TfL Dial-a-Ride service criticised for cancelled journeys

The transport service has been criticised by Londoners with disabilities. Photograph: Transport for London

Londoners with mobility issues have slammed TfL’s door-to-door transit service for repeatedly cancelling journeys and leaving them “stranded”. The network’s bookable minibus system, Dial-a-Ride, has been running since the 1980s to offer accessible transport to disabled people and older residents who can’t easily use conventional public transport.

However, Hackney residents have shared their struggles with the service as they claim it is not meeting their needs. Bryan Pinto, 73, who has been using Dial-a-Ride for two decades, said the service had declined and more and more users were regularly having journeys cancelled.

Speaking to the Local Democracy Reporting Service (LDRS), he said: “It’s more than unacceptable. What if someone’s made an arrangement to go to a funeral, and suddenly they are left stranded?”

Mr Pinto blamed the rise in cancellations on the drop in available drivers. According to TfL data, the number of Dial-a-Ride drivers fell from 321 to 173 between 2019 and 2023, as these staff took voluntary redundancy.

He also criticised TfL for switching its booking system to an app. “It’s like Uber. The majority of elderly people are not very familiar with computers. Their eyesight is very poor”, he said.

Maggie Cooke, 77, was accepted as a Dial-a-Ride user a few months ago. She said her bookings were being cancelled “quite regularly”, and the lack of available round trips risked cutting her off from her community.

She described one occasion in December last year, when she had used a Dial-a-Ride minibus to get to a Christmas party at the Kingshold Community Centre where she volunteers, but there was no return journey available.

She added after she challenged TfL over the situation, an operator told her she could have instead chosen not to take the outward trip. “That would isolate me”, she said.

Hackney councillor Clare Joseph (Labour) told the LDRS said she was “regularly” contacted by residents who were frustrated with Dial-a-Ride. She added: “Older people often don’t have smartphones, and would much prefer to talk to someone.

“Once they actually manage to get in the app they are often given the message that no journeys are available, and bookings cannot be made in advance. It feels as if the service is being deliberately run down when it should be a priority for TfL, and so many people could benefit from it, particularly in a context of road closures and bus cuts”.

On Friday, City Hall’s transport committee published a new report which stated Dial-a-Ride “may be failing to meet its core purpose”. The study, which concluded that TfL was “lacking depth or nuance” on accessibility, found that users were turning away from Dial-a-Ride due to “unreliability” and inability to meet demand.

The report stated: “If Dial-a-Ride is not operating at full potential, a significant number of older and disabled residents may be unable to complete essential journeys – to shops, health appointments, or social activities. This could place them at increased risk of transport-related social exclusion, exacerbate isolation and deepen inequalities”.

Speaking to the LDRS, James Meade, General Manager of On-Demand Transport at TfL, said: “Our aim is to ensure as many older and disabled Londoners as possible benefit from our free Dial-a-Ride service, and we are very sorry if any of our customers have experienced difficulties using the service.

“While we are currently fulfilling more than the targeted 90 per cent of customer requests, we are always looking to improve all aspects of the service and are open to feedback”.