# AI search for a taxi business: getting recommended by ChatGPT and others

> AI assistants such as ChatGPT, Perplexity, Claude and Google's AI Overviews answer from what they can read: web pages found by search engines and their own crawlers, map listings and reviews. To be described correctly, let their search crawlers in, state your services, areas, prices and licence in plain text, and keep your name, address and phone the same everywhere. Google's guidance, updated in December 2025, says its AI features need no special files.

By Joe, founder of Dispatch AI. Updated 2026-10-14. The web page: https://dispatchai.co.uk/guides/getting-recommended-by-ai-assistants/

Some passengers now ask an AI assistant instead of typing into Google: "who does airport runs from Reading?" or "is there a taxi firm in Frome with a wheelchair-accessible car?". AI search for a taxi business runs on the same raw material as ordinary search. This guide explains what that material is, what you can tidy up, and what nobody can promise you.


## How do AI assistants find local businesses?

AI assistants find local businesses by searching the web and reading what they find, much as a person would. Each company describes its own set-up, and the descriptions are more ordinary than the hype suggests:

| Assistant | Where its answers come from, by its maker's account | The search crawler to let in |
|---|---|---|
| Google AI Overviews and AI Mode | Google Search's own index. Google says the usual SEO basics apply, and to keep your Business Profile up to date | Googlebot |
| ChatGPT search | Third-party search providers and content from OpenAI's partners, including data providers for maps | OAI-SearchBot |
| Claude | Web search, with Anthropic's search crawler indexing pages to improve its search results | Claude-SearchBot |
| Perplexity | Perplexity's own search results, built by its crawler | PerplexityBot |

None of them publishes how it picks one local taxi firm over another in an answer, and Google says it keeps its ranking details confidential. So there's no trick to learn. The useful work is making the facts about your firm easy to find, easy to read and the same everywhere they appear, which is what the rest of this guide covers.


## Can AI search crawlers read your taxi website?

Check two places: your website's robots.txt file and your web host's bot settings. Google's guidance for its AI features says to make sure crawling is allowed both in robots.txt and by any CDN or hosting service in front of your site.

The other companies spell out what blocking their search crawler does:

- OpenAI says sites that block OAI-SearchBot won't be shown in ChatGPT search answers, though they can still appear as plain navigation links.
- Anthropic says blocking Claude-SearchBot stops its system indexing your content for search, which can reduce how visible and accurate your firm is in its search results.
- Cloudflare, a widely used service that sits in front of websites to speed them up and protect them, changed its defaults on 1 July 2025. Every new domain is now asked at sign-up whether to allow AI crawlers. If your site went onto Cloudflare after that date, check what was chosen.

Search crawlers and training crawlers are separate. OpenAI's GPTBot and Anthropic's ClaudeBot collect content that may be used to train models, while OAI-SearchBot and Claude-SearchBot serve search. Perplexity says PerplexityBot isn't used to crawl content for AI foundation models. You can block training and still allow search.

One more check: put your important facts in text. Google lists making sure important content is available in textual form among the basics for its AI features. A price list that only exists as a photo of a laminated card is hard for any software to quote correctly.


## What facts should your taxi business state plainly?

The facts a passenger asks about, written as plain sentences on the page they belong to. "We're licensed by Swindon Borough Council" in text is easier to repeat than a council logo in the footer.

Make sure your website states:

- Your trading name, and your company name if it's different
- The council that licenses you and your operator licence number
- The towns and postcodes you pick up from
- What you do: which airports, which stations, account work, school contracts, executive cars
- Whether you have wheelchair-accessible vehicles and how to book one
- Fixed fares for your common journeys
- How to book, and the hours someone answers the phone and WhatsApp
- How you charge for waiting at airports

Put each main service on its own page, with the answer in the first lines and a heading phrased as the question passengers ask. That's ordinary good SEO, and Google says the same SEO basics apply to its AI features. Our guide to [SEO for taxi firms](https://dispatchai.co.uk/guides/seo-for-taxi-firms/) lists the pages worth having, and our guide to [what a taxi website needs to get bookings](https://dispatchai.co.uk/guides/taxi-website-that-gets-bookings/) covers the layout.


## Why do name, address and phone need to match everywhere?

Google builds its picture of your firm from several places, and mismatches muddy it. Google's guidelines ask businesses to appear online the way they're known in the real world, on signs and stationery. They also say Google uses information from other sources when it decides how to show your address, and can pick up details about your business from your website and from mentions of your firm around the web.

Anything else that reads the web meets the same mess you leave. A firm listed under three spellings, with an old phone number on a directory, gets described three ways.

Check your name, address and phone on each of these, and make them match:

1. Your Google Business Profile
2. Apple Maps, through Apple Business, where Apple lets you claim your location and control your logo, hours, images and details
3. Your website's footer and contact page
4. Your Facebook page and any other social profiles
5. Directory listings and old adverts that still show your number
6. The company name on your website's legal details, which should match Companies House

If you change how your phones are answered, keep the number. Dispatch AI, which is booking and dispatch software for taxi and private hire firms, is set up with a call divert on your own line, so the number in your listings doesn't change. Our guide to [setting up a Google Business Profile](https://dispatchai.co.uk/guides/google-business-profile-for-taxi-firms/) covers the name rules in full.


