Addison Lee - better to pay cash

[~Divine~Wind~]

Quite. Infact why ANY taxi driver should expect a tip at all is beyond me. What exactly do they do above and beyond the cost of the journey to deserve a tip?

'Have a tip, thanks for not crashing'?

Every ****** and their dog expect tips now not just Taxi drivers, those resaurants that add the gratuity payment on the bill are swiftly told to remove it. biols my **** if I want to pay a tip for a great service I will but Im certainly not gonna subsidise peoples pay because their employer is a ****

 

[Cosimo]

People like you make me sick, oh I am drunk but I can use my iphone to get home, ******* live in the real world, seriously

Never used a phone to get home whilst drunk just relied on homing instinct.

 

[Nexus]

http://www.addisonlee.com/press/read/523

Interesting.

Wonder if that means they will also be using all of Lewis Day's stock of Prius' which are the standard car?

Though it may just be buying out the competition.

I do seem to remember a colleague having chatted to an Ad Lee driver and he told him that they don't get a very good deal. But really they don't have any choice if they can't afford their own car, as they also have to pay a portion towards its rental. I think this is another reason why they've also got lots of foreigners, because its easy for them to become one with nothing.

Looking at this info on becoming one of their drivers goes to explain a little further why you might have been pushed for cash. They get paid monthly for CC/Account bookings, but obviously straight away for cash. Likely the guy just wanted some ready money, but not really the best way of going about it.

Will I be paid cash for every journey?

There are two types of booking at Addison Lee. Our priority service is account based bookings. For these journeys, you will not receive cash from the client, but will be paid weekly, directly into your bank account.

Secondly, there are cash bookings. For these journeys, the passenger will pay you directly, in cash, when you have completed the journey. These jobs are useful to top up your cash flow.

 

[Correlian]

Its pretty bad here in Dublin - deregulation (anyone can get a licence) together with recession means a massive oversupply of taxis. This leads to huge comptetion to get on ranks which also leads to some nastiness (for instance you wont see a black / african driver on O'Connel street, the native Irish drivers make sure of that). Then when you add in the number of crappy old Toyotas and Nissans from 1995 - 2000 its not an altogether nice experience.

Then, when you finally make it into the taxi, some drivers get very upset about short journeys, specific routes you want them to take (port tunnel for instance). Its not good.

That said, there are some great drivers - just a lot of bad ones too.

 

[fidget]

I had to Google "Addison Lee".

Just a tip.... We don't all live in London

 

[Dolph]

Much harder to evade tax when it's paid on account rather than via tax.

 

[alastair84]

Haha you thought that we were all talking about a single taxi driver, called Addison Lee, didn't you?

 

[Scuzi]

Its pretty bad here in Dublin - deregulation (anyone can get a licence) together with recession means a massive oversupply of taxis. This leads to huge comptetion to get on ranks which also leads to some nastiness (for instance you wont see a black / african driver on O'Connel street, the native Irish drivers make sure of that). Then when you add in the number of crappy old Toyotas and Nissans from 1995 - 2000 its not an altogether nice experience.

Then, when you finally make it into the taxi, some drivers get very upset about short journeys, specific routes you want them to take (port tunnel for instance). Its not good.

That said, there are some great drivers - just a lot of bad ones too.

The situation for taxi drivers in Dublin has become dire. I remember listening to a discussion on the wireless last year about it and apparently the suicide rate among them has skyrocketed.

 

[Glaucus]

My old next door neighbour is a taxi driver. Since the financial crisis there pay has dropped massively. Not because they charge less. But because town is so empty.

I remember the days of Quinn for taxis for a night out, know you can flag one down before you even get to the taxi rank. In fact it's a waste of time even walking there. You might as well stature walking in the direction of home.

It was Friday and sat night they made most of their money.
The ones with the train station licenses are now the ones who are laughing, secure customers and normal shift patterns.

 

[Amp34]

I used to get a black cab from Heathrow to West Drayton on a regular basis when I worked up there. Every damn time without fail the driver would have a rant at me about how it was a short journey and he came to the airport to make big money, not do silly jobs like this.

They have an ego that needs a reality check.

You mean like the £70 it costs to travel 15 minutes to Staines from heathrow on a sundat at 9pm?! Absolutely ridiculous charges. That was with those stupid coordinators who faf around liasing between you and the taxi driver as well...

 

[Amp34]

I had to Google "Addison Lee".

Just a tip.... We don't all live in London

So did I and I work in london... What's your point...

