These terms govern your use of Sri Lanka TaxiList as a driver. Registering an account means you accept them. They are written to be read, so they are shorter than most — but every clause in them binds you, and section 10 limits what you can claim from us.
What Sri Lanka TaxiList is
Sri Lanka TaxiList is a taxi hire marketplace. It is not a taxi hire provider.
We introduce customers to independent drivers and to licensed transport operators. We do not own a single vehicle, we do not employ a single driver, we do not dispatch, and we never carry a passenger. When somebody books, the journey is provided by the driver or operator they chose — not by us.
Everything to do with providing the transport therefore sits with that provider: the vehicle and its condition, the driver and their licence, the insurance, the fleet, the company behind it, and everything that happens on the road. This is not a disclaimer bolted on at the end. It is what the business is, and every clause below follows from it.
Our part is the introduction: showing the vehicle, calculating the fare from the rates the provider set, passing on the booking, and taking a commission when the journey is completed. If we do that part badly, that is ours. Everything else belongs to the provider.
1. Who this agreement is between
This agreement is between you and Sri Lanka TaxiList ("we", "us", "the platform"). It covers your use of the platform. It is not a contract of employment and it is not a contract of carriage.
If you drive for a registered operator, your relationship with that operator — your pay, your hours, your vehicle — is between you and them. We are not a party to it, and nothing here changes it.
2. What we do, and what we do not do
We operate a marketplace. We show your vehicle, your price and your profile to people looking for transport, and we pass you the bookings they make. That is the whole of our service.
We are not a taxi company. We do not own vehicles, we do not employ drivers, we do not dispatch you, and we do not carry passengers. When a customer books, the contract of carriage is between the customer and the operator whose quote they accepted — not with us.
2.1 You are not our employee, and this is why
Calling something self-employment does not make it so, and we do not ask you to pretend. The relationship is not employment because of how it actually works, and by registering you confirm each of the following is true:
- you decide whether to work at all, on any given day, and for how long;
- you are free to refuse any booking, and refusing does not breach this agreement;
- we set no shift, no roster, no target and no minimum;
- you provide the vehicle, or your operator does; we provide none;
- you meet your own running costs — fuel, maintenance, insurance, licensing, tax;
- you may drive for any other platform, operator or customer at any time, including our competitors, and we will not treat that as a breach;
- nobody at this company directs how you drive, which route you take beyond what is reasonable, or how you conduct yourself beyond the standards in section 9;
- you may be replaced on a booking by another approved driver from your operator, with our agreement.
Accordingly you are not entitled, from us, to wages, salary, overtime, paid leave, sick pay, maternity or paternity pay, notice, redundancy or gratuity; nor to contributions to the Employees' Provident Fund or the Employees' Trust Fund; nor to any benefit arising from a contract of employment or from the Shop and Office Employees Act, the Wages Boards Ordinance, the Termination of Employment of Workmen Act, or any similar enactment.
2.2 If you are employed, you are employed by your operator
Many drivers on this platform are employed by, or contracted to, a registered operator. Where that is so, every obligation of an employer — wages, EPF and ETF, leave, gratuity, termination, workmen's compensation, insurance for you as an employee — belongs to that operator and to nobody else.
Your operator agrees, in its own agreement with us, to carry those obligations and to indemnify us against any claim that we are or were your employer. If you believe an employer's duty is not being met, it is your operator you must raise it with. We will help you reach them, and we will act where the law requires us to, but we cannot pay what an employer owes.
2.3 If a tribunal disagrees
If any court, tribunal or authority nevertheless determines that an employment relationship exists between you and us, you agree that any sum we are ordered to pay is reduced by everything you have already received through the platform in the relevant period, so that you are not paid twice for the same work. This clause does not apply to any statutory entitlement that cannot lawfully be reduced.
3. Who is responsible for what
The rest of this document sets these out in detail. This table is the summary, and where the detail and the table appear to differ, the detailed clause governs.
| Responsibility | Owner |
|---|---|
| Holding a valid driving licence for the class driven | Driver |
| Medical fitness to drive, and police clearance | Driver |
| Hire-and-reward motor insurance | Driver, or the operator that owns the vehicle |
| Vehicle roadworthiness, fitness certificate, revenue licence | Vehicle owner — the driver or the operator |
| Vehicle maintenance, fuel and running costs | Driver or operator |
| The manner of driving, and any accident arising from it | Driver |
| Traffic fines, penalties and prosecutions | Driver |
| Passenger safety and conduct during the journey | Driver |
| Property lost in the vehicle | Driver, until returned |
| The contract of carriage with the passenger | Operator |
| Wages, leave, EPF, ETF, gratuity, termination | Operator — never the platform |
| The driver's income tax | Driver |
| Paying the driver | Operator |
| Verifying documents are present and unexpired | Platform |
| Assessing whether insurance cover is adequate | Nobody but the driver — see 12.3 |
| Calculating and displaying the fare | Platform |
| Setting the rates the fare is calculated from | Operator |
| Passing on accepted bookings, and platform availability | Platform |
| Deducting and accounting for commission | Platform |
4. Getting approved, and staying approved
Before you can be shown to customers you must give us, and keep current:
- your National Identity Card or passport;
- a driving licence valid for the class of vehicle you will drive;
- a medical certificate where the class requires one;
- police clearance;
- for the vehicle: valid insurance, a certificate of fitness where required, and a current revenue licence.
