Torridge licenses 139 vehicles as at 1 April 2024 — 47 hackney carriages and 92 private hire vehicles.
Private hire clearly leads the licensed fleet, so most work arrives pre-booked through a phone line, an app or a web form before any driver moves.
A licensed fleet this small is usually owner-run, and the pressing problem is not allocation but coverage: who answers the phone when the person who normally does is driving.
130 driver licences are in force against those 139 vehicles, or 0.94 drivers per vehicle. Most vehicles are effectively single-driver, so utilisation is capped by driver hours rather than by vehicle supply.
Torridge licenses 2.03 taxis and private hire vehicles per 1,000 residents, against a median of 2.62 across the 292 authorities in the same return — 23 per cent below the national midpoint.
Licensed supply is below the national midpoint, so peak demand routinely exceeds available vehicles. The operational win is honest quoting and declining work you cannot service, not more marketing spend.
Against its own region the fleet is thinner than typical: the South West median is 2.14 per 1,000 residents.
Torridge requires a licensed private hire operator to record 11 of the 12 booking details the DfT surveys: passenger name, time the booking was made, date the booking was made, pick-up time, pick-up date, pick-up point, main destination, driver name, vehicle registration, name of the booker and dispatcher name.
That is a demanding regime: most of the fields the DfT surveys are mandatory here.
Not required here: driver licence number.
On vehicles, hackney carriages are held to no age or emissions standard restrictions and private hire vehicles to no age or emissions standard restrictions.
Torridge caps the number of hackney carriage licences it issues, so plate availability rather than demand sets the ceiling on that half of the fleet. Capped areas tend to see plates hold value and change hands, with growth pushed towards private hire, where numbers are not restricted.
In-vehicle CCTV is permitted but not required here, so it stays an operator decision rather than a licence condition.
Before a new driver in Torridge can be sent a job, background screening is enhanced dbs and barred list checks and safeguarding training covering child sexual exploitation and county lines is required.
1.4 per cent of the licensed fleet in Torridge is wheelchair accessible — 2 hackney carriages and 0 private hire vehicles.
That is a thin accessible share, so accessible bookings need planning rather than absorbing, and one vehicle off the road materially cuts capacity.
Torridge publishes a list of designated wheelchair-accessible vehicles, which brings its drivers within section 165 of the Equality Act 2010.
Torridge departs from the majority answer on 8 of the surveyed licensing policies.
Caps hackney carriage licence numbers: "Yes" here, against "No" for 74 per cent of authorities.
Requires daily hackney roadworthiness checks: "No" here, against "Yes" for 51 per cent of authorities.
Hackney topographical assessment: "No" here, against "Topological" for 65 per cent of authorities.
PHV topographical assessment: "No" here, against "Topological" for 52 per cent of authorities.
Hackney English-standard requirement: "No" here, against "Both" for 50 per cent of authorities.
PHV English-standard requirement: "No" here, against "Both" for 51 per cent of authorities.
