A Cardiff taxi firm is offering its drivers a qualification in how to present a better image of their job.

Premier Cars wants its 240 drivers to take a Btec course on how best to be polite, carry luggage and read maps.

The £250 course involves two days in a classroom plus a 70-hour online course which 21 drivers have so far completed.

The firm's managing director Peter Renwick said: "If you have a bad taxi ride, you always remember the bad one, you never remember the good one."

He said: "This helps them (the drivers) to understand why they need to be an ambassador and how to achieve it."

The seven-module Transporting Passengers by Taxi and Private Hire includes the finer points of customer service, equality and diversity and health and safety.

Have your say I don't think it's just cabbies who need teaching about manners - it's a general problem in society… more than once I have been "served" in a shop by a member of staff who didn't once look at me, or stop talking to a colleage (or worse, a friend on a mobile phone)
Tom M, Cardiff Dave Edgell, 52, who worked in TV and video repairs until he took up taxi driving for three years ago, was one of the first to sign up for the qualification.

"I have always studied things all my life and it didn't bother me at all. I quite enjoyed it.

"I have proved to myself and people around me that I'm familiar with all the latest. I feel I'm doing the job to my best ability and I'm doing it correctly."

The drivers used the firm's office to complete the online sections of the course.

Mr Renwick said the taxi industry had been lacking a professional qualification.

He added: "Everyone's got manners but it's knowing how to deal with situations. It's brushing up on the skills they have.

"If they are picking up a new person to the city, they need to be an ambassador for the city."

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/wales/7470774.stm