Services · Mobile app development · Taxi booking apps
We handle taxi booking app development UK operators need when they run fleets in more than one town or nation. Passenger, driver and dispatch apps are designed around four separate licensing systems: London, the rest of England and Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland. Rules, fares and records are configured per licensing authority, so one platform can serve every market you work in.
Licensing in the UK is local. Hundreds of councils set their own conditions, fares and vehicle standards. A platform that hard codes one city's rules breaks the moment you expand, so we build those rules as data your team can manage.
200+ companies servedFrom a first store to an ADX listed developer
Platform capabilities
A single-town operator can live with a simple app. Once you run fleets in several areas, the gaps show quickly: a fare table that only works for one council, driver records that cannot show which authority licensed them, and reports that mix everything together. National growth also brings scrutiny, because each licensing authority will want to see that your system supports its conditions.
The legal base differs by nation. In London, TfL licenses taxis and private hire under its own legislation. Elsewhere in England and Wales, councils license hackney carriages under the Town Police Clauses Act 1847 and private hire under the Local Government (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act 1976. Scotland uses the Civic Government (Scotland) Act 1982, and Northern Ireland uses the Taxis Act (Northern Ireland) 2008. The capabilities below are the ones that make a multi-area platform workable.
Fares, tariffs, document requirements, vehicle standards and booking record fields are stored per authority. Launching in a new town means adding its rule set and testing it, not rewriting the app. Changes made by a council can be applied in the admin system by your compliance team the same week.
New areas go live through configuration, not new code.
Groups often hold several operator licences, one per area, each with its own drivers and vehicles. The platform models every licence as a separate operator with shared branding, shared passenger accounts and separate records, reporting and dispatch, which matches how licensing authorities see your business.
One brand for passengers, clean separation for regulators.
In England and Wales the Deregulation Act 2015 allows a private hire operator to pass a booking to another licensed operator, including one elsewhere. The platform records the original booking, the receiving operator and the reason for the transfer, so any authority asking about a trip gets a clear answer. The passenger still sees one booking and one receipt.
Overflow work moves between areas with a full audit trail.
The Equality Act 2010 and the Taxis and Private Hire Vehicles (Disabled Persons) Act 2022 place duties on drivers and operators to help disabled passengers. The app captures assistance needs at booking, routes them to suitable vehicles, and is designed to WCAG 2.2 so the booking flow itself is usable.
Accessible service that works the same in every area.
Card, Apple Pay and Google Pay through a PCI compliant provider with Strong Customer Authentication, plus account billing for corporate clients with sites in several cities. Open Banking payments can be added for account customers who prefer bank transfers to card payments.
One payment setup for every market you serve.
London's ULEZ, Clean Air Zones in several English cities and Low Emission Zones in Scottish cities all affect which vehicles can work where. Each vehicle record holds its emissions status, and dispatch rules can keep non-compliant cars out of zones they should not enter. Charges that your terms allow you to pass on can be added to quotes or account invoices by area.
Fleet decisions reflect the zone rules in every city you serve.
The Statutory Taxi and Private Hire Vehicle Standards issued by the Department for Transport shape what English councils expect on checks and safeguarding. The platform stores document expiry dates, training records and suspension status per driver, and blocks dispatch when something lapses.
Compliance is visible to managers before an inspector asks.
Controllers can work one area or several, with permissions set per operator licence. Head office sees every area at once, while local teams see only their own fleet. Escalations, complaints and lost property are logged centrally so patterns across areas are easy to spot.
Head office oversight without slowing local teams.
National employers, NHS suppliers and travel management companies want one account covering every city. We build account hierarchies with sites, cost centres, approval rules and consolidated invoicing, while each trip is still fulfilled by the correct local operator.
National contracts become easier to win and to run.
Demand, acceptance, cancellations, waiting times and driver supply are reported per licensing area and per operator. Expansion decisions rest on real booking data rather than guesswork, and underperforming areas are visible early. Head office can compare areas side by side on a single screen.
Clear evidence for where to grow next.
Who this is for
The UK taxi and private hire market is made of many local firms, a few large groups and the national ride hailing platforms. Independent firms are increasingly joining up through acquisitions, franchise networks and booking partnerships. Many are also exploring wheelchair accessible fleets, electric vehicles and corporate contracts that cover several cities. A platform built for one town struggles in that world. These are the businesses that benefit most from a system designed for several areas from the start.
You have bought operators in several towns, each with its own app, dispatch system and customer list. Running them separately costs money and blocks a single brand. We plan a migration to one platform, bringing each firm across in turn, preserving its licence, records and loyal customers, and switching off the old systems only when the new one is proven in that area.
Each acquired firm migrates on its own schedule.
You want to give passengers one national app while trips are carried out by independent licensed firms in each town. The platform routes bookings to the right local partner, records every handover, and gives each partner a console of its own. Commission and settlement reports are produced automatically for each partner. Partners keep their own licences, drivers and local reputation while gaining national demand.
Your clients are businesses with offices, staff and visitors across the UK. They want one account, one invoice and consistent service everywhere. We build the account portal and reporting first, then connect it to your own fleets and partner operators so the client never sees the complexity underneath. Monthly reports show service levels per city, which supports contract reviews.
You plan to open in two or three cities and grow from there. We design the rules engine and data model for expansion from the start, but keep the first release focused on the areas you can actually serve. That avoids paying to build features for cities you have not yet licensed. Investors also tend to ask how the product scales, and a clear data model answers that question.
Operator licences in each area remain your responsibility to obtain.
How we work together
Codeeo has no UK office. Our team of 80+ is based in Dubai, Riyadh and Karachi and works remotely with clients across the UK, running discovery, design reviews and sprint demos over video call. National platforms usually suit a dedicated team that stays with the product through several area launches, though some groups prefer a fixed scope first release followed by a retainer. For acquisitions, we can also assess an existing platform before you decide whether to keep, extend or replace it. Our record so far is 200+ projects delivered across the UAE and the US, with a 4.7 rating from 23 Google reviews.
A defined build with a deadline
We agree what the product has to do, write it down with a price and a date, and build exactly that. Changes are priced before they are made, not discovered on the invoice.
A product that keeps evolving
Named engineers who work your hours, join your standups and stay on the codebase. You direct the backlog; we own the quality of what ships.
Something live that needs looking after
A monthly block of hours for improvements, fixes and the small requests that otherwise wait months. Unused hours carry for a quarter.
Technology
Apps are typically built cross platform for iOS and Android, with a scalable cloud backend in a UK region. Rule sets live in a database rather than code. Payment, mapping and messaging providers are chosen with you for national coverage, and all accounts sit in your company's name. Load testing covers a national peak, such as a Friday night across every area at once.
01Mobile
02Data and cloud
03Marketing and tracking
The number of areas, operator models and integrations.
A platform for one licensing area is far simpler than one serving several authorities, partner operators and national accounts. Migrating data from acquired firms, connecting accounting and HR systems, and building partner settlement all add work. We estimate after discovery, when the scope is clear, and we can phase the build so early areas go live before later features are finished. The depth of the head office reporting and the number of user roles also shape the effort more than most clients expect.
Schedule a free consultation and get a written recommendation, with costs, before you commit to anything.
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