Seems as if theres some scope for Private hire taxi driving, reasonable car,pick up passengers and deliver them , chat to customers, and drive around town all day anyone do it and does it pay reasonably well self employed or employed.

You’ll need to work, probably, in excess of 60 hours a week. You may find that 70 is more typical. That all depends, of course, on who you work for – most big firms have the lucrative daytime contracts with local businesses – so an independent driver is unlikely to get much of that sort of trade. That said, there’s a guy in the village I used to live in who did a great trade ferrying the old folk about during the day – he had a very strong business and didn’t need to do much of the evening/weekend work that is staple for most drivers, private and Hack.

It’ll also be cheaper for you to start with a company as your insurance as a new driver will be huge, possibly in excess of £100/wk. With a company, you’ll be looking at somewhere in the region of £250-£300/wk for your car/ins and data head (jobs). Even with your own car and insurance, your data head will be around £60/wk.

The craic can be great, but it can also be quite hard going and stressful. It’s funny how many people treat a taxi driver as they might a priest or a counselor, and how many treat them as the lowest on the social ladder. Be prepared to have to overcome or ignore some deep prejudice before you can interact with some people. It is a truly unique way to meet people from all walks of life in an unnaturally intimate environment. You will see just how the human condition affects us all.

Get a gym membership. It’s important to get regular exercise and it’s also a good way to keep up social activity.

Also, walk into any town during the day during the week and look at how many taxis are sitting on ranks, They’re not earning. You make decent money at weekends at night ferrying drunks about hoping they don’t throw up in your car taking it off the road.

I did it for a while, nights in in South London. It’s an awful job. Fair play to anyone that makes a living at that, i’ll never do it again.

Think loddrik did it for a while?

My uncle did it all his life, black cab rather than private hire but he owned his own. He loved it, made a reasonable but modest living, seemed to work out. Nobody knows how much time he spent actually driving, and how much he spent just out of the house parked up somewhere, hiding from my aunt, who is a total dick.

Mate here (rural area) has work made up of OAP shopping runs, school runs and airport transfers. He’s not loaded, but his hands are soft from all the car washing.

I have a mate does it in Edinburgh. Works 6 days/week, but only works for approx 6 hrs/day. His motor on the otherhand works 24/7 – he makes enough to live in a nice house in a nice part od town.

A job where you can get paid for moaning at a captive audience?

Sounds perfect for you!

My sister and BiL run a taxi firm. On his birthday he drove mid Wales to Birmingham, then Manchester, then Birmingham, then mid Wales and was then working at 5:30 the next morning.

Had a lodger who was a private hire car driver, he earned about 17k (10 years ago when the mean full time male wage was something like 20-21k). Mind you he didn’t work all hours, so could have earned more.

I suspect that if you own a minicab company and have a fleet, it’s *very* profitable. Being a driver? Less so.

I was charged £12 for a traffic free 3 mile journey at 2pm.
Someone is doing alright.

The insurances and equipment hire from the bigger companies can be extortionate so check that out first, fella I was talking to the other day was being charged £4000 a year car insurance and £2000 a year kit hire/fees.

I was charged £12 for a traffic free 3 mile journey at 2pm.
Someone is doing alright.

Or £12 for 6 miles as he didn’t have a return fare – plus how much time does he sit waiting?

I can’t really believe that anyone would imagine that been a taxi driver is a ‘money earner’ – long hours, and lots of expense.

Figures a bit out of date, but in Cambridge, each day you sign on to the system with the cab company, you get charged £20. On top of that petrol, private hire license, 2 extra council MOTs a year, no upper limit on number of private hire licenses issues (unlike taxis).

Are there any sort of limits on numbers of licences/taxi’s allowed in a given-area?

Huddersfield town centre- you see taxi’s queued around the block. Who they are hoping/waiting for no body knows.

Same in Manchester- it seems to be saturated. Just too many. How can drivers make money in such situations?!

Are there any sort of limits on numbers of licences/taxi’s allowed in a given-area?

Depends on the licensing authority (council). Taxis are normally controlled to quite a limited number and plates change hands for £100k in some areas. Private Hire is much more lax and sometimes unlimited which means wages are kept very low as there are too many cars chasing a finite number of fares so utilisation is low.

