Taxi

positron

Just wondering if any of you knowledgeable lot here has any suggestions for a wannabe (thinking of) Taxi guy?

I am full-time employed otherwise, so thinking of doing this as a weekend-job primarily; and with a rented accommodation and spiralling costs of living, I could really do with some extra income. I found some info here (http://www.taxi.ie/howto.shtml), and am thinking about buying a car that punters won’t mind getting into (second hand, between €10 – 15 thousand) and start working on weekends (only). Is this a feasible plan? Will the returns pay off the investment, in say a couple of years? Any problems, existing or coming up (too many taxi’s out there? Grudge towards new taxi plates? Luas/Dublin Bus etc) that I should know about? Any comments appreciated!!

John R

There is plenty of demand for taxis on Friday and Saturday nights in the city.
It is difficult to drive through the city on these nights without hitting potential punters drunkenly running across the streets. Last week some fool jumped into my car while I was waiting at traffic lights, it took me several minutes to convince him that I was not driving a taxi and that I would not just drop him off anyway. I just got him out of the car it time, as I was driving off I saw him puking up on the pavement.
Not the best advert for being a taxi driver.
During the day there are far too many taxis already, the damn things are cluttering up the city. The drivers, even the ones who entered after de-regulation are always moaning about not being able to earn a living wage, I would not necessarily believe that but unless you are willing to ship the drunks home from the pubs/clubs or if you can get contract work or regulars there is not that much to be made out of it, certainly not if you are looking at a large outlay to begin with.

Seth Brundle

a) you possibly won't be fit to drive if you are working all week and then hop into a taxi to carry drunkards home at the weekends. You will burn yourself out before long!
b) how much will you earn each weekend? Will this be more than the cost of your new car, its frequent servicing, cleaning and its insurance (which *will* be high) - I doubt it!
c) there is also the possibility that Minister Brennan will introduce his yellow taxi idea which may mean you will need a re-spray

Victor

I spoke 'frankly' with a taxi driver recently. He was an ex-van driver and to quote him "money can be made in this business". His speciality was picking up lone males that other drivers wouldn't. Thet tended to be glad having walked from town to Rathgar before he picked them up and tipped well.

ToxicPaddy

Money can be made if you're willing to put in the work but the initial outlay is
fairly substantial as it was something I was lookin into a while back..

The plate, car, insurance, meter etc all add up, so before you do anything, get
quotes...

One thing that put me off was the fact that a few taxi drivers that I spoke to who
were under 30 and started off in the game got quotes of close to €9k for their
first years insurance, one of them told me that this dropped down to €3.5k after
3 years.. but €9K on top of car replayments, etc all adds up..

However, one thing that will help is that if you have your own car, you can pop for
a few hours in the evenings mid week if youve nothing better to do, so even if you
popped out for a few hours and made an extra €100 here and there, it all adds up..

Really up to yourself and depending on how much work you wanna do..

Id keep an eye on the evening herald, there are always complete taxis up for sale in
there, car+plate+meter for under €20k, which would be a good start.. dont go
spending serious money on a car.. in Dublin most of your journeys are gonna be no
more than 15-20 mins.. so you dont need a big flash car, just something thats
reliable and easy on the juice and cheap enough to maintain as this will be another
big outlay..

Tox

Fionn101

possibly to start off you should rent a taxi , so get your PSV licence and then goto those people who rent out yellow taxi's per night(noel mcCabe taxi's I believe) , this will also allow you to gage income before the expense of purchasing a taxi.

Also register with a local hackney place , it brings in the extra dollars , especially to beginner with no contract clients

Fionn

BANZAI_RUNNER

first i would try the hackney business, i hear that the taxi regulator is trying to introduce a single colour for taxis, yellow i think , and also 1 out of every 5 has to be wheelchair accessable, also if you want to get a psv license you will need a tax clearence certificate from august, bearing this in mind , you will also have to pay taxes on your earnings fron the taxi, so will it be really worth the hassle.

positron

First of all, thanksfor all the suggestions and comments, very helpful indeed.

There’s a certain risk of burn out working over the weekend after a whole week at work, and I will have to try it out before I go about it – my full time job is stressful enough (IT) but its more mental exhaustion than physical. That’s another reason why I decided to try the game on weekends, bank holidays and odd weekdays, when I am not really tired from work.

Another reason was that if I could use the car as taxi on weekends for work, and with out the plate on weekdays for personal use, I could really afford a nice family saloon (a Merc E class or something like that). But then again, if they change the rules to paint them all yellow, I might have to drop the whole idea, as I can’t really afford two cars.

I am aware of the costs, insurance is the main culprit, but as I said, I was hoping to own a nice car that will pay off itself by extra work on weekends. That is, only the insurance (plate can be sold later, I think) is going to be dead-money / down the drain, but I was told my couple of taxi drivers that they make handsome profit working weekend nights- ballpark figure was in the range of 500-600 euros. Any comments on that figure?

I am looking into ‘cosying’ (as they call it, that is, renting cabs) as well to get a feel of the thing.

On another note, I am not worried about the bad image cabbies have in this city, I can live with it, and may be prove some wrong by being one of the good guys, well, hopefully – not sure if I would be that nice if someone p*kes inside all over the seat!

Thanks again for the thoughts, much appreciated!

Victor

Originally posted by positron
I am aware of the costs, insurance is the main culprit, but as I said, I was hoping to own a nice car that will pay off itself by extra work on weekends. That is, only the insurance (plate can be sold later, I think) is going to be dead-money / down the drain, but I was told my couple of taxi drivers that they make handsome profit working weekend nights- ballpark figure was in the range of 500-600 euros. Any comments on that figure?

Maybe sales are 500-600, but I doubt profits (including wages?) would be. How much do they loose during the week?

tinofapples

I've just recently started working part time as a taxi driver in Galway for the very same reason as you , extra dosh .

Initial costs would be expensive for you if you were to incur these yourself , I'm just driving one day (Sat 7am-7pm) and get to keep 45% of the takings. The guy who owns the vehicle has 3/4 mini buses on the road and has them leased out to guys to drive . There is open insurance on them which I hear is very difficult to get apparently.

There is money to be made in it , so far I like the work and might consider packing in the 9-5 and go at this full time .

My cousin did this last year , 1st Insurance policy was €8500 he recently got a new quote , €2700 , big difference.