Bolton: Concern over digital taxi licence switch over

A meeting of Bolton Council this week heard how the initiative is intended to help drivers manage the switch over from in person to online licencing renewals.

But Cllr Rabiya Jiva said the new online system was proving difficult for many people who were no used to using digital rather than in-person services, while council helplines had not proven much use either.

She said: “When you have a new system in place, surely should we not have something in place until you phase it out to inform people that they still have the other option?”

Cllr Jiva, who is also opposition spokesperson for stronger communities, told the meeting how she had sampled a helpline that was designed to help drivers through the process but did not find it to be of much use.

She said:“I even rang the helpline myself to test it, I love testing things when people tell me about these things, I’ll test them.

“After about 36 minutes on April 6, I started at 2.30pm, I just gave up.”

Cllr Rabiya Jiva raised this issue at a Bolton Council meeting this week (Image: Newsquest)

She added: “I wanted to experience it for myself, the frustrations of individuals.”

The meeting of Bolton Council’s corporate and external issues scrutiny committee this week heard more broadly about the switch over to online services as part of the “digital revolution.”

But Cllr Jiva, who represents the Crompton ward and is currently a candidate in Halliwell, said she recieved an email from the council's licencing team which told her no one had volunteered to be a “taxi champions” to help drivers with applications.

Members of the taxi trade have expressed concerns about the process (Image: Newsquest)

She also said she believed that relying on volunteers for a paid service was not good enough.

Cllr Jiva said: “We can’t just expect to put the demand back on to taxi champions, hopefully we could but it is a paid service so I need to stress there, can we put some mechanisms in place around that?

“Because it isn’t as smooth as some individuals think it is.”

Cllr Jiva said she was continuously seeing cases of taxi drivers who were struggling and called on Bolton Council to engage with the trade and its representatives in finding a way forward.

She also said that digital services more broadly had proven difficult for many people, especially those who are older or vulnerable, with many having to rely on younger relatives.

Cllr Jiva said: “Let’s find a happy medium and connect with those people who use our services.”

In response, Bolton Council officials say they are looking for ways to make the service easier for drivers.

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Customer service manager Chris Hart said: “Just because we’ve delivered the form doesn’t mean we’re leaving it like that, we’re working with colleagues in the taxi licensing department to improve it and we acknowledge that.

“Its quite a big change, asking people to upload documents that they had previously handed in so, we’re looking at ways we can make that easier and reduce the number of documents which they have to upload.

“We’re also looking at developing online tutorials to give guidance on how to do it online as well to accompany those taxi licence forms.”