Are Lyft and Uber in the UK?

Here in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania taxi service was utterly horrible. Then the 2 ride shares entered the market and were fought tooth and nail by the taxi company. They now have an experimental 2 year license, and the taxi company has introduced its own phone app…

Your potential earnings vary greatly depending on which licensing authority you work in. In Cardiff your looking at the “living wage” sort of thing. Everyone in Cardiff is self employed, no companies actually employ drivers they act as booking agencies, you pay them a flat fee every week, that and all your other bills mean as an owner driver you have to earn £250-300 a weak before you get into profit. If you rent a vehicle that might go up to £350 !! I wouldn’t recommend it unless complete flexibility in your working hours is important ( it is to me ) If you want any more info drop me an email and I’ll try and answer any questions you might have.

I drive a black cab two nights a week. I love it. I’m lucky that I don’t do it full time though. I suspect I’d hate it if I did. Never dread going in to work. Liverpool a good place to do it though as it’s so busy at weekends. Probably only London is busier at weekends. Hotels all full. Loads of bars and clubs. It allows to be a full time dad.

The deal (with the wife) always was that I’d go back to a ‘proper’ job once my youngest started school which she did in September. I got a surveying job in October. I lasted two weeks before I resigned my notice in and am now back on the cabs. The money isn’t great but I am free to do school runs and look after kids and my time is my (our) own. Wife is a career woman and she is quite happy with the status quo.

I’d never ever do private hire though. I like having the locking doors and security screen, plus it means i don’t have to talk to people in the back which I prefer not to.

I guess I’m lucky in that if it became harder to earn a living on them I’m educated to a decent enough standard where I could go and get a decent job doing something else. I can’t see myself doing that any time soon though. my work life balance is way too good at the minute.

Got a lift in a brand new Audi private hire car the other day.

The only thing I can think is the job is doing some stuff on the side, lets say illicit deliveries, or as the driver spends his living driving everywhere he wants to do it in a nice car.

AFAIK it’s not very profitable.

Unless you have the exclusive license to operate a fleet from an airport…

I see loads of brand new audi/merc/BMW private hire cars around here. They must be working 7 days a week and/or having a graft on the side.

Private hire drivers have to work at least 6 days per week. On average that would be 70 hours.

Think carefully before you commit.

But then those 70 hours aren’t comparable to 70 hours of office/factory work.

So it will depend on you. If you love driving then go for it. If you don’t, stay well clear and don’t waste your time.

I work as ph driver and like flexibility, so far it worked out fine. Much better than in public transport.

I once got a taxi from Coventry Hospital back to my house at the time (was a student).

As I walked into the rank, the taxi driver seemed ever so relieved to have a fare, and very enthusiastic at the business proposition.

It was then I realised that there were police slowly working their way through the rank, searching the drivers and the cabs.

The policeman gave my driver a nod as to say “Go on mate, do your fare – we’ll get you next time.” and we sped off. As we left the hospital, my driver was frantically waving, flashing and mouthing “Police, turn back!” at every taxi coming the other way.

Essentially, it’s a front for drugs.

When was that?

Or more likely checking whether they had a permit to pick up in that spot / other documents.

Well, as PH driver you have to know these kind of things.

Not only that but gentlemen establishments for boys and girls too. I suppose Loddrik ‘s in the know how commission works.

My Father in Law has been doing it for years, we works for/with a local firm but he owns his car and chooses when he wants to work. He tells me he’d never get into the job now, but he’s nearly retired so too late to change. He drives an E-Class Merc, it cost more to buy and run than the usual Skoda / Ford but it meant he got more work on airport runs and school runs which is where the money is mid-week.

It seems like more of a lifestyle than a job to me – he starts about 8am and takes disabled kids to school along with their full-time carers, he needed some special certificate for this, over and above a usual CRB check. That’s all done by 9am so he’s down the local Greggs to meet up with his Taxi mates for breakfast – by 11am the calls start taking the old ladies to the supermarket and what-not, it’s short trips and rarely tipped work so not a money maker really but it “keeps him out of trouble” until the second school run at 3pm. By 4pm he’s back kicking about waiting for the odd job.

