Perth Designated Drivers

It might be a surprise that I am excited that services like Uber are going to have a regulatory framework from 1st July 2016. I constantly get asked by our customers if Uber is taking lots of business away from us.

The short answer is no.

Taxis in Perth needed a good shake up. Customer service has been terrible, the companies are not accountable, wait times on weekends have been huge and prices have been getting more and more expensive. Uber has been able to rectify these things by getting more drivers on the road, providing solid customer service, managing complaints and discrepancies quickly and easily and by charging up to 50% less than a taxi after all the various fees were taken into account.

At Perth Designated Drivers we never really saw taxis as our competitors as they do not have anything to do with getting your car home. So when Uber came on the scene and started taking all the taxis business, we did not see too much of a dip.

We had a handful of customers who used a Designated Driver in every possible situation because they were so sick of taxis, so Uber offered them an alternative and those customers have since used us less frequently. However the rise in customer awareness of alternatives and their willingness to try new services has vastly improved our customer base. Uber reached the mainstream last year and we had our best year yet.

The best thing overall about Uber becoming legal in WA as of July 1st 2016 is the opportunities that the legislation gives us to provide transport alternatives to our customers. We have long been asked to taxi regular customers in our own cars because they appreciate our customer services and punctuality, however we have always had to refuse as we could not be insured to do so and one fine could put us out of business. Now we will be able to offer customers point to point taxi services, airport transfers and even being able to transport additional passengers in the chaser vehicle.

Thanks Uber, Thanks WA Government, Thanks Customers.

There are a few things than can make you nervous when driving a million dollar car. Obviously the first thing is your own driving, making sure every move and turn is slow and precise. With the extended wheelbase and the sheer weight of this machine, a lot of focus is required to make sure you stay within the lanes and brake with a safe distance. The Phantom does its part, with very responsive power steering and brakes.

The first thing you notice out your windscreen is the bonnet of the car. While most cars have a tapered bonnet, the Rolls is square, extending out in front of your vision like a steely black battering ram. You feel like you are driving something more powerful than a car, more like a tank.

This piece on Hack on Wednesday 27th Nov 2013 discusess how driving hungover can be just as bad as driving over the limit.
A study from the UK backed up by a similar study from the Netherlands found participants that had been drinking the night before but still had a BAC of 0.00 were just as impaired in a driving simulator as participants that were over BAC 0.05.
Chris Alfred of the University of England explained to Hack that the brain goes through a recovery period after drinking which extends past the point where all the alcohol is removed from your body.
Have a listen to the piece here

Perth Designated Drivers are celebrating having won the Best Home Business Award at the annual Local Chambers Business Awards.

The “drive you home in your own car” service was presented the award at a ceremony on a Captain Cook cruise on Friday night.

Director, Lewis Cann said it was wonderful to receive recognition for the hard work that had been put in for the past seven months, which has seen many people driven home safe in their own cars.

“We are extremely proud to receive this award and look forward to further building on our success as we expand our business” Mr Cann said.

“We are constantly striving to innovate our core business. Even though driving people home in their own cars is a relatively simple concept, we are trying to develop new and interesting ways to assist both local businesses and our customers.”

“With the dismal taxi services in Perth and a spate of recent drink driving deaths, people have never been more receptive to the designated driver service.”
 
The Local Chambers Business Awards are highly regarded amongst the local community. Judging is conducted by highly experienced and successful business people who select businesses deserving of recognition for their abilities to meet award criteria and who have demonstrated a spirit of enterprise towards their business affairs and community involvement.
 

I don’t want to seem like I’m self promoting so I will write this as if I was on the ABC.
 
Starting a business in the ‘late night intoxicated car owners transfer and logistics industry’ gives you an interesting insight into the way people view drink driving. When we first started this business (a service that drives people home in their own cars), we thought to ourselves “Perth has a need for this service. There are places taxis won’t go, or go quickly and there is a problem with drink driving.” We made our message about providing an alternative to drink driving.
 
We had an amazing response from people and business owners that we met. Some said we were offering an invaluable community service. Many said they would use us often as they “drink drive all the time”. We got very excited. We did not get a single call from these people.
 
As it turns out, Perth has an ingrained culture of drink driving. People are too willing to do it, and they are not getting caught. The chances of reprimand are limited to the main streets on a Saturday or public holiday when the RBT’s are en force. The police pick a month to target drink driving. Operation Octopus in December 2009 and January 2010 was a targeted campaign to reduce drink driving around back streets from liquor serving establishments. In the two months 6073 breath tests were taken resulting in 337 charges laid for drink driving, a strike rate of 5.5%. On any day, 2.5% of people breath-tested are found to be over the limit.
 
