Glossary of transport with a driver

92 terms of taxi, private hire and pre-booked rides in Spain, defined by what the law and the trade say, not by what anyone promises. Each one links to the piece that develops it.

Last reviewed: 27 October 2026

Advance income tax payment (forms 130 and 131): The quarterly advance of personal income tax that a self-employed driver pays on account of the annual return: form 130 under direct assessment, on the accumulated income, and form 131 under objective assessment, on the activity's módulos. The amounts paid are deducted in the annual tax return, which refunds or claims the difference. Passenger transport is a business activity, not a professional one, and as a rule its invoices carry no withholding even when the customer is a company, so this payment is the main way of prepaying the tax.
Affiliate: A partner who recommends the platform through a dedicated link or code, published on their website, newsletter or social channels, and receives a reward for the bookings that come through it, under the terms of the affiliate programme. They take no part in the booking or the service and bear no responsibility for them. Attribution is done through the link, lasts as long as the terms set, and is settled by period with an invoice.
Airport transfer: A service booked in advance between an airport and a home, hotel or company, in either direction, with a fixed price and a driver who waits. On an airport pick-up the driver knows the flight number, follows its arrival and adjusts the pick-up time to the actual landing within the included wait. On the way out, the platform suggests what time to leave according to the distance, the flight time and whether it is domestic, Schengen or international. It is the most searched service and the one that demands the most punctuality.
Assistance dog: A trained and certified dog that accompanies a person with a disability — guide, hearing, medical alert, support — whose access to any public or public-use transport, taxi and VTC included, is guaranteed by state and regional law, at no extra cost and without a muzzle or carrier being demanded. A driver cannot refuse the job because of the dog; an ordinary pet, by contrast, travels under whatever is agreed when booking.
Authorisation renewal (visado): The periodic check, every two years for transport authorisations, that the holder still meets the requirements under which it was granted: insurance, vehicle, address, being up to date with tax and social obligations. If it is not renewed in time, the authorisation lapses and a new one must be applied for, which under the quota may not be possible. The Ministry's public register shows the date of the last renewal, and it is one of the things a passenger or platform can check.
Authorised pick-up zone: The space an airport or station operator sets aside for chauffeured vehicles to collect their passengers, separate from the taxi rank and the loading areas, sometimes with access control, a maximum time and a parking charge. Picking up outside it can mean a fine for the driver, so a booking's meeting point is set inside the zone and the passenger is told how to reach it from the terminal.
Booking amendment: A change to one condition of an already contracted transfer without ending the contract: the time, an address, the number of passengers or bags, a stop or the vehicle. Since the fixed price is calculated on those details, an amendment may recalculate it upwards or downwards, and the platform should show the new price before accepting it; a change of time on the same day is usually admitted if the driver has not left. Unlike a cancellation, the booking stays alive and no money is returned.
Booking on behalf of a third party: A ride booking in which the person contracting is not the one travelling, and sometimes not the one paying either: a son arranging his parents' pick-up, a company bringing in a client. Of the passenger only the name, for the sign, and a phone number so the driver can locate them are needed; of the booker, their contact details and, if they pay, payment and billing details. Giving someone else's data requires a legitimate reason, informing them and asking for no more than necessary, under the General Data Protection Regulation.
Business account: An account on the platform in the name of a company, school, clinic or hotel, with several users allowed to book for themselves or for others, a shared payment method or end-of-month payment, cost centres, a grouped monthly invoice and a statement of every ride. Its administrator decides who may book, within what limits and with which mandatory details. It differs from the partner portal, which is meant for those who intermediate or those who provide vehicles.
Cancellation: The annulment of a booking by the customer or the platform before the service starts. Each platform's terms set until when it is free and from what point part of the amount is retained, depending on how long remains until pick-up and whether the driver is already on the way. When the platform cancels, for example because it cannot assign a driver, the customer pays nothing and is offered an alternative. A cancellation must always be recorded in writing, with its time.
