RESEARCHED AUTHORITY
Three Rivers
Three Rivers Council · Sources checked 13 September 2026
- Driver licensing
- Official route/source found
Applicants must be at least 21 with a full UK DVLA licence held three years, right to work and suitable character/medical fitness. Dual licensing permits hackney and private-hire driving.
- Vehicle licensing
- Official route/source found
Current vehicle guidance requires MOT, designated-garage compliance certificate, ownership or hire-purchase evidence and hire/reward passenger insurance. Hackneys need a calibrated, sealed, correctly tariffed meter; private hire needs calibration only if a meter is fitted. Licences last one year with renewal requested four weeks before expiry. Vehicles normally must be under seven years old, but the council expressly allows disapplication where acceptable standards are met. Vehicles ten years and older need three compliance tests yearly; those aged three and older need annual MOT. No category of insurance write-off is licensed. A failed MOT/compliance test means immediate removal from service pending valid clearance. Accidents must be reported within 72 hours. Rear and internal plates are required; executive PH rear-plate exemption does not remove the windscreen plate or driver-badge requirement. These are current published principal conditions.
- Operator licensing
- Official route/source found
Applications go to licensing.team@threerivers.gov.uk with fee paid through customer services. Each applicant supplies an unused same-day DVLA check code and planning-permission evidence, then takes the operator knowledge test. The council inspects the base, booking process and records. Licences run up to five years; annual Basic disclosure is mandatory. Renewals must be submitted at least two months before expiry; expired licences require a new application. New driver employment must be emailed to licensing. Own dispatched drivers and vehicles must be Three Rivers-licensed; subcontracting to other licensed operators is allowed.
- Licensing fees
- Official route/source found
The council confirms its consulted 2026/27 licensing charges took effect on 1 April 2026. New private-hire or hackney driver licences are £199 for one year or £518 for three; renewals are £178 or £477. New dual-driver licences are £232 or £612, with renewals £227 or £597. A new annual vehicle licence is £235 and renewal £197. The enhanced-DBS charge is £52.60 and knowledge-test attempts two to five cost £21. Operator and ancillary charges are also listed in the full schedule; applicants should use that live document for the applicable vehicle band and replacement items.
- Taxi tariff
- Official route/source found
The current council-linked approved card is dated 6 November 2023. £4 includes the first 1,015 metres or part; each started 90 metres thereafter up to 2,030 metres costs 10p, then each started 50 metres costs 10p. Waiting is 10p per started 20 seconds. Night start charge from 21:30–06:00 is £4.50. Christmas Day doubles the fare; ordinary bank holidays add 50p except Boxing Day/New Year's Day, which add 50%, also applying from New Year's Eve 20:00. These are metre distances, not miles; commercial transcriptions using 1,015 metres as 1.015 miles are unsafe. The card confirms committee approval but does not separately specify legal commencement. Stage-boundary handling and stacking of night/holiday adjustments require explicit interpretation before calculator activation.
- Mandatory qualifications
- Official route/source found
Applicants must be 21 with three years' UK DVLA entitlement. An advanced taxi assessment through Green Penny, BLT or Drivetech must be dated within twelve months. Safeguarding is mandatory with a new certificate every three years; the page lists BLT e-learning or virtual-classroom courses and Green Penny. Group 2 medical evidence must be under three months old; established drivers provide medicals three-yearly until 65 then annually, or more often if required medically. Enhanced DBS must be enrolled in its Update Service. Applicants book the knowledge test after submitting their application.
Withheld or still needing confirmation
- Full training, vehicle/operator criteria, fees and tariff require further extraction.
- The summary highlights principal charges rather than reproducing every ancillary or operator fleet-band item.
- Preserve previous fields. Numeric fees and exhaustive supporting-document policy not refreshed.
- Card date known; separate legal commencement not printed.
- At 2,030 metres a90-metre pulse can straddle the threshold; do not infer rounding model.
- Night/holiday combination order not explicit.
- Exact standards, application documents, inspection schedule and fees are not supplied by the DfT return.