Coventry taxi fares set to rise
Taxi fares are going up after Coventry City Council approved a new tariff, despite some objections
Coventry taxi fares are set to rise after the city council approved changes to the tariff, despite objections from some cab drivers.
The changes will reduce the initial distance covered by the starting fare from 0.922km to 0.76km, and reduce the initial waiting time covered from up to 4.5 minutes to up to 3.7 minutes.
The starting fares themselves will remain unchanged at £3.80 for daytime journeys (6am to 10pm), £4.60 for night-time journeys (10pm to 6am) and £4.90 for public holiday journeys.
Also not changing are the increments of 30p for day and night journeys and 35p for holiday journeys for every additional 0.162km or additional waiting time of 48 seconds.
Coventry City Council’s senior licensing and enforcement officer, Mick Coggins, told a meeting of the Cabinet Member for City Services: “As a result, passengers would reach the next increment sooner, which would increase the overall fare payable for journeys.
“Unite Union, as representatives of the Coventry trade, was consulted and provided its fair rate. The variation was advertised for 14 days and disability groups, passenger organisations, and taxi licence holders were also contacted. This ended up in three objections.”
Details were redacted but one email that appeared to be from a cabbie urged the council to decrease rather than increase the tariffs so that “we might get more business.”
Another also opposed the rise, saying: “I’m a hackney taxi driver, we should leave the tariff as it is. Uber has taken a lot of the trade already, doesn’t make sense to raise the tariff in the current economic climate.”
Major Gill, chairman of Unite the Union’s Coventry Taxi Branch, had submitted the request for the ‘small increase’ and previously told the Local Democracy Reporting Service the changes only worked out around 30p extra for each fare “whether it’s a small or big job, whether the total is £4 or £15 and regardless of whether are are one or five passengers in the taxi.”
This would mean, on average, an extra £2.40 a day for drivers, he said. But it would help go towards the additional costs of insurance, road tax, diesel and general household expenses that cabbies have had to absorb since the last rise in August 2022.
He urged the public to give more support to local drivers, as the iconic and globally-recognised black cab, or hackney carriage, is manufacured in Coventry by the London EV Company (LEVC) at Ansty Park.
“I had to put something up because everything else is going up,” the 69-year-old said. “The local taxi trade is already losing custom to Uber and Bolt.”
Cabinet Member for City Services Cllr Patricia Hetherton considered the representations that had been made and approved the changes to hackney carriage fare tariffs on the basis that “the proposal represents a reasonable and proportionate adjustment which supports the continued provision of safe, accessible and reliable taxi services in Coventry.”
The revised rate will be programmed during the week starting September 28, 2026, and take effect once taxi meter changes have been completed.
Private hire vehicle fares are not under the council’s control but usually align with the same pricing system as the city’s hackney carriages.
The city council pointed out in its report that it does not receive any income from the fares but manages taxi licensing using funding from licence fees and related charges paid by drivers, vehicle proprietors and operators.