Everything you give us must be true, current and yours. Giving false information, or another person's documents, ends your account immediately and we will report it where the law requires.
The platform checks expiry dates. When a document lapses you stop being offered to customers until it is replaced. This is automatic, it is not a penalty, and it is your responsibility to renew in time. You must tell us within seven days if your licence is suspended, endorsed or withdrawn, if your insurance is cancelled, or if you are charged with any offence involving a vehicle, dishonesty or violence.
5. Accepting and completing journeys
You choose which bookings to accept. You are under no obligation to be available at any time, and there is no minimum.
Once you accept a booking, you agree to:
- arrive at the stated pickup point at the stated time;
- carry the passengers named on the booking, and their luggage up to the capacity recorded for your vehicle;
- take a reasonable route, and not lengthen a journey to increase a fare;
- drive the vehicle recorded on the booking, unless we have agreed a change in advance;
- not sub-contract the journey to another driver.
You must hold a valid licence and be fit to drive at the time. You must not drive under the influence of alcohol or drugs, or while your licence is suspended. You must obey the Motor Traffic Act and the rules of the road; a fine, a penalty or a prosecution arising from your driving is yours.
6. Fares, commission and payment
The fare quoted to the customer is calculated by the platform from the distance, the duration, the vehicle class and the rates your operator has set. You may not ask a customer for more than the quoted fare, and you may not ask a customer to pay outside the platform in order to avoid commission. Doing either ends your account.
We deduct commission from completed bookings at the rate agreed with your operator. Where no rate has been agreed, the standard rate is 15%. Commission is taken from the fare — it is not added to what the customer pays.
Waiting time, parking, tolls and any agreed extras are added to the fare as recorded on the booking. Payouts are made on the cycle stated in your operator agreement, to the account you have registered. We may withhold a payout while a booking is disputed, while a chargeback is outstanding, or where we have reasonable grounds to believe the booking was not genuine.
7. Cancellations, waiting and no-shows
If you cancel after accepting, we may charge a cancellation fee and repeated cancellations will affect whether you continue to be offered work. If you cannot make a booking, cancel it as early as you can — a late cancellation costs a customer their journey.
If a passenger does not appear, wait the period stated on the booking before recording a no-show. Do not record a no-show you did not wait for.
8. Your vehicle
The vehicle must be the one registered on the platform, roadworthy, clean, and lawfully licensed to carry passengers for hire. It must match the class, seat count and luggage capacity recorded against it — a customer who books on that basis is entitled to rely on it.
Keeping the vehicle serviced, insured and legal is your responsibility, or your operator's. We do not inspect vehicles and our showing your vehicle to customers is not a statement that it is safe or roadworthy.
9. Passengers
Treat every passenger with courtesy. You must not refuse a passenger because of race, religion, ethnicity, nationality, sex, disability or age. You must carry a guide or assistance dog.
You may end a journey where a passenger is threatening, violent, or behaving in a way that makes the vehicle unsafe. Tell us as soon as you can if you do.
Property left in your vehicle must be reported to us or to your operator within twenty-four hours and returned to the passenger. You may charge a reasonable cost of returning it.
Passengers rate journeys and those ratings appear on your profile. A rating that falls persistently below the platform standard, or a serious complaint upheld against you, may end your account.
10. Liability
Read this section carefully. It decides who carries what.
What you are responsible for
You are responsible for everything arising from your driving and from the journeys you carry out. That includes injury to any person, loss of or damage to property, and any claim brought by a passenger, a third party, an insurer or an authority.
You will indemnify us against any claim, loss, fine or cost we incur because of something you did or failed to do — including driving without valid insurance or a valid licence, an accident, a traffic offence, a criminal act, or a breach of these terms.
You are responsible for your own tax. We do not deduct it and we do not account for it on your behalf.
What we are responsible for
We are responsible for operating the platform with reasonable care and skill, for quoting fares accurately according to the rates recorded, and for passing on the bookings you accept.
We are not responsible for: what happens during a journey; the acts of passengers, operators or other drivers; the condition of any vehicle; loss of earnings, whether from a fault in the platform, a lack of bookings, a suspension, or your removal from it; or loss of or damage to your vehicle or belongings.
We do not guarantee that you will receive any bookings, or any particular number of them.
Where we are found liable to you despite the above, our total liability for all claims in any twelve-month period is limited to the commission we actually received from your bookings in that period. We are not liable for indirect or consequential loss.
Nothing in this section limits liability for death or personal injury caused by our negligence, for fraud, or for anything else that cannot lawfully be limited.