 

[Scuzi]

You mean like the £70 it costs to travel 15 minutes to Staines from heathrow on a sundat at 9pm?! Absolutely ridiculous charges. That was with those stupid coordinators who faf around liasing between you and the taxi driver as well...

Tell me about it. £25 to West Drayton which is...what? 3 miles? Purple Parking valet service ***

 

[arknor]

I got a taxi in Bristol once and had to use the sat nav on my phone to give him directions, IMO they should either know the area or have their own sat nav, they are pretty cheap these days.

i got of the train in nottingham jumped in a black cab and told him where i wanted to go and he handed me an A-Z lol... this was about 10 years ago before satnav i guess.

it was one of the areas of nottingham with a really bad reputation so i cant believe he didnt even know how to get there.

luckily i didnt need the a-z to give him directions or i would have found another taxi instead

 

[Scam]

cool story bro, why dont we all show each other our bank balances , cars and houses?

dont know why people have to come out like wow im rich as hell cos i can get taxis on a company account on a forum like this espcially when its fairly obvious quite a few on here are more than likely a lot richer than you will ever be yet they dont need to brag

Holy jumping to conclusions batman... The only reason I can get cabs to/from work is because I work an extremely variable nightshift - starting anywhere from 11pm-4am. If you must know I get paid **** all for working in central London and that's just about the only benefit I get out of my company..? If you're so insistent on picking up on someone bragging maybe you're better off looking at the person who has bragged about spending £600+ on AdLee in 3 months? Sheesh.. chill out man. The whole world's not against you.

Considering the horrendous hours of the night I end up getting cabs with AL I think I've actually done alright. Only had 2-3 near misses in about a year. That's probably more to do with the lack of traffic though! The guy I work with has had a driver fall asleep 3 times at the wheel though and had one drive looking only at the satnav - to the point where he turned off a roundabout early and stopped immediately and pulled back onto it!

I've had one guy (white, British ) ranting at me about the pay etc. I think he thought I was some hotshot getting picked up in Soho whereas I was sat in the back working out that yes he probably does get paid more than me anyway. Didn't help that he was finishing for the night and lived in Essex whereas I live in West London..

 

[Adrianr]

Quite. Infact why ANY taxi driver should expect a tip at all is beyond me. What exactly do they do above and beyond the cost of the journey to deserve a tip?

'Have a tip, thanks for not crashing'?

+1

You can apply that to any other job that pays a wage for a service and still expects a tip on top.

Didn't know about the Addison Lee app though, sounds smashing

 

[fidget]

So did I and I work in london... What's your point...

My point is the fact that most people living in London seem to forget there is a lot more of the UK on the other side of the M25 and we are not all aware of every "London only" company or place.

Therefore a thread with a title such as "Addison Lee - Better to pay cash" would have been better written as "Addison Lee Taxis - better to pay cash" instead of assuming that everyone in the UK has heard of a London only business.

 

[dowie]

People like you make me sick, oh I am drunk but I can use my iphone to get home, ******* live in the real world, seriously

Wow - if you're anti technology then you're probably posting on the wrong forum... people using smart phones etc.. are 'living in the real world'. I don't see what is so wrong about sharing a tip to pay cash - which saves money for both the customer and gets the driver a better share.

 

[dowie]

ha, living in London one of the biggest cities in the world, city that never sleeps and people have to go to their Iphone because they are inept at going to a cash machine while "tipsy"

please go.

LOL - yes people use technology out of laziness - not just simply convince and efficiency. I suppose you always trek down to the nearest taxi office and book in person as using a phone/app to book a cab makes you 'inept'

In other news I also buy things on the internet (such as from stores like overclockers) and have them delivered to my house - I guess that must be because I'm to inept to go to a proper shop?

Honestly what is a Luddite like you doing on a forum like this, should you even be using the internet?

 

[Amp34]

My point is the fact that most people living in London seem to forget there is a lot more of the UK on the other side of the M25 and we are not all aware of every "London only" company or place.

Therefore a thread with a title such as "Addison Lee - Better to pay cash" would have been better written as "Addison Lee Taxis - better to pay cash" instead of assuming that everyone in the UK has heard of a London only business.

And... There are plenty of people that live and work in London that don't know them either. Just smacks of hatred really considering there have been plenty of threads like this with northern themes that those outside the small cities in the north wouldn't know...

 

[Nexus]

And... There are plenty of people that live and work in London that don't know them either. Just smacks of hatred really considering there have been plenty of threads like this with northern themes that those outside the small cities in the north wouldn't know...

Indeed.

I used to think Addison Lee was a cleaning company.