Canonical URL: The address a website declares as the main version of a page when the same content can be reached through several addresses, so that the search engine indexes that one and does not split relevance among copies. In a network of per-province domains, each area, route or guide page canonicalises on its province's domain and the shared pages on the brand domain; the other domains redirect with 308. Without clear canonicals, fifteen domains with the same text compete with each other and all lose.
Carrier's civil liability: The duty to answer for the damage the transport causes to passengers, their luggage and third parties. In the vehicle it is covered by compulsory motor insurance and the increased cover required by transport rules; in the relationship with the customer, by the contract of carriage, which makes the carrier responsible for taking the person to the agreed destination within the agreed time and conditions. A platform that only intermediates is liable for the intermediation; one that contracts in its own name, for the transport.
Child restraint system (child seat): An approved seat or booster that the General Traffic Regulation requires for children under 135 centimetres tall in the rear seats. Urban taxis have a legal exemption; a VTC or an interurban trip does not, so the seat must be in the car: it is requested when booking, with the child's age or weight, and enters the fixed price as a supplement. Travelling with the child on your lap is not an option.
Commission: A percentage or amount the platform retains or shares out of a ride's price. It has two senses: what the platform charges the driver or fleet for intermediating and managing the job, and what it pays a mediator for bringing the customer. Both are published in writing in the terms of each relationship and appear in the settlement, never improvised per job. The actual figures are not written on a page: they come from the contract or the panel, which is where they can change.
Compulsory passenger insurance (SOV): The insurance the law requires of anyone transporting passengers in public-service vehicles, taxi and VTC included, covering passengers' injuries during the trip regardless of fault, with the compensation set in Royal Decree 1575/1989. It is in addition to the vehicle's compulsory third-party liability insurance and the extended liability cover the authorisation requires. A passenger may ask to see the receipt in force; a serious platform checks it when registering each vehicle.
Content pruning: Removing from the index the pages that get no visits or impressions within a reasonable period, so that the search engine focuses on the ones that do perform and the site does not look like a page factory. It is done reversibly: the page still exists and is linked, but indexing is no longer requested and it leaves the sitemap; if interest returns, so does the page. It is the counterpart of publishing content at scale by province: what does not work is withdrawn, not accumulated.
Corrective invoice: An invoice that corrects another already issued: because the amount was refunded after a cancellation, because the final price changed due to waiting or a stop, or because a tax detail was wrong. It has its own series, identifies the invoice it corrects and states the reason, and it is the only legal way to cancel or amend an invoice: nothing is deleted or replaced. On a platform it is generated automatically when there is a refund on an already invoiced service.
Cost centre: An accounting label with which a company allocates its expenses among departments, projects, sites or clients. In a business account each ride is assigned to a cost centre when booked, and the monthly invoice and statement arrive grouped by that field, so each area manager sees their own and accounting does not have to split by hand. Default centres can be set for each employee and one can be made mandatory before confirming.
Cost per kilometre: What each billed kilometre costs the person driving, the sum of three components: the year's fixed costs (vehicle, insurance, taxes, authorisation, self-employed contributions) spread over the kilometres billed, not those driven; the variable cost per kilometre (energy, tyres, maintenance) charged entirely to the ones paid for; and the driver's time over the whole job, including approach, waiting and return. That is why a short trip requires a minimum amount covering approach and return, and a long one spreads the fixed costs over more kilometres and falls per unit.
Courtesy waiting time: Minutes of waiting at the origin that are already inside the fixed price and are not charged separately: a margin to come down with the suitcases or leave the terminal without rushing. Its length depends on the kind of pick-up — longer at airports and stations than at a home — and is published in each platform's terms. Once the courtesy is used up, extra waiting is charged under the conditions accepted when booking, or the job is treated as a no-show if the customer does not answer.
Data minimisation: A principle of the General Data Protection Regulation, supplemented in Spain by Organic Law 3/2018, under which only data that are adequate, relevant and limited to what is necessary for the stated purpose are collected. In a ride booking: addresses, date and time, passengers and luggage, flight or train number, name and phone number, email, tax details only for a full invoice, and a means of payment. An identity document, date of birth, health or reason for travel serve no purpose in providing the transport and should not be requested.
