The Transport Bureau (DSAT) has announced that it has accepted 21 bids out of the 40 bids submitted for its public tender for the granting of 10 eight-year company licences each of which will be allowed to operate up to 50 common taxis.
According to the announcement, the prices offered by the 21 accepted bids range between 2.5 million and 3.8 million patacas. The government set the minimum bid at 2.5 million patacas.
The 40 submitted bids were unsealed by DSAT officials in a meeting on Friday, after which the bureau announced in a statement on Monday that it had decided to accept 21 of the 40 bids, while it rejected the remaining 19 bids. According to the DSAT website, the 19 bids were rejected because the respective companies did not meet the statutory requirements for operating taxis or their tender documents failed to meet the official requirements.
The granting of the 10 company licences will enable up to 500 new taxis to hit the roads.
DSAT officials said on Friday that some of the new taxis were expected to come into service next January at the earliest, after the scheduled completion of bid assessments before the end of next month that will choose the 10 winners.
Common taxis – as opposed to special radio taxis – are colloquially known as “black taxis” (“hak dik” in Cantonese).
The tender for the 10 licences was launched on October 25. Potential bidders were required to submit their tenders by Thursday last week.
According to the current law regulating the city’s taxi sector, which took effect in June 2019, only companies are allowed to bid for a licence to operate common taxis.
Before the current taxi law came into force, common taxi-vehicle licences were granted to individuals.
According to the current taxi law, a single company is only allowed to hold up to 300 taxi-vehicle licences. A company must have a minimum capital of five million patacas to bid for a licence to operate common taxis. Only locally-registered companies are allowed to bid for the licences.
The last time the government launched a public tender to grant new common taxi-vehicle licences to individuals was in 2018, when 100 new licences valid for eight years were bid for.
The ongoing tender process for the 10 licences, which was launched last month, is the first tender since the current taxi law took effect in 2019, according to which common taxi licences are now granted to companies instead of individuals.
The ongoing public tender will grant new licences valid for eight years to 10 companies to operate common taxis. Each winner can apply to operate up to 50 taxis.
Consequently, the public tender will grant up to 500 new common taxi-vehicle licences.
This time, each company can only bid for one taxi-operating licence comprising up to 50 taxis, with the minimum bid set at 2.5 million patacas. Each bidder was required to pay a deposit of 3.5 million patacas.
The 21 accepted bids will now be assessed based on three criteria, namely the proposed price accounting for 40 percent of the scores, the proposed plan of how to run its fleet of taxis accounting for 50 percent, and the proposed kinds of vehicles accounting for 10 percent.
Before the current taxi law took effect – when common taxi-vehicle licences were granted to individuals, those who proposed the highest bids were granted a licence during a public tender.
According to the current taxi law, a single company, regardless of those holding only one taxi-operating licence or those holding more than one, is only allowed to hold a maximum of 300 taxi-vehicle licences in total.
At the end of the last quarter, according to DSAT data, Macau had a total of 1,566 taxis, comprising 1,266 black taxis and 300 special radio taxis.
Two taxis wait for passengers at the taxi rank outside the Grand Lisboa hotel-casino tower last night. – Photo: Tony Wong
