Corporate taxi rates: how to price a business account

There's no published going rate for corporate taxi work, and this guide won't invent one. What it does is show you how to build your own corporate taxi rates: the account price list, the extras, the payment terms, what giving credit costs you and the VAT points to get right. Every example is labelled as one, with its inputs shown. Put your own numbers in.

Should corporate taxi rates be a price list or the meter?

Corporate taxi rates work best as a fixed price list for the routes the client uses most, with a clear rule for every other journey. The office manager can budget, the finance team can check each line of the invoice, and your controller quotes the same price every time.

A price list also ends the argument about traffic. The office to the station costs the same at 8am as at 2pm, so nobody rings you about a fare that crept up in a jam.

For journeys that aren't on the list, say how they'll be priced: your normal zone prices, or your normal mileage rate. Our guide to taxi zone pricing explains how zones work. If you run hackney carriages on the meter, check your council's rules before you agree fixed prices for journeys inside its district. Our guide to hackney carriages and private hire covers the difference.

How do you build an account price list?

Build it from the client's own journeys and your own costs, not from what you guess a rival charges. Six steps:

1. Ask the client for a list of the journeys they book most, or three months of old taxi receipts.
2. Pick the 5 to 10 routes that make up most of their spend.
3. Price each route from your cost per mile and per minute, plus your margin. Our guide on how to price taxi fares shows how to work out those costs.
4. Round each price to a clean figure.
5. Put a date on the list, and the date you'll review it.
6. Add one line for everything else, such as "other journeys at our standard zone prices".

Example only: the £4.00 pickup charge, £1.90 a mile and rounding up to the next 50p are made-up inputs to show the method. They aren't market rates.

Dispatch AI is booking and dispatch software for taxi and private hire firms. It answers your phone, WhatsApp, texts and emails, books the jobs at your prices and sends them to your drivers on your own app, with fixed prices by zone, set by you.

What should you charge for waiting time on an account?

Set a free waiting period and a rate after it, put both on the price list and record the minutes on each booking so they show on the invoice. Business clients don't mind paying for waiting. They mind finding it on the invoice with no explanation.

Two kinds of waiting come up on accounts. The first is the passenger who's late down to reception. The second is the planned wait, such as a solicitor's client at a hearing who wants the same car to bring them back. Price the planned wait as an hourly rate, agreed when the job is booked.

Example: 5 minutes free at an office pickup, then 40p a minute, and a wait-and-return rate of £20 an hour. All three figures are made up. Decide yours from what an hour of a driver's time costs you, and agree who can approve a long wait: the booker, or the passenger on the day.

How should you price airport runs on an account?

Give each airport a fixed price each way, and decide in writing how you'll handle the airport's own charges. Those charges are real costs, and they change.

Heathrow charges £7 every time a vehicle enters a terminal drop-off area. The charge has to be paid by midnight on the day after the visit, and an unpaid charge becomes an £80 parking charge, reduced to £40 if paid within 14 days. Other airports set their own fees, so check each airport's own website before you price it.

You have two choices. Build the charge into the fixed price, or show it as a separate line at cost. A separate line is easier for a finance team to check, and it means you don't have to reprint the price list when an airport puts its fee up. For pickups, agree who pays for waiting when a flight lands late. Our guide to winning more airport work covers meet and greet and pickup planning.

Do corporate accounts need a minimum fare?

Yes. A half-mile hop from the office to the bank costs your driver the same time getting there as a longer job, so set a minimum fare for the account and apply it every time.

Example: a £7.00 minimum on an account where the shortest regular route is £9.00. The figure is made up; set yours from what an empty run to the pickup costs you.

What payment terms should you give, and what does credit cost you?

Give a monthly invoice with payment due 30 days after it, and price in the cost of waiting for the money. GOV.UK says that agreed payment dates must usually be within 60 days for business transactions, and longer only if that's fair to both sides. If you agree no date at all, a payment is late 30 days after the customer gets the invoice or the service is done, whichever is later.

Credit isn't free. Your drivers still expect their money every week while the client's fares sit unpaid.

Example: an account spends £2,000 a month. You invoice on the 1st for the month before, and they pay 30 days later. A journey on 1 March is paid about 1 May, 61 days later. A journey on 31 March is paid 31 days later. On average you wait about 45 days for each pound, so you're carrying about £3,000 of that client's fares at any time (45 ÷ 30 × £2,000). If that £3,000 sits on an overdraft at 10% a year, the credit costs you £300 a year, or 1.25% of the £24,000 the account spends in a year. The £2,000 and the 10% are made up; use your own.

So either price the account to cover that cost, or shorten the wait: ask for 14 days instead of 30, or offer the client card payment. Start every new account with a credit limit you could afford to lose, and raise it once they've paid on time for a few months.

What can you charge when an account pays late?

You can claim statutory interest and a fixed sum for recovery costs. GOV.UK says the interest rate for business-to-business debts is 8% plus the Bank of England base rate. The Bank of England's Bank Rate was 3.75% when we checked, held on 17 September 2026.

Example: with the base rate at 3.75%, statutory interest is 11.75% a year. On a £2,000 invoice that's £235 a year, or about 64p a day.

On top of the interest, GOV.UK lets you charge a fixed sum for recovery costs, once for each payment:

You can't claim statutory interest if your contract sets a different interest rate, so either leave interest out of your terms or set a rate you'd actually charge. If a larger customer won't pay, the Office of the Small Business Commissioner helps small businesses with unresolved payment disputes against bigger ones.

How does VAT affect corporate account invoices?

VAT affects your account invoices only if you're VAT registered. GOV.UK says you must register when your taxable turnover goes over £90,000, and you can ask to deregister below £88,000. If you aren't registered, you don't charge VAT and your invoices mustn't show it.

If you are registered, HMRC's VAT Notice 700/21 says you must normally issue a VAT invoice within 30 days of the supply, and a simplified invoice is only allowed under £250. Say clearly on the price list whether VAT will be added to the prices shown, so the client's budget matches the invoice.

How VAT falls on the fares depends on your set-up. HMRC's VAT Notice 700/25 says that where an operator acts as an agent for its drivers, VAT is only due on the fares if the driver is registered, and any administration charge on the same invoice must be itemised separately. HMRC has also changed the rules on the Tour Operators' Margin Scheme: from 2 January 2026, private hire operators can no longer use it, although journeys a driver supplies directly to a passenger aren't affected. Take this one to your accountant. Our guide to tax for a taxi business has the background.

Should you give a business a volume discount?

Give a discount only where the work genuinely costs you less: regular runs booked well ahead, on fixed routes, in hours when your cars would otherwise sit idle. A solicitor's 11am court runs are worth a sharper price. A Friday 5pm office rush isn't, because you could fill those cars twice over.

A better trade than a straight discount is a small reduction for faster payment. Being paid in 14 days instead of 30 means you carry two fewer weeks of the client's fares, and it's money in the bank rather than a promise. Our guide to keeping drivers busy in quiet hours shows how to find the hours worth discounting.

When should you review account prices?

Once a year, on a date written into the account terms, with notice in writing before the new prices start. Review sooner if a big cost moves: your insurance renewal, fuel, or a change to the council's hackney tariff if you run hackney carriages.

Keep every version of every price list with its date. When finance queries an invoice from eight months ago, you can show which list it was priced on.