Discretionary passenger transport: Public passenger transport with no pre-set route, calendar or timetable, contracted for the vehicle's whole capacity, as opposed to scheduled line services. Taxi and VTC are discretionary transport in a car; when the group exceeds nine seats, a coach or minibus with a discretionary coach transport authorisation and a suitably licensed driver takes over. The distinction matters for knowing which vehicle and which company may carry a group.
Electronic invoice (e-invoicing): An invoice issued and received in a structured electronic format, which Law 18/2022 makes compulsory between businesses and professionals according to the timetable set by the law and its implementing regulation, with different deadlines by company size. It adds to the requirements of Law 11/2021 on invoicing software, which must produce verifiable and complete records. For a self-employed driver, already required by Royal Decree 1619/2012 to invoice every job, it means checking the date on which each obligation applies and which software meets the requirements.
Empty kilometre (dead mileage): A kilometre the vehicle covers without a passenger: from the base or previous job to the pick-up, and from the destination back to base or next job. On a one-way transfer the return is as long as the outbound leg and nobody pays for it, so driven and billed kilometres differ, and their ratio is what most moves the real cost. It burns energy, wears the car and takes the driver's time, and is charged to the kilometres billed; chaining jobs to reduce it is the strongest lever on cost.
Fixed price: The total amount of the ride, known and accepted before the booking is confirmed, calculated on the expected distance and time of the trip plus any applicable supplements, and independent of the traffic or the route the driver ends up taking. It includes what it says it includes — courtesy waiting, tolls if any, normal luggage — and is itemised on the invoice. The opposite is the metered fare, known on arrival, or the dynamic pricing of some apps, which changes with demand.
Fixed service (recurring ride): A ride that repeats on a pattern — every working day at the same time, three days a week, every Monday — for the same person or group: the trip to school, to the day centre, to dialysis or rehabilitation, to the factory shift. It is contracted once with the pattern and its exceptions, preferably assigned to the same driver and invoiced by period. It is what schools, clinics and companies ask for and what gives a driver the most stability.
Fleet: A company holding several VTC authorisations or taxi licences that employs or contracts drivers to operate them, with its vehicles, insurance, shift management and accounts. It works with the platform as a unit: it receives jobs to distribute among its drivers, assigns them from its own panel, settles in bulk and has its own commission arrangement. What the administration requires of it — authorisations, insurance, working-time records, data protection — is the same as for a self-employed driver, multiplied.
Flight diversion: An aircraft landing at an unplanned airport because of weather or an emergency. The airline then decides whether to take passengers to the original destination by road, offer another flight or leave them there; until then the passenger does not know where the car is needed. For a booked transfer, flight tracking detects it, but the pick-up can only be moved to the new airport, with the price recalculated, or cancelled, under the published terms. First find out what the airline will do; then tell the transfer.
Flight tracking: The automatic check of a flight's status — scheduled time, delay, cancellation, terminal change — from its number, to adjust the airport pick-up to the actual arrival without the passenger having to call. The platform asks for the flight number when booking, shifts the pick-up time with the delay and notifies the driver; the courtesy wait starts counting from the actual landing. A long delay or a cancellation is handled under the amendment terms, not as a no-show.
Force majeure: A cause beyond both parties to a contract, unforeseeable or unavoidable, that prevents its performance: in a transfer, a cancelled flight, a closed road, a sudden illness or a storm. Since nobody brought it about, a reasonable cancellation policy treats it separately from cancellation by notice period, from the no-show and from the operator's cancellation, with a refund or a change of date at no cost, sometimes against proof. What counts as force majeure and what evidence is asked for is set by the platform's terms, not the law.
Full invoice: A tax document with every detail required by the invoicing regulation: number and series, date, name or company name, tax ID and address of issuer and recipient, service description, taxable base, VAT rate and amount, and transaction date. It is what a company or self-employed person needs to deduct the expense and the VAT, and what a business account issues by default. It can be requested after the service within the legal period by providing the tax details.
