SINGAPORE — An average of about 2,600 taxis sat idle each month between January and August this year, a sharp rise from the same monthly figure recorded three years ago of about 590 unhired cabs, latest data from the Land Transport Authority (LTA) showed.
The statistical trend is the latest sign of the intense competition the Republic’s taxi industry is facing from the private-hire car industry.
Lost business aside, experts say the idle taxis present a double financial blow for the companies via depreciation of the vehicles and their Certificates of Entitlement (COE).
“You have a depreciation of the COE and the car itself — and those are supposed to be recovered from taxi rentals. Unhired taxis mean you’re not recovering those expenses,” said Singapore University of Social Sciences urban transport expert Park Byung Joon.
Transport specialist Terence Fan of the Singapore Management University said taxi companies will have to offer lower rentals or fringe benefits that make driving more attractive, such as fixed salaries.
“Being able to offer more choices may help because, obviously, people now have more choices, so allowing more flexibility in terms of how and when people get to drive will help,” Assistant Professor Fan added.
But the experts do not expect a quick reversal of the trend, if at all.
Between January and August this year, the average rate of taxis that were not hired stood at 9.8 per cent, the LTA said in response to TODAY’s queries.
This is almost five times the average unhired rate of 2.1 per cent in 2014.
Photo: From January to August, the average proportion of cabs which sat idle stood at 9.8 per cent — nearly five times higher than the average rate of 2.1 per cent in 2014, Land Transport Authority figures showed.
In terms of taxi fleet size, Singapore saw a monthly average of 26,182 cabs between January to August this year. This meant some 2,566 taxis went unhired each month on average, compared with 588 cabs that sat idle each month in 2014.
Meanwhile, the fleet size of ComfortDelGro, Singapore’s largest taxi operator, continued to tumble.
According to the latest figures published by the LTA, ComfortDelGro had 14,823 Comfort and CityCab taxis on its books in September — including those sitting idle — the lowest since September 2007. It lost 304 taxis between August and September.
ComfortDelGro and Grab are locked in a battle for drivers, with the ride-hailing firm drawing more than 3,000 ComfortDelGro cabbies to the Grab platform following a recruitment drive offering heavily discounted rentals.
Overall, there were 24,468 taxis in the Republic in September, the lowest in about eight years. Save for Premier Taxis, whose fleet inched up by 42 taxis, the fleet of all the other major operators continued to slide between August and September.
While the idle taxis can technically be exported for use overseas, that is not commonly done as these vehicles have seen heavy use, said Ms Pauline Goh, managing director of the LTA-authorised scrapyard Kiat Lee Group.
Taxis here are typically scrapped at the seven-year mark, the end of their lifespan. “All these taxis that the taxi companies release are due for scrap. If not, they’ll definitely have to lease them out to (cabbies) to go on the roads,” Ms Goh added.
