London Gatwick Police Clamps Down On Driver Waiting For Uber Booking

London Gatwick Airport LGW

WEST SUSSEX POLICE has launched a crackdown on private hire drivers in restaurant car parks and garage forecourts around Gatwick Airport waiting for potential fares generated through the Uber app. 

Officers based at Gatwick have noticed a rise in private hire drivers, the majority using the Uber app, parking within the airport boundaries as they wait for booking requests from arriving passengers who use Uber rather than the authorised Gatwick airport car service provider, Airport Cars Gatwick. Uber customers request a car, and the job is offered to the nearest registered driver which is why drivers choose to wait as close as possible to the terminal. 

 Airport Cars Gatwick has the only licence to pick up passengers arriving at the airport while Other private hire firms can collect pre-booked fares, although they have to wait in car parks and cannot use the airport's taxi ranks. 

 Gatwick-based police have been carrying out patrols of the airport boundaries since the start of the month and have forced many drivers to move on. On 01 April 2015, ten drivers caught on Gatwick land were told to leave, a further five were moved on during an operation on April 7 and eight were asked to leave on April 9.

 Sergeant Darren Taylor, from the airport's community safety team said: 'Taxi drivers are loitering and clogging up areas of the airport used by the public. We have found drivers parked up in the car park for the McDonalds drive through and also in petrol station forecourts. He continued: "Many of these drivers come down from London and they wait there for an Uber request to come through on their phone. We first became aware of the issue when we were getting calls from BP and Shell garages saying there were drivers who just sat in the forecourts for long periods of time. The forecourts are not designed for that purpose. 

We are actively discouraging this practice by giving any drivers we catch words of advice and asking them to leave. If we catch the same person frequently breaking by-laws we will be forced to contact the local authority where they are registered to raise a complaint and enforce exclusions. Sgt Taylor said a meeting would be held with Uber to discuss the best way forward.

Gatwick Taxis to Heathrow Airport