Have simple taxi meter system, drop surcharges

• peterpan212

  14 Jan 14, 13:40

  From

  Paul Chan Poh Hoi

  -

  Published: 14 January, 4:02 AM

  Updated: 14 January, 5:00 AM

  The National Taxi Association is suggesting Electronic Road Pricing (ERP) concessions for cabbies to encourage more to drive into the Central Business District. (“Niche cabs may not need to meet LTA’s standards”; Dec 28)

  I see no merit in this. Instead, a holistic approach and practical rules for our taxi operators are needed.

  The current conundrum lies in the business practices that marginalise the interest of passengers, including tourists.

  The Land Transport Authority (LTA) must insist on international payment practices, with a simple meter system, and get rid of confusing surcharges to maintain a fair business principle.

  While lower ERP costs, through a cheap S$25 monthly pass, would incentivise more cabbies to enter the CBD to earn more, what would passengers get out of the lower ERP costs? Such income enhancement for cabbies and operators could discourage them from being on the road during off-peak hours. This approach may not change the status quo of long waiting times.

  ERP concessions may exacerbate congestion because more taxis would enter the CBD, whereas a holistic approach would result in a more efficient and productive taxi industry, requiring fewer taxis to carry more passengers.

  To address the taxi conundrum, the LTA could begin by recognising taxis as an integral part of the public transport system and revamping the industry to be more commuter-centric.

  The LTA needs to believe in the simple meter system. What has worked for Hong Kong, Taiwan and New York would work for Singapore.

• DriverDriver

  14 Jan 14, 15:04

  big change coming very soon. big heads all urgent meetings liao...if Mr Know It All is still around. that means clearly hes not big enough hahaa
• bowah

  14 Jan 14, 15:17

  NTA???? for show only lah, jiak sai one, during meeting, seibei quiet, then got reporter interview them that time, gong wu gong bo..NTA is an association created by the govt forcing the companies to sponsor and recognise it. If given a chance to remove them, taxi companies long long kick them out liao. Smlj EPR card for $25?? meaning, you never enter or do not want to enter, they already make money liao...28,000 cabs x$25 fix income
• DriverDriver

  14 Jan 14, 15:19

  haha Mr Know It All is here! that means hes small character liao confirm. small guy wanna act big stuff online. haha
• bowah

  14 Jan 14, 15:21

  I am Mr Know It All, wow!
• j007

  14 Jan 14, 22:26

  No surcharge, u will not see taxi on the roads 

  all hiding elsewhere 

• Samsun

  15 Jan 14, 04:13

  no surcharge, still need to pay erp means all will rot in cbd lor. rot until traffic clears.

• bowah

  15 Jan 14, 08:28

  That is why, all these so called gurus, scholars or half fark civil servants who had never even touch a taxi steering are simply TCSS. When you plan something, you must plan in a way of moving toward an idiot prove system, meaning even an idiot like me will understand and follow. As such for Taxis, you need to plan an all rounder system to beneift the paxs, govt, companies and most importantly, the taxi drivers. Although many tends to think TD is the asshole of all taxi problem, but it the ass that allow you to shit, without the ass, you will get serious constipation and end up death with a bloated bowel
• Diablo9898

  15 Jan 14, 09:13

  Originally posted by bowah:

  That is why, all these so called gurus, scholars or half fark civil servants who had never even touch a taxi steering are simply TCSS.

  When you plan something, you must plan in a way of moving toward an idiot prove system, meaning even an idiot like me will understand and follow.

  As such for Taxis, you need to plan an all rounder system to beneift the paxs, govt, companies and most importantly, the taxi drivers. Although many tends to think TD is the asshole of all taxi problem, but it the ass that allow you to shit, without the ass, you will get serious constipation and end up death with a bloated bowel

  Not easy to solve this issues... different places have different type of supply and demand.

  Last night ard 1030pm, MBS long paxs queue but not much taxis..Even with surcharge (25% and city), paxs still wait long long..

   

• Taxilim88

  15 Jan 14, 09:19

  This Mr Paul Chan and many other so called "scholars" like to compare HK, NY and Singapore without even trying to understand how taxis operate in the various cities.