Group vehicle (people carrier, minivan up to nine seats): A car with more than five seats — six, seven or up to nine including the driver — that lets a group travel in a single vehicle with its luggage. The VTC authorisation and the taxi licence cover up to nine seats; beyond that it is discretionary coach transport with another authorisation and a differently qualified driver. For a wedding, a team or an outing, several vehicles are combined and coordinated by the platform, with one contact per vehicle.
Habituality rule: The transport regulation's requirement that a VTC vehicle provides most of its jobs — the exact share is set by the rule in force — within the region that issued its authorisation, measured by period. It was created to stop one region's authorisations being used permanently in another. For a platform it means assigning jobs to vehicles from the pick-up region and tracking the split; for a fleet, controlling where each car works.
hreflang: The attribute with which a page tells the search engine which other addresses are the same page in other languages or for other countries, and which is the default version. It lets someone searching in English be shown the English version and keeps the two versions from being treated as duplicate content. It is declared in the page head or in the sitemap, and each language must point to the others reciprocally; an English version without hreflang is a page competing with its own original.
IndexNow: An open protocol with which a website tells the search engines that support it — Bing, Yandex, Seznam and those sharing their index — that an address has been created, changed or deleted, instead of waiting to be crawled. A request is sent with the site key and the list of addresses. It gets a new guide or a price change seen in hours rather than weeks; Google does not take part and still relies on the sitemap and crawling.
Intermediate stop: A planned halt during the trip, other than the origin and destination, to pick up or drop off another person, call at an address or wait a few minutes: two passengers travelling together to the airport from different homes, a stop at the pharmacy on the way to hospital. It is declared when booking so that it enters the fixed-price calculation and the expected arrival time; an improvised stop on board is handled under the accepted terms.
Interurban bus concession: The arrangement by which the administration awards a single company, by contract for a period, the operation of a scheduled bus route between municipalities, with published timetables, stops and fares. This is how scheduled passenger road transport is organised in Spain under the LOTT, so companies do not compete on one route: one must find which concession holder covers the journey, not compare. On sparsely populated routes there may be one or two services a day. Routes between regions are awarded by the Ministry; those within one, by that region.
Interurban service: A ride that starts and ends in different municipalities, or that leaves the joint service area where the vehicle was authorised. It is the proper scope of the state VTC authorisation since 2018 and the one that requires a taxi to hold an interurban authorisation in addition to its municipal licence. A trip from a village to the capital's airport, to a reference hospital or to a high-speed rail station is interurban; the taxi price in that case comes from the interurban fare, not the urban one, and the VTC price from the contract.
ITV (roadworthiness inspection): The compulsory periodic check of the vehicle's condition at an authorised station. Vehicles used for chauffeured passenger transport are inspected more often than a private car — yearly from the first year, and every six months after a certain age — because they cover far more kilometres. The sticker and the inspection card must be in force; a vehicle without a current inspection may not provide service, and the platform blocks it until it is renewed.
Joint service area: A set of municipalities that, by agreement among themselves and the region, operate as a single taxi territory: a licence from any of them may pick up and drop off travellers in all of them, under a common fare, as if they were one city. It solves the metropolitan-area problem, where a taxi from one town could not take passengers in the neighbouring one. Inside the area the service is urban; leaving it makes it interurban.
Legal basis for processing: The ground the General Data Protection Regulation requires for processing personal data, which in a ride booking is above all the performance of the contract: without an address, a time and a contact there is no service, and those data need no consent. Others are processed under a legal obligation, such as those required for invoicing or for the service register imposed by transport rules. Consent is kept for what is not necessary for the service, such as receiving offers, in a separate box not ticked in advance.
llms.txt: A text file at the root of a website, meant for language models and their crawlers, that summarises what the site is and links its main pages with one line of context each, so that an assistant can find its way without reading all the HTML. It is a recent convention, not an official standard, and is complemented by a long version that includes the relevant content. A site publishes one per domain: each province's lists its routes with prices; the brand's, what belongs to no area.
