If you have been a victim of verbal or physical abuse whilst working as a Taxi or PHV Driver, or you have reasons to be concerned about abuse towards one of your passengers, you really need to consider recording the incident in writing as soon as possible, and reporting it to your company’s Safeguarding Officer.
With it becoming much harder to rely on the Police for support due to their resources being so stretched, perhaps it is time for us to take a good hard look out how we conduct ourselves and whether we could do anything to seriously improve the way we are able to deal with situations ourselves – read here.
You can use the online autofill report form here to help ensure you record all the correct details, and keep all the information in a nicely formatted and easy to read document that you can print in multiples in order to keep copies for yourself and others (this form has auto fill fields built in, so you can fill it in online then print off copies, or download it and open on your computer to fill in). If you don’t have Adobe Reader on your PC, you can download it here.
Verbal Abuse can often fall within the realms of an offence under the Public Order Act 1986, so do not think that you cannot do anything about abuse you have been the victim of, the key thing is ensure you make a precise written account of the incident and secure any available evidence, witness details and CCTV.
We tried pursuing a Zero Tolerance Policy against Abuse towards Taxi & PHV Drivers to be supported by both the Police and Cornwall Council, where we are seeking an official written policy for all to follow in dealing with any incidents. One option would perhaps be to have an official leaflet to be made available to all drivers at license issue – A5 Leaflet (Draft only – not for circulation). Alas, thus far nothing has really happened on this, and I suspect it may not – no surprise really.
Taxi Driver Fined for refusing to take passenger!
https://www.newquaytaxiforum.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2019/08/Bideford-Taxi-Driver-Fined.pdf