TAXI drivers who charged Grand National racegoers a minimum £60 fee for fares over the three-day race meeting will be investigated.
Liverpool Council trading standards officers began to register complaints from aggrieved travellers at the weekend when they phoned up to complain about overcharging.
According to people present at the course, many drivers were taking advantage of the chaos to ask for exorbitant fees from racegoers battling through crowds containing thousands of people.
Racegoers lined the platforms at Aintree railway station, waiting for long periods for trains.
Complaints started coming into trading standards officers almost immediately after Saturday’s big race.
More then 150,000 people attended Aintree racecourse between Thursday and Saturday as sunny weather saw many of the enclosures sold out.
Some hackney carriage drivers were accused of cashing in, with reports circulating of fares of up to £40 and even £60 flat-rate fees for journeys as short as the five miles to Lime Street station.
According to the official hackney carriage rates for Liverpool, a daytime pick-up from Aintree to Lime Street should cost around £9.30 – meaning some racegoers were ripped off by up to 570%.
Many people who wanted to make a complaint to trading standards had not taken their cab driver’s licence number.
A spokesman for Liverpool Council said: “We received a lot of calls after the National, but were unable to help most of the people because they had no details of the specific incident or cab. We do have several people with the licence number of the cab driver and we are investigating those incidents.”
Tommy McIntyre, Unite’s national representative for taxis, said: “I do not think there are nearly as many of these incidents as people think.
“You hear people talking about it, but not many can give a licence number. But it was a stupid thing for drivers to do.
“There was a lot of money to be made without ripping people off.
“The Grand National is bigger business to us than Christmas and New Year rolled into one.
“As a trade union, we would love these people to be reported to us, with a licence number, so we can get them out.
“They damage the relationship we have with our customers.”
Three drivers are now being investigated by city council licensing officers.