  Let this simple minded taxi driver tell you something:

  In HK, taxis operate within restricted geographical areas.  Although the red taxis (majority) can operate all of HK, except south of Lantau island, most travel within the city urban area itself.  Green taxis operate within the New Territories and Blue taxis, within Lantau island.  Thus, they travel relatively short distances thereby making more trips.  Most people live and work within the urban area.

  In NY, most cabs operate within the Brooklyn and Queens areas, where most people live and work too. Very few travel South to Straten Island or north to Manhattan or even Bronx.  You try getting a cab in Manhattan and ask the driver to take you to Straten or even NY city.

  In Singapore, you have people living in the far areas of Woodlands, Pasir Ris and Jurong West, but work in the City. If you fetch a pax at night from the city to Jurong West at 12am, chances are you are going to have to make an empty trip back to the city to fetch more people.  The surcharge helps to compensate this, although that is not the real intent.

  Let's look at the statistics.  HK has 18,138 taxis making about 1 million passenger trips a day. That means each taxi makes 55 passenger trips a day (Sep 2013 figures).

  In Singapore, we have 27,492 taxis making 813,763 passenger trips a day (Nov 2013 figures).  That means each taxi makes only 29.6 passenger trips a day which is about half that of HK.

  What does it tell you?  That HK taxis make shorter trips mostly within the urban areas only, whilst in Singapore, you make longer passenger trips in and out of the city to the heartlands.

  If you can guarantee me at least 55 passenger trips a day, then perhaps we can talk about removing the surcharges.

• Diablo9898

  15 Jan 14, 13:13

  Originally posted by Taxilim88:

  This Mr Paul Chan and many other so called "scholars" like to compare HK, NY and Singapore without even trying to understand how taxis operate in the various cities.

  Let this simple minded taxi driver tell you something:

  In HK, taxis operate within restricted geographical areas.  Although the red taxis (majority) can operate all of HK, except south of Lantau island, most travel within the city urban area itself.  Green taxis operate within the New Territories and Blue taxis, within Lantau island.  Thus, they travel relatively short distances thereby making more trips.  Most people live and work within the urban area.

  In NY, most cabs operate within the Brooklyn and Queens areas, where most people live and work too. Very few travel South to Straten Island or north to Manhattan or even Bronx.  You try getting a cab in Manhattan and ask the driver to take you to Straten or even NY city.

  In Singapore, you have people living in the far areas of Woodlands, Pasir Ris and Jurong West, but work in the City. If you fetch a pax at night from the city to Jurong West at 12am, chances are you are going to have to make an empty trip back to the city to fetch more people.  The surcharge helps to compensate this, although that is not the real intent.

  Let's look at the statistics.  HK has 18,138 taxis making about 1 million passenger trips a day. That means each taxi makes 55 passenger trips a day (Sep 2013 figures).

  In Singapore, we have 27,492 taxis making 813,763 passenger trips a day (Nov 2013 figures).  That means each taxi makes only 29.6 passenger trips a day which is about half that of HK.

  What does it tell you?  That HK taxis make shorter trips mostly within the urban areas only, whilst in Singapore, you make longer passenger trips in and out of the city to the heartlands.

  If you can guarantee me at least 55 passenger trips a day, then perhaps we can talk about removing the surcharges.

  Imagine we follow HK style...

  Break Singapore into 4 portion (NSEW) and the drop off point in the middle of Singapore (dunno where?? Let's say Bugis)

  North, South, East and West have 5k Taxis ea..

  Pax from Jurong wants to go to Changi.. they must alight at Bugis and take another taxi plying in their destinated area...

  Seems like bus interchange leh..But definately able to spread out the taxis...

  However, still a lot of grey area lah... Do paxs want to pay 2 x trip fare??? Who (TDs) should be in which area???

• hammerhammer8888

  15 Jan 14, 13:36

  Originally posted by Diablo9898:

  Imagine we follow HK style...

  Break Singapore into 4 portion (NSEW) and the drop off point in the middle of Singapore (dunno where?? Let's say Bugis)

  North, South, East and West have 5k Taxis ea..

  Pax from Jurong wants to go to Changi.. they must alight at Bugis and take another taxi plying in their destinated area...

  Seems like bus interchange leh..But definately able to spread out the taxis...

  However, still a lot of grey area lah... Do paxs want to pay 2 x trip fare??? Who (TDs) should be in which area???

  Stay where zai where loh.

