Fare band system in the taxi industry
As part of the initiative to diversify taxi fares, the Ministry of Transport introduced the taxi fare band system in April 1997. Until then, the average costing and pricing regulation method had set taxi fares based on average costs in each fare block. The fare band system, on the other hand, defines the average cost as the ceiling and allows individual companies to set fares anywhere between the average cost and a figure 10% below that. The fare band system was introduced followed deregulation requests from various sectors, the introduction of a similar system in the domestic aviation market in December 1996, and the introduction of the price ceiling system in the railway industry in January 1997. In the taxi industry, where fares have steadily diversified, 2,707 vehicles working for 329 taxi companies in 29 fare blocks still charge the ceiling fare as of September 1997.
Minimum number of taxis in the fleet
Each operation territory defines the minimum number of taxis of a corporate taxi operation must have in the fleet. In other words, a company that does not meet this minimum requirement will not be granted a taxi business license. The objective of this regulation was to ensure that each taxi company was organizationally capable of conducting sound management, adequate maintenance, compensating customers for accidents, and handling post-accident procedures properly. Some criticized this requirement as an impediment to entering the industry and sought to lower the requirement drastically or abolish it altogether. In accordance with the Deregulation Package Action Program, approved by the Cabinet in March 1997, the Ministry of Transport lowered the minimum requirement from 60 vehicles in some areas to no more than 10.
