Licence checking software could prove invaluable for taxi sector, says CFC

The taxi and minicab sector has been highlighted as a sector that could greatly benefit from Licence Link licence checking software, from software market leader CFC Solutions.

The company believes that the tool – which links with the DVLA database online to see whether drivers have any convictions – could prove invaluable to taxi fleet managers and to the local authorities who issue private hire and hackney carriage licences.

In the general fleet sector, CFC’s experience with Licence Link shows that 20% of drivers have between 3-11 points on their licence while one per cent have 11 points.

Neville Briggs, managing director at CFC, said: “Ensuring that taxi drivers are fit to drive is essential – from the point of view of local authorities who issue licences and also for owners and operators of taxi companies. If drivers who do not hold valid driving licences or have been disqualified are licensed as taxi drivers by local authorities or employed as drivers by taxi companies, there is a definite failure of duty of care.

“This is a subject that has come under much scrutiny of late, with news stories about licences being issued to drivers who have criminal convictions. Licence Link does not reveal problems with non-motoring offences but it does ensure that a framework is in place to check driving licences on a structured and regular basis, which is something that appears to be often lacking from both a taxi fleet and local authority basis.”

Free to adopt, Licence Link was launched last year and has become the fastest selling product that CFC has created in its three decades of writing software for fleets.

Briggs continued: “Our general findings – that one in five drivers has points on their licence - underlines the importance of all types of fleet undertaking regular licence checks. A driver who is one offence away from a ban represents a significant risk management issue for any employer, including taxi companies.”

Individual cases highlighted by Licence Link include a driver who had an undeclared full driving ban and another who declared a full licence but only held a provisional one.

Briggs said: “Thankfully, the number of drivers highlighted by Licence Link who should not be driving at all has been low but we have found a number of worrying instances.

“Sometimes these employees are acting maliciously by, for example, not declaring a ban because they know they will lose their job. At other times, they made an inadvertent mistake by perhaps being confused over which classes of vehicle they can drive.

“However, in all cases, they represented a risk management issue to their employer.”

Briggs added that the success of Licence Link during its first year on sale had been thanks to a strong desire on the part of fleets to make thorough licence checks.

He said: “Licence Link is a product that seems to have hit a sweet spot in the market and is rapidly being adopted by all kinds of fleets in all kinds of sectors of the industry.

“The key strengths of the product – its effectiveness, its simplicity, its ease of adoption and delivery through free software with checks only paid for as they are needed – all mean that it proving to be the licence checking tool of choice for hundreds of fleets.”

Licence Link is designed to help all employers simplify the routine task of regularly checking car and van driver licence information through a web based system - something made essential by the recent introduction of risk management legislation.

Once basic driving licence information is entered onto Licence Link, fleet managers can choose how often automatic checks are made with the DVLA database – for example, annually for low mileage drivers or more often for high mileage, high risk employees.

Risk summary reports will automatically group drivers into different levels of risk group – for example, those with 1-3, 4-7, 8-12 and 12 plus points, and Licence Link can be set up so that those with higher numbers of points are checked more often.

Automatic alerts are sent to the fleet manager if the DVLA checks show changes to endorsements, the categories of vehicle that an employee is allowed to drive or if there are critical licence events such as disqualification or a photo card expiring.

Further features in Licence Link include the ability to upload and store document scans against each driver record, such as an image of each driver’s licence and driver declarations. These files are held online and encrypted for security purposes.

Access to Licence Link is via a credit payment scheme. To run checks, a company buys credits in advance and as each licence check is made, the system displays the credits remaining, providing a constant balance reminder for the fleet manager.