We live in Cardiff which is a big party town, plus there’s always some event on so the City Centre is busy most nights of the week, he’ll work until about 9pm or 10pm – but not later, over the years he’s been beaten and threatened with knives and guns – or at least convincing replicas – a few months ago some meathead got into an argument with his girlfriend – who was sat in the back, he took his frustrations out on the car and smashed the windscreen and kicked the dashboard before running off – cost him a couple of hundred to fix and 2 days lost income.

He’s been doing it a long time, and has one of the nicer cars in the ‘fleet’ so is near the top for the best work, even so in return for working 12-14 hours a day for 6 days a week, he’s far from wealthy, he lives in a small rented flat and he’s outside interests are limited to Monday night skittles playing other drivers.

He said he used to earn a lot more when he was younger doing the late night stuff, but he stopped 10 years ago when too risky for him at his age – it’s ten times worse now he says and most of the drivers that work the nights are younger and just as crazy as the clients, there’s a hell of a lot of gossip and bullshit in the Taxi world, but not many weekends go past without some horrible act of violence taking place on one side of the fence or other.

Sod that.

Essentially, it’s a front for drugs.

Not that I don’t doubt it goes on. I know of one driver who I strongly suspect is using a black cab for other uses.

From talking to taxi drivers out there, and views on here, perhaps its not the right carrer direcional change i was looking for, thanks for all the replies though.

My dad does a bit since retiring from construction. He need something easier on his body after multiple hernias. He never works nights, but has been involved in multiple assault/robbery scenarios. I say involved in rather than victim of since he’s never handed over any money, and has always ensured his would be attackers come off worse on account of the claw hammer he keeps under his seat.

a few years ago i took an illegal cab back to my digs in SE london after a night on the sauce.

I woke the next morning gutted to find i’d left my bag in the cab complete with wallet, £80 cash, cheque book, passport along with various electronics of value.

I got a call later that evening from a very friendly Nigerian man stating he had my bag. Turns out he found my mobile number on a scrunched up phone bill in the bag. He then proceeded to drive across London, re-unite me with my bag and offer to drive me home again (i’d been on the sauce again) and refuse flatly to charge me, let alone accept a tip/reward for being so honest.

‘Olu’ as he was known became a sort of friend/personal driver for many of my friends over the next few months, carting us all over London at all hours.

Lovely man. I believe he finally landed the bank manager job he was looking for in Lagos and moved back home.

In central scotland(not glasgow), a plate and car costs around £30,000. With that given, insurance is around £900 a year, other fees can be another £450 or so.
If you work the right 50 hours a week you can earn around £700-£800 before tax. Its almost all cash so…

Just a comment regarding the potential dangers. In 25yrs driving a cab in Cardiff I’ve never been physically assaulted, robbed or threatened with a weapon of any sort. All of those things can happen, but I used to get more trouble working in a LBS with people returning inner tubes they’d pinched fitting claiming they were faulty ( one guy over the counter punching me ).

My old man owns a firm in a small town. He does a lot of school runs in minibuses/cars as there’s loads of little towns in the school catchment area and everything’s a bit spread out, this is incredibly easy work IMO (and his), he does (or did) a good bit of stuff with disabled kids/young adults too which is a bit more challenging at times but he seemed to enjoy this. Through the week it just seems to consist of shipping old ladies and tourists around. He works constantly, always always on and answering the phone but this fits with his personality I think. (Destroyed his marriages though!!) He seems to make a decent amount of money, loadsa toys and bloody nice houses/cars.

I’ve helped him out a good bit in my younger days and absolutly **** hated it. I couldn’t think of anything I’d rather do less, I enjoy driving but FARK, constantly driving to a time scale and having to be sure where you’re going messed with my head (pre sat nav)! I also really hate dealing with drunk people and sometimes it can feel hairy. I’m a smaller guy so would likely get a kicking, it’s unlikely in a small area but there were a couple of times where I felt on edge.

Also, something that probably gave me a bit of confidence later on to approach older women……old drunk “ladies” are **** filth and far too touchy feely, absolutely terrible! Some should be ashamed of themselves!!