• Taxilim88

  15 Jan 14, 13:38

  HK can work because ppl live and work in or near the city. Small geographical coverage. The niche is short distance travel, from MTR to destination/home and vice versa. 

• Diablo9898

  15 Jan 14, 13:50

  Originally posted by Taxilim88:

  HK can work because ppl live and work in or near the city. Small geographical coverage. The niche is short distance travel, from MTR to destination/home and vice versa. 

  OIC... But the problem actually is not the price or surcharge... Supply and demand issues... Paxs (real paxs hor) don't mind paying more as long as the taxis are there when they need it..

  So maybe i/o having a drop off point, we can have 8 drop off points but same of breaking Singapore into 4 portions...

  Anyway, in 5 to 10 years time when all MRT network up, we can expect short distance type of paxs..ie Mrt to work..work to Mrt..Mrt to home...

• peterpan212

  15 Jan 14, 14:55

  Why when ppl like to compare but always ignore to compare the taxi fares and rental cost of taxi in these countries?  Singapore basic taxi fares is too cheap when compare to these countries taxi fares but the cost of rental or cost of living is not lower than these countries.

  Taxi is like a hired a private car with chauffeur for a single trip or very short period of time. Typically, rental of private car with chauffleur cost about $50-$60 with minimum 2-3 hours. So for shorter period, the per unit charge should be more.  Why are TD not been paid fairly accordingly to the market rates of  hired a private car with chauffeur?

  Why pax already getting 25% discount (i.e. without surcharge charge) duing off peak hour and LTA define peak hour (9:30am -11am and 5pm-6pm) still complain?

  Are they trying to exploit TD?

   

• peterpan212

  15 Jan 14, 16:25

  Originally posted by Diablo9898:

  Not easy to solve this issues... different places have different type of supply and demand.

  Last night ard 1030pm, MBS long paxs queue but not much taxis..Even with surcharge (25% and city), paxs still wait long long..

   

  
  There is no way to supply taxi based on peak demand where most of the time do nothing and just for the peak demand to happen.

  During peak demand peak, there is still taxi available but not able to meet the full total demand. Prioritise the allocation of available taxi  to the pax that want to jump queue.  How?  Scholar should know .

• Samsun

  15 Jan 14, 16:36

  Originally posted by bowah:

  That is why, all these so called gurus, scholars or half fark civil servants who had never even touch a taxi steering are simply TCSS.

  When you plan something, you must plan in a way of moving toward an idiot prove system, meaning even an idiot like me will understand and follow.

  As such for Taxis, you need to plan an all rounder system to beneift the paxs, govt, companies and most importantly, the taxi drivers. Although many tends to think TD is the asshole of all taxi problem, but it the ass that allow you to shit, without the ass, you will get serious constipation and end up death with a bloated bowel

  fark lah. plan simi toward, forward. lan lah.

  This is how the govt plans:

  1. plan to make $$

  2. plan to make more $$.

  3. plan to make all the $$.

• Samsun

  15 Jan 14, 16:37

  Originally posted by Diablo9898:

  Not easy to solve this issues... different places have different type of supply and demand.

  Last night ard 1030pm, MBS long paxs queue but not much taxis..Even with surcharge (25% and city), paxs still wait long long..

   

  aft 2 am.....taxi Q long long....pax no have....

• Keepthechange666

  15 Jan 14, 20:33

  Originally posted by j007:

  No surcharge, u will not see taxi on the roads 

  all hiding elsewhere 

  This is very the true.....

  Last time CBD bo surcharge......

  Nicholl highway 一�龙 of taxi......

  Waiting for what? Hahaha.....

  Now with surcharge......

  CBD becum 一�龙 of taxi......

   

• charlize

  15 Jan 14, 20:43

  

• bowah

  16 Jan 14, 10:31

  Originally posted by Keepthechange666:

  This is very the true.....

  Last time CBD bo surcharge......

  Nicholl highway 一�龙 of taxi......

  Waiting for what? Hahaha.....

  Now with surcharge......

  CBD becum 一�龙 of taxi......

   

  
  Last time is 一�龙, today is 一�虫 last time less taxi, better pax, lower rental and fuel prices, and most driver were youngs Now, more and more taxis, lousy paxs, higher rental and fuel prices and most of these drivers are getting older...so become 一�虫