‘Apps are big cause of taxi shortage’

THE Taxis for Ireland Coalition is calling on Government to address the extreme shortage of taxis right across Ireland.

However, a spokesperson for the taxi sector claims there is not actually a shortage of taxis and that the issue is instead tied to the negative impact of the taxi apps on drivers’ earnings, with some drivers even turning off apps at peak hours.

Taxis for Ireland Coalition has written to the Taoiseach and the minister for transport about the extreme shortage of taxis in all Irish cities, towns, and rural areas.

The recently-formed coalition’s members include the Restaurants Association of Ireland, Vintners’ Federation of Ireland, Licensed Vintners’ Association, Irish Tourism Industry Confederation, Bolt, and Uber, and surveys commissioned in 2023 by coalition members revealed seven out of 10 people across Ireland have difficulty getting home from pubs and restaurants.

Some 63.33% of publicans surveyed described their local taxi service as either poor or non-existent and, in a survey of more than 1,000 urban-based people, 58% agree there is a taxi shortage in Ireland.

Kieran Harte, head of Ireland at Uber, said: “The growth in the use of apps to book taxis and hackneys over the past decade has seen the number of drivers and vehicles in the industry significantly rise in nearly every international market Uber operates.

“However, in Ireland, the number of available vehicles has actually decreased by 15% over the same decade.”

Hotelier Joe Kennedy, chairman of the Cork branch of the Irish Hotel Federation, told The Echo: “It’s definitely a point of concern for hotel industry.”

Kennedy said the sector struggles to get taxis for their customers and residents, both back to hotels late at night and to airports or other departure points early in the morning.

He confirmed that the “dual situation” was particularly bad this year, saying the issue is “definitely at its peak”.

Mr Kennedy said that many hotels, particularly outside the city, were having to inform customers to ensure they had a taxi pre-booked to return to their hotel before they even went out for the night.

“To be fair to the taxi industry, I’m not sure the general public gives them an easy time,” he said, explaining his own father was a taxi driver for 30 years, so he was aware “how challenging it can be”.

Meanwhile, Bobby Lynch, a Cork taxi driver and spokesperson, told The Echo that issues in getting taxis is not due to a lack of drivers, saying: 

“There’s no shortage of taxis, it’s [other] people causing the shortage.”

Lynch said that if a taxi is booked by a receptionist at a hotel partnered with an app, €2 of the fare goes to the hotel regardless of journey length, on top of the 15% taken by taxi app FREENOW, and “the public have no idea about this”.

As a result, Lynch says, drivers tend to turn off their phones and apps at peak times, preferring to pick up direct fares at taxi ranks, so it appears on the apps that there are no taxis available.

A spokesperson for FREENOW told The Echo: “A fixed driver partner fee of €2 applies to bookings which are made by certain hospitality customers (including hotels, restaurants and commercial premises). This is part of FREENOW’s commercial arrangements with select hospitality partners.”

Lynch said: “Apps are trying to come in and take over the industry, and drivers are starting to cop on.

“It’s the taxi driver who invests in the industry, and it was working a treat before the apps came in ... now they take 15% of a €6 job, then you could do a €200 job and they take the same percentage.”

Mr Lynch said the taxi industry was no longer an attractive employment option, saying that none of his children wanted to go into it after seeing the effect it had on him.

“It can make a young man very old very quickly,” he said. “People are depressed because of it.”