## Do reviews change what AI assistants say about you?

Reviews are public text about your firm, so anything that reads the web can read them. Google says the number of reviews and positive ratings feed into local prominence on Google Maps. No assistant maker publishes how much weight its answers give reviews, so treat them as part of the picture rather than a lever.

What you control is the honest version: ask for genuine reviews steadily, and reply calmly, because replies are public text too. Buying or faking reviews has been illegal in the UK since 6 April 2025 under the Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Act 2024. Our guide to [getting more Google reviews the right way](https://dispatchai.co.uk/guides/getting-more-google-reviews-taxi/) covers what's allowed.


## Should a taxi firm add an llms.txt file?

It's optional, quick and harmless. llms.txt is a proposal, published by Jeremy Howard in September 2024, for a short markdown file at yoursite/llms.txt that tells AI tools what a site is and links to its most useful pages.

The proposal sets out a simple layout. A heading with the site's name, which is the only required part. A short summary in a quote block. Optional notes, then lists of links under subheadings. For a taxi firm that's your name, one line saying what you do, where and who licenses you, and links to your prices, airport, accounts and contact pages.

Keep it in proportion. Google's guidance says you don't need new machine-readable files, AI text files or markup to appear in AI Overviews or AI Mode, and that there's no special schema.org markup to add either. So llms.txt is an emerging convention worth an hour, not a substitute for clear pages.


## What should you ignore?

Promises. Be wary of anyone who promises you a top spot in an assistant's answers. Google's guidance says AI Overviews and AI Mode need no special optimisation beyond normal SEO, and Google says there's no way to request or pay for a better local ranking. OpenAI says any website can choose to appear in ChatGPT search, which in practice means letting OAI-SearchBot in.

Instead, check what the assistants say about you, once a month:

1. Ask two or three assistants the questions your passengers ask, such as "taxi from [your town] to [your airport]".
2. Write down what each one says about your firm, and where it says it got the information.
3. Where a fact is wrong, fix it at the source: your website, your Google profile or the directory it came from.
4. Ask again a month later.

## Frequently asked questions

### Does ChatGPT use Google reviews to recommend taxi firms?

OpenAI's own description of ChatGPT search mentions third-party search providers and content from partners, not particular review sites. Keep your reviews genuine wherever passengers leave them, because any of them can end up in an answer.

### Should I block AI crawlers from my taxi website?

That's your call, but split the two kinds. You can block crawlers that collect content for training, such as GPTBot and ClaudeBot, and still allow the search crawlers. OpenAI says a site that blocks OAI-SearchBot won't appear in ChatGPT search answers.

### Is an llms.txt file required?

No. It's a proposal from September 2024, not an official standard. Google says its AI features need no AI text files or special markup. It does no harm to add one.

### Does schema markup help AI assistants find my firm?

Google says there's no special schema.org structured data needed for its AI features, and that any structured data should match the visible text on your page. Markup describing your business can still help Google Search understand it, but clear text on the page matters more.

### How often should I check what AI assistants say about my firm?

Once a month keeps it a small job. Check sooner after you change your phone number, prices or service area, and fix any wrong fact at its source rather than arguing with the assistant.


## Sources

- [AI features and your website (Google Search Central)](https://developers.google.com/search/docs/appearance/ai-features) no special files or markup needed; crawling allowed by robots.txt and CDN; keep Business Profile up to date; updated December 2025
- [Overview of OpenAI crawlers (OpenAI)](https://developers.openai.com/api/docs/bots) OAI-SearchBot, GPTBot and ChatGPT-User
- [Introducing ChatGPT search (OpenAI)](https://openai.com/index/introducing-chatgpt-search/) third-party search providers, partner content, maps data, October 2024
- [Does Anthropic crawl data from the web, and how can site owners block the crawler? (Anthropic)](https://support.claude.com/en/articles/8896518-does-anthropic-crawl-data-from-the-web-and-how-can-site-owners-block-the-crawler) ClaudeBot, Claude-User and Claude-SearchBot
- [Perplexity crawlers (Perplexity)](https://docs.perplexity.ai/guides/bots) PerplexityBot and Perplexity-User
- [The /llms.txt file (llmstxt.org)](https://llmstxt.org/) the proposal, by Jeremy Howard, first published 3 September 2024
- [Cloudflare changes how AI crawlers scrape the internet (Cloudflare)](https://www.cloudflare.com/press-releases/2025/cloudflare-just-changed-how-ai-crawlers-scrape-the-internet-at-large/) new domains asked whether to allow AI crawlers, 1 July 2025
- [Guidelines for representing your business on Google (Google Business Profile Help)](https://support.google.com/business/answer/3038177) consistent real-world representation; information from other sources
- [Tips to improve your local ranking on Google (Google Business Profile Help)](https://support.google.com/business/answer/7091) reviews and prominence; no paying for ranking
- [Apple Business (Apple)](https://businessconnect.apple.com/) claim your location on Apple Maps
- [Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Act 2024, Schedule 20](https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2024/13/schedule/20) fake reviews banned from 6 April 2025

Dispatch AI is a trading name of CABO TECH SOLUTION AI LTD, registered in England and Wales, company no. 16255667.