11. Claims — who answers for what
Section 10 sets out the principle. This section applies it to the kinds of claim that actually arise, so that nothing falls into a gap. In every case below the claim lies against the provider of the transport — the driver, or the operator that engaged them — and not against the platform, except where this agreement expressly says otherwise.
| Claim | Answered by |
|---|---|
| Death or injury to a passenger, a pedestrian or any third party | Driver and operator |
| Damage to another vehicle or to any property in a collision | Driver and operator |
| Damage to, or loss of, a passenger's luggage or belongings | Driver and operator |
| Theft from a passenger, or of a passenger's property | Driver and operator |
| Assault, harassment, discrimination or misconduct by a driver | Driver and operator |
| Assault or misconduct by a passenger against a driver | The passenger |
| An insurer refusing a claim because of how the vehicle was used | Driver and operator |
| Driving uninsured, unlicensed, or otherwise unlawfully | Driver and operator |
| Traffic offences, fines, penalties and prosecutions | Driver |
| Criminal acts committed in connection with a journey | The person who committed them |
| A vehicle that is unroadworthy, unfit or wrongly licensed | Vehicle owner |
| A vehicle that could not carry the passengers or luggage booked | Operator |
| Late arrival, non-arrival, or a missed onward connection | Driver and operator |
| A journey abandoned part-way | Driver and operator |
| Wages, EPF, ETF, gratuity, leave, termination, workmen's compensation | Operator |
| Income tax on driver earnings | Driver, and the operator where it must deduct |
| Company tax, VAT and regulatory penalties of the provider | Operator |
| Licensing or regulatory action against a vehicle or a driver | Driver and operator |
| Misuse of customer contact details given to perform a booking | Whoever misused them |
| A fare quoted wrongly by the platform against recorded rates | Platform |
| A booking accepted but never passed on by the platform | Platform |
| Commission wrongly deducted or a settlement wrongly calculated | Platform |
Where a claim is brought against us that this table places with somebody else, the indemnities in this agreement apply and we will look to that person for the whole of it, including our legal costs.
This table is not exhaustive. A claim not listed is answered by whoever, on the principle in section 10, is responsible for the thing that caused it — and the fact that the platform introduced the parties does not make it ours.
12. Insurance
This section is short but it is the one most likely to cost you everything. Read it.
12.1 What you must hold
At your own cost, and for the whole time your vehicle is shown on the platform, you must hold:
- third-party insurance as required by the Motor Traffic Act; and
- cover that expressly extends to carrying passengers for hire and reward.
A private, domestic or social-use policy does not cover this. If you carry a paying passenger on a private policy, your insurer is entitled to refuse the claim, and in a serious accident you personally will face the cost of injury and damage with no cover behind you. This is the single most common and most expensive mistake a driver on any platform makes.
12.2 Evidence, and telling us when it changes
You must give us the policy document on request, and in any event when it renews. You must tell us within twenty-four hours if the policy is cancelled, lapses, is refused renewal, or is varied so that hire and reward is no longer covered — and you must stop accepting bookings immediately when any of those happens.
12.3 What we do not do
We record the expiry date you give us and we stop showing your vehicle when that date passes. That is an administrative check and nothing more. We do not read your policy, we do not assess whether the cover is adequate, and we do not verify that it extends to hire and reward. Our showing your vehicle to customers is not a statement that you are insured, and you may not rely on it as one.
We do not insure you, your vehicle, your passengers, your income, or anybody else's property. We hold no policy that responds to a claim against you. If your insurer refuses a claim because of how the vehicle was being used, that is between you and your insurer, and the cost is yours.
12.4 If you drive uninsured
Accepting a booking without valid hire-and-reward cover is a serious breach of this agreement and, separately, an offence. It ends your account immediately. You will indemnify us in full against every claim, cost and penalty we incur as a result — including any claim by a passenger we introduced to you.
13. Your information
We hold your details, documents and journey records to operate the platform, to verify you and to meet our legal obligations. Your name, photograph, rating, languages and vehicle are shown to customers so they can choose a driver — that is the point of the platform, and registering means you agree to it.
Your National Identity Card number, your address, your documents and your bank details are never shown to customers. What we collect and how long we hold it is set out in our privacy and data protection policy, which applies to you and which we handle in line with the Personal Data Protection Act No. 9 of 2022.
14. Suspension and removal
We may suspend or remove your account where a document has expired, where you have broken these terms, where a serious complaint is upheld, where we are required to by law, or where we reasonably believe a passenger is at risk.
Where the reason allows it, we will tell you why and give you the chance to put it right. Where there is an immediate risk to a passenger we may act first and tell you afterwards.
You may close your account at any time. Anything already owed to you is still paid; anything you owe is still due.
15. Changes
We may change these terms. If a change materially affects you we will tell you at least fourteen days before it takes effect, by email and in the app. Continuing to accept bookings after that date means you accept the change. If you do not, close your account.
16. Disputes and governing law
If something goes wrong, raise it with us first — most things are settled that way and quickly. Our complaints procedure is set out in the customer complaints and disputes policy, which we apply to drivers in the same way.
These terms are governed by the law of Sri Lanka, and the courts of Sri Lanka have exclusive jurisdiction.
17. The rest
If any part of these terms is found unenforceable, the rest continues to apply. Our not enforcing something on one occasion does not mean we have given it up. You may not transfer this agreement to anybody else.