History
The company was started in June 2006 by Dominic Ponniah, a British-Asian who got the idea after a business trip in India. Tuctuc Ltd started off with 12 Bajaj Retros in various livery designs ranging from the Union Jack to Burberry check.
Ponniah investigated different possible licensing régimes and chose to license the service as a passenger bus service. Low capacity led to problems meeting the scheduled timetables. The company was fined £16,500 for breaching its bus licence terms, but this was cut to £8,000 on appeal.
Burberry forced the company to take the 'Chavrolet' rickshaw off the road, claiming a violation of Burberry's copyright. Dominic Ponniah, manager of Tuctuc Ltd, then decided to close the business until Spring 2007 when 10 new, larger autorickshaws would be operational.
The company was forced to remove its stop signs from the seafront after it was found they were on listed lamp posts.
Tuctuc restarted on May 23 2007 with just six new Thailand style tuk tuks, but with all the former 12 Bajaj Auto Rickshaws still operational. Tuctuc had tried to sell them off but received no bids. Tuctuc switched to operating a dial-a-ride service which meant passengers had to book before travelling. The service stopped operations in Brighton shortly after.
Read more about this topic: Tuctuc Ltd
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