LOTT (Law 16/1987 on Land Transport): The state law that organises road transport in Spain: it defines public and private transport, authorisations, the rules for chauffeured car hire, inspection and penalties. It is the framework that taxi and VTC rules refer to, and it has been amended several times for this sector, with Royal Decree-laws 3/2018 and 13/2018 as milestones. Its implementing regulation is the ROTT. Any debate on what a VTC may do starts at its articles 91 and 99.
Luggage: Suitcases, bags and items the passenger brings along and that travel in the boot. A normal ride includes the usual luggage of the passengers who fit in the vehicle; bulky items — bicycles, boards, instruments, several large cases per person — are declared when booking so that they enter the price and a vehicle with space is assigned, instead of finding out at the door that it does not fit. The carrier answers for luggage damage under the contract of carriage.
Mediation (intermediation): A relationship in which a third party — a hotel, an agency, an organiser — connects its customers with the platform and earns a commission on the rides booked through it, without providing the transport or taking on its liability. The traveller pays the same fixed price as when booking directly; the commission comes out of the platform's share. It is formalised in the partner portal, with a dedicated link or code to attribute bookings, and settled by period with its invoice.
Meet and greet pick-up: A pick-up arrangement at airports and stations in which the driver waits inside the terminal, at arrivals or at the agreed spot, holding a sign with the passenger's or company's name, escorts the customer to the vehicle and helps with luggage. It is used for travellers arriving from abroad, groups and corporate services, and usually carries a supplement for parking and waiting time. The alternative is the outdoor meeting point pick-up, with the driver sending a message.
Meeting point: A specific place, inside or outside a terminal, station or hotel, where driver and passenger meet to start the service: a numbered arrivals door, a specific exit from the concourse, an authorised pick-up area. It is set when booking and confirmed by message shortly before, because at a large airport getting the terminal or the level wrong can cost more than a flight delay. The platform keeps the usual spot for each airport and station so it does not have to be explained every time.
Minimum pre-booking interval: The minimum time some regions require between contracting a VTC job and the start of the ride, to mark the difference from the on-demand taxi. It does not exist across all of Spain, nor is it the same where it exists, and courts have struck down several of the intervals set. A platform operating in several regions applies each one's when calculating the first available time, which is why the earliest time it offers may vary depending on where the pick-up is.
Named ticket: A ticket issued in a person's name and tied to a specific train and time, the norm on Spanish high-speed rail: the name and identity document number are given when buying, and access to the platform passes through a luggage check where identity may be verified. It is not valid for another traveller or another train without a formal change, and doors close shortly before departure. Regional and medium-distance trains allow more leeway. It is the opposite of the bearer ticket used on the metro or the urban bus.
No-show: A job that is never provided because the passenger does not show up at the origin within the expected wait and does not answer the contact attempts, without having cancelled beforehand. The driver has made the journey and waited, so the terms usually provide for the amount to be charged in full or in part, just like a hotel or restaurant booking. To avoid it, it is enough to cancel or warn of the delay within the period set in the terms; at airports, flight tracking greatly reduces the cases.
Non-assisted patient transport (ambulance): A class of ambulance health transport, regulated by Royal Decree 836/2012, for patients who need no care en route but whose condition prevents them from using ordinary transport; it includes single-patient and collective vehicles. It requires the transport authorisation for that class under Law 16/1987, the regional health authorisation and qualified staff. In the public system it is prescribed by a doctor. A chauffeured car is not health transport, even an adapted one: it only serves someone who can travel seated and without assistance.
Non-urgent patient ride by chauffeured car: Ordinary passenger transport, pre-booked at a fixed price and provided under a VTC authorisation or taxi licence, for someone who can travel seated, get in and out with occasional help and complete the journey without care: appointments, check-ups, rehabilitation, the trip home after a confirmed discharge or escorting older people to appointments. The driver is not healthcare staff: they do not administer medication, handle devices or judge whether the patient is fit to travel; the clinical team decides. If a stretcher, oxygen or supervision is needed, an ambulance is required.
