Taxi dispatch systems explained

Example of how most modern taxi dispatch systems work

How is Stanway travel services Ltd different to other taxi companies you may ask. Well, let us give you a little insight into how most taxi booking systems work.

When you book an airport taxi from Colchester, your address is likely to be in predefined zone. These zones are set to help customers and taxi drivers. When you confirm your booking, it creates a “job”. A job with a lead time, that can depend on your location or zone. That leadtime will be subtracted from the time for when you booked the cab for. For example, if you booked the cab for 20.45 and your leadtime is 15 min, the job will become active at 20.30. as son as the job becomes active, it will join a queue with all other active jobs. The taxi booking system then (depends on setup but typically) will offer the job out to the driver in your zone who has been available the longest. If there is none there it will look for the nearest available driver. When a driver is available, the system will offer them the job and they can normally choose to accept or decline it. Declining the  job normally puts the driver to the back of the que for the zone but in a busy area(zone) that normally isn’t a problem as another taxi booking will come up very soon or there may already be a que of jobs to pick from. Once the driver accepts the job, he becomes your allocated taxi driver and the job gets dispatched.  Most of this process is automated to help speed things up and make a transport quicker, more efficient. Unfortunately this also means that an airport transfer could fall go through the same process and there may not be a driver available who is willing to go to the airport at that time, which may even cancel your job / booking only a few minutes before you are due to leave. While this system s fantastic and well suited for local short trip with plenty cars nearby, it can be a disaster for airport transfers or other long-distance journeys