will help to keep members informed of how our industry - especially the radio taxi industry - is changing around us...
Brian Rice |
