Meter falls on taxi ranks

By Dion Teasdale
YARRA Valley Taxi service is at crisis point with its Healesville and Yarra Junction road crews experiencing a driver shortage.
Some drivers are being forced to work 18-hour shifts and some passengers are having to wait up to four hours on Friday and Saturday nights for a taxi.
Yarra Valley Taxis general manager Neil Comer said the shortage was impacting on the ability of the company to maintain the service across the Yarra Valley.
“The service is at crisis point. We have a shortage of drivers and our current drivers cannot keep up the number of hours required to run the service properly,” he said.“We’ve got drivers starting work at 5am and not finishing until 11pm, which is not good. Drivers become fatigued and that’s when accidents happen.”
Mr Comer said if the problem is not addressed soon, the taxi service will become unavailable in certain areas for periods of time.
“We are almost at the point where during peak times we will have to divert callers to an answering machine that tells them, ‘sorry, but there are no taxis available’,” he said.
Mr Comer said the service requires at least six new drivers to commence work immediately.
“There are only three full-time cars operational at the Healesville rank, down from five, and though we still have four full-time cars in Yarra Junction, there are no relief drivers for that side,” he said.
“We would love to be able to provide a service 24 hours a day, seven days a week, but we are at the point where the service will be suspended at particular times unless new drivers can be found.”
Mr Comer said part of the problem was that prospective drivers do not want to work on Friday and Saturday nights, despite the benefits.
“The majority of people you pick up on Friday and Saturday night are out to have a good time and 99.9 per cent are pleasant and behave themselves,” he said.
“It’s a job where you get in the car at 6pm and drive people to and from where they want to go, and at the end of the shift you can walk away with between $200 and $300 in your pocket.”
Mr Comer said prospective drivers don’t have to pass any tests to start working.
“All you need is about $100 to pay for a medical test, a police check, and a taxi licence,” he said.