Autocab is a UK dispatch platform for taxi and private hire firms, covering booking, automated dispatch, a passenger app, driver app, and payments, plus its iGo network that shares overflow jobs between operators. An outsourced desk fits by working your Autocab account for phone bookings, exceptions, and out-of-hours cover.
Autocab is one of the platforms UK private hire and hackney operators reach for when they need proper dispatch rather than a radio and a booking book. It is widely used across the trade, and most operators meet it through its booking and dispatch system and the iGo network that moves overflow work between firms. Here is what it does and where the gaps sit.
What Autocab covers
Autocab is a full dispatch platform aimed squarely at the UK trade. The pieces operators lean on day to day:
- Automated dispatch that allocates jobs to the nearest suitable vehicle
- A passenger booking app and web booker
- A driver app for job offers, navigation, and status
- Integrated card and account payments
- The iGo network, which passes overflow bookings between operators
- Reporting on jobs, drivers, and takings
The iGo network, briefly
iGo is Autocab’s marketplace for sharing work. When you can’t cover a job, it can be offered to other firms on the network, and you can pick up overflow from them. It is useful for smoothing peaks, but it does not solve the underlying problem of a phone that rings out when your office is shut. A passed job still needs someone to take and enter the booking in the first place.
Where the software needs a human
Automated allocation handles the straightforward jobs well. It does not answer the phone, reassure an anxious passenger, sort a no-show, or manage an account customer with a standing instruction. UK firms still take a large share of bookings by phone, and out-of-hours those calls are where the lost fares hide. The platform optimises dispatch; it does not cover your night.
Real-time driver coordination and routing around the clock — overnight, weekends, holidays, and peak surges covered.
How an outsourced desk fits Autocab
An outsourced dispatch desk works inside your Autocab account rather than alongside it. The desk answers your phone in your firm’s name, enters bookings into Autocab, manages exceptions, and covers the out-of-hours window your own staff can’t. The booking lands in your system; the passenger is simply booking with your firm.
- Take phone bookings and enter them into Autocab in your name
- Cover out-of-hours, weekend, and overflow demand
- Handle no-shows, re-covers, and account requests
- Keep your night fares from ringing out to voicemail
Making it work
The difference between a useful desk and a frustrating one is the onboarding. Give the desk your zones, your account rules, your fare structure, and your answering style, and it operates your Autocab account like part of your own office. Skip that, and you get a generic call centre guessing at unfamiliar software.
Common questions
Where this guide fits: it is part of our taxi & cab answering and dispatch coverage. Next step: try the desk free for your first week.
Marcus runs the overnight dispatch floor at SS Support Network. Before moving into outsourced operations he spent nine years dispatching for taxi and NEMT fleets, and he writes about the calls, no-shows, and routing decisions that actually happen at 3 a.m.
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