Think about that next time you’re on the road. For every 40 cars you see, one of them was over the limit, risking your life and theirs.
 
Last night, I had a customer tell me that they think “90-95% of your business will be people who have been caught drink driving before”. I had to correct her, I can recollect the small few instances. Two people who have lost their licence before have used our service. They speak of how they will never do it again as they placed a huge burden on others when they could not drive themselves.
 
I’ve had one customer explain to me that they consider themselves a “responsible drink driver” because when he drink drives, he doesn’t hoon or do anything stupid. He then went onto explain to me that he fell asleep at the wheel while drink driving on the Mitchel Freeway and only woke up as his car gently scraped across the wire fencing guarding the train line. When he woke he was heading into a tree and could just steer the car away in time. Despite this, he said only now that he had a child with him did he consider not drink driving, thus using our service.
 
On three occasions we have had bookings for late at night, between 11 and 1pm, where at the last minute we have received a text saying “sorry, drove off”. One of them drove off because we were five minutes late for his booking, which was only because he changed restaurants. He sent us another text 15 minutes later, a picture message of a booze bus with the caption “blew 0.07”. This was three weeks after the law changed so that blood alcohol content between 0.05 and 0.08 incurred a minimum three-month suspension.
 
As much as we would love to be doing our small effort to reduce drink driving on our roads, it turns out the majority of what we do is offer responsible people a viable alternative to taxis. Responsible people in Perth are sick of late or non-existent taxis, engaged phone lines, poor driving and poor customer service.
 
Taxi charges are set by the state Government, so there is no way for taxis to change their business structure. They cannot charge more, or charge in advance to secure a booking. They get no benefit from waiting for you, or driving you in a safe and sensible manner. They get no benefit from picking people up from the outer suburbs when they can wait in the queue in Northbridge or the Airport. For these reasons, taxis fail responsible people and leave little alternative to the drink driving prone.
 
Not that this is an excuse.
 
My opinion: A long-term education and awareness campaign needs to occur in conjunction with changes to taxi regulations and improvements in late night public transport in order to change the culture of drink driving in Perth. What is yours?

This blog was posted at emergen.com.au on 07/04/2011. Comments are visible there.

From WAtoday.com.au
Drink drivers warned of summer blitz
 
Katherine Fenech
 
A three week drink-driving blitz would focus on roads surrounding WA’s licensed premises, Police Minister Rob Johnson says.
 
With an additional $300,000 from the state government funding 5,000 extra patrol hours, police would target drink driving and alcohol-related offences in hotspots mapped out using intelligence gathered from local police, as well as the traffic and liquor enforcement divisions.
 
“Summer is traditionally a time when people are out socialising, however I am urging them that if they are planning to drink, then they should make plans not to drive,” Mr Johnson said.
 
Advertisement: Story continues below “Alcohol is one of the top three causes of road trauma, and drivers with a blood alcohol level of 0.08 or above are seven times more likely to be involved in a crash.”
 
Operation Octopus, launched today by Mr Johnson and Police Commissioner Karl O’Callaghan, would begin tonight and run until the end of January.
 
The same operation during 2009/10 resulted in 337 drink and drug related charges being laid. Of those, 43 people were arrested and there were 107 charges for anti-social behaviour, crime and liquor offences.

A little exerpt from thewest.com describing the Police focus for the holiday season. Dont forget your designated driver this New Year;
 
 
Police have warned of a booze-bus blitz and instant action against drink drivers as they launched their Christmas and New Year traffic campaign.
Acting deputy commissioner Stephen Brown said officers would step up their efforts to catch drivers who flouted the rules.
He said police would have more police cars on metropolitan and regional roads and operate booze buses almost non-stop through the period.
Acting Sen-Sgt Chris Sammells said police would also have greater scope to arrest drink drivers after amendments to the State’s Road Traffic Act passed on December 9.
They included powers which made it easier for officers to arrest a motorist on the spot if they blew a blood alcohol reading above 0.08 and removing the right of a driver to request a blood test, which often delayed the ability of police to arrest offenders.
While police said they would target other traffic offences such as speeding and failing to wear a seat belt, acting Mr Brown said there would be a particular focus on drink driving.
He said alcohol was routinely among the top three causes of road deaths and trauma and people whose blood breached the 0.08 alcohol limit were seven times more likely to be involved in a traffic crash.
He warned motorists they were significantly more likely to be caught over the festive season, citing police efforts which last year caught 984 people for drink driving offences during the period.
The launch of the Christmas care traffic campaign came as police reminded people that double demerit points would come into force from midnight this Friday and run until the end of January 9.