Dubai: Roads officials said on Thursday they had boosted the number of taxis at Dubai International Airport terminals resulting in dramatically slashed waiting times.
The Dubai Taxi Corporation (DTC) at Roads and Transport Authority (RTA) said it had implemented the ‘Smart Trips’ initiative in its fleet vehicles in a bid to raise customer satisfaction by reducing taxi wait time.
Each taxi cab will operate on two different shifts whereby the airport taxis will operate at night and normal taxis will operate during the day.
The renewed push is “reducing the taxi waiting time from 30 minutes in 2012 before the initiative was implemented to three minutes in 2014,” the RTA said in a press release on Thursday.
Mohammad Yousuf Saleh, Director of Fleet Operations at Dubai Taxi Corporation, said, “We have implemented the idea in order to ensure develop, improve and optimally utilise the available resources of taxis and cabbies. The Dubai Taxi Corporation runs 350 taxi cabs at Dubai airports to serve arrivals to Dubai emirate, in addition to other 100 taxi cabs to serve VIPs, 80 vehicles for ladies and families, and seven for special needs.”
“These vehicles lift those arriving from Dubai airport to their different destinations within the UAE around the clock. Special parking spaces have been designated for these taxis at terminal 1, 2 and 3 and Al Maktoum International Airport, where distinguished cabbies and highly qualified staff have been entrusted to provide this service,” said Saleh.
“The fleet has been beefed up with 100 vehicles in the first phase since the idea was implemented back in January 2013; and featured another increase in August 2013 where the number of fleet vehicles reached 175 in order to meet the steady growth in the number of arrivals at Dubai Airports. As the idea has proved successful, the Dubai Taxi Corporation implemented the initiative at Al Maktoum Airport at the beginning of May 2014, and realised the same objectives of reducing passengers’ waiting time,” he said.
Saleh called upon the public, visitors and customers to cooperate with the Dubai Taxi Corporation by maintaining their property and personal belongings when they are in taxis, as well as requesting the trip invoice before disembarking from the vehicle as it contains important data such as the vehicle’s side number, taxi drivers’s ID, trip cost, and the trip’s date and time. Such data is needed when dealing with suggestions, comments, complaints or reported cases through the RTA’s call centre 8009090, DTC’s website www.dubaitaxi.ae, or the RTA’s website www.rta.ae. This will reduce the numbers of lost items cases and boost customer service ratings.