Objective assessment (módulos flat-rate scheme): A personal income tax method, regulated in Law 35/2006 and the annual order on módulos, under which the income from an activity is calculated from signs and indices set for it (vehicles, staff, distance driven) regardless of what was actually earned. It is available only for the activity headings the order includes, such as taxi and road passenger transport, and within its revenue limits. Those applying it are usually also in the simplified VAT scheme, which settles the tax with indices and does not allow deducting VAT on every expense.
Partner: The generic name for anyone with a professional relationship with the platform other than that of customer: the company with an account and monthly invoice, the mediator who brings bookings for a commission, the licensed operator who provides the services or the affiliate who publishes a link. Each relationship has its own sign-up, terms and settlement, and all are managed from the partner portal. A partner is neither an employee nor a shareholder: it is a written commercial relationship.
Pay on board: A payment method in which the customer pays the driver for the ride at the end, in cash or by card on the vehicle's terminal, instead of paying in advance on the website or in the app. The price is still the one fixed when booking: paying on board does not turn it into a metered fare. The driver hands over the receipt and the invoice is issued from the platform as usual, with the customer's tax details if requested.
Pick-up time: The moment agreed in the booking at which the vehicle must be at the origin, ready to leave. On a home pick-up it is the time the customer chooses; at an airport or station it is calculated on the scheduled arrival of the flight or train plus a reasonable time to disembark and collect luggage, and it moves with the actual delay. From that time the courtesy waiting included in the price starts counting, and after it the chargeable waiting, if any.
Pre-booking (prior contracting): The rule that a VTC job must be contracted before the vehicle starts providing it: with the origin, destination, time and price agreed and reported to the register, and without picking up customers on the public road. Some regions also require a minimum interval between booking and pick-up. For the traveller it means knowing what they will pay and who drives before getting in; for the platform, that every ride leaves a paper trail. It is what sets a booked ride apart from a street-hailed taxi or a variable-price app.
Refund: The return to the customer of what was charged for a service that was not provided or not provided as contracted: a cancellation within the deadline, a driver who does not arrive, a trip that is interrupted. It is returned through the same payment method and within the period set by the issuing bank, and gives rise to a corrective invoice when an invoice had already been issued. It is not the same as a goodwill compensation, which is a company decision and not an obligation.
Regional VTC sticker: A visible identifier that some regions require of VTC vehicles providing urban service, in addition to the national sticker, since Royal Decree-law 13/2018 left urban transport to regions and municipalities. It is a plate or sticker with a format, colour and placement set by the regional rule, and goes with that region's urban permit or driver register. It does not exist in every territory nor is it the same everywhere; its absence where required is an offence for the driver and a warning sign for the passenger.
Register of Transport Companies and Activities: The public register kept by the Ministry of Transport with the country's road transport authorisations, VTC ones among them, with an open look-up on its electronic office: entering the number plate is enough to learn whether that vehicle holds a current authorisation, of what class, who the holder is and whether it is in force, suspended or lapsed. No certificate or prior registration is needed. It is the most reliable check a passenger or a platform can make before getting into a car.
Regulated fare: The taxi prices approved by the council or the joint service area body, with the flag fall, the price per kilometre and per waiting hour, the supplements (airport, station, night, holiday, luggage) and, where they exist, fixed-price trips such as the airport run. They are published in the official gazette and must be displayed inside the vehicle. A VTC is not bound by it: its price is whatever is agreed when contracting, which is why comparing the two only makes sense on the total price of a specific trip.
Regulation (EC) 261/2004: The European Union rule giving air passengers rights against the airline for denied boarding, cancellation and long delay, on flights departing from the Union or arriving with a European carrier: assistance (meals, communications and accommodation), the choice between a ticket refund and alternative transport, and compensation depending on the flight distance, not owed if the airline proves extraordinary circumstances. In Spain it is supervised by the State Aviation Safety Agency. It is a separate contract from the transfer waiting at the airport, which has its own terms.
RETA (Special Scheme for Self-Employed Workers): The Spanish social security scheme for the self-employed, including a driver holding their own VTC authorisation or taxi licence. It covers healthcare, incapacity, retirement and cessation of activity, with a monthly contribution. Registration must be completed before the first paid job, together with the tax census registration; the transport authorisation does not replace it and working without it is irregular. Under the real-income contribution system the self-employed worker contributes according to a forecast of net earnings and the social security authority regularises the following year against the income tax return.
Return trip: Two rides contracted at the same time between the same points in opposite directions, for example to the airport on departure day and from the airport on return, each with its own time and assigned driver. They are booked in one go to avoid repeating the details and so that both appear on the same confirmation and, where applicable, the same invoice. Each leg keeps its fixed price and cancellation terms, and the return can be adjusted to the actual flight like any airport pick-up.
Right of withdrawal: The power that consumer law (TRLGDCU) gives anyone buying at a distance to undo the contract without giving reasons within a set period. It does not reach a transfer with a specific date: article 103, letter l, excludes services with a specific date or period of performance, because a car reserved for a given hour cannot be sold again. The absence of withdrawal does not remove the rules: cancellation terms must be published before payment, and a term the customer could not have known does not bind them.
ROTT (Land Transport Regulation): Royal Decree 1211/1990, which implements the LOTT. For chauffeured hire it sets the authorisation requirements, the vehicle conditions, the duty of prior contracting and trip sheet, the ban on picking up customers in the street and the habituality rules, that is, the share of jobs that must be provided in the region that issued the authorisation. Its 2015 and 2017 amendments are the ones that set the ratio of one VTC authorisation for every thirty taxis.
Royal Decree-law 13/2018: The September 2018 rule that limited the state VTC authorisation to interurban services and gave the regions and town councils the power to regulate urban ones, with a four-year transitional period, extendable, for existing authorisations. From then on each region has legislated differently: its own urban licences, minimum pre-booking intervals, vehicle or driver requirements. It explains why the conditions for a VTC change from one region to another.
Saved-card payment: A payment method in which the customer registers a card once with the platform, which stores it tokenised at the payment provider, and each ride is charged to that card on confirmation or on completion without re-entering the details. The platform never sees the full number, only the identifier the provider returns. It is the norm for business accounts and frequent travellers, and it allows an amount to be refunded to the same method without asking for bank details.
Self-employed driver: A professional who drives their own vehicle under their own authorisation — VTC or a taxi licence with interurban authorisation — and works with one or more platforms that assign them jobs, without an employment relationship. They invoice the platform or it self-invoices them, they pay their own social security and insurance, and they decide which jobs to accept. It is the most common figure in small provinces and the one that most needs the platform to bring predictable demand, not promises.
Settlement: The periodic closing of accounts between the platform and a driver, fleet or mediator: the list of the period's jobs with their price, what was collected through each channel, the commission applied, adjustments for waiting, tolls or cancellations and the net amount to pay or receive, with the corresponding invoice or self-invoice. It is published in the panel, can be downloaded and is the document each party uses to reconcile its books. The frequency and payment terms are in the relationship's conditions.
Simplified invoice: What used to be called a till receipt: an invoice without the recipient's details, which the regulation allows for passenger transport and other low-value services. It is valid as proof of payment and to record a minor expense, but it does not let a company deduct VAT, because it does not identify it. Anyone travelling for work should ask for the full invoice with their company's details; in a business account that is already taken care of.
Sitemap: An XML file listing the addresses of a website that its owner wants the search engine to know about, with the real last-modified date of each one and its versions in other languages. A site with several domains publishes one per domain and lists in each only what is canonical there: a province's, its areas, routes and guides; the brand's, the shared pages and the sector content. A false date in the sitemap teaches the search engine to distrust all of them.
Structured data (schema.org): Markup in JSON-LD format that describes to a machine what is on a page using the schema.org vocabulary: an organisation, a local business, an article with author and dates, a list of questions and answers, a service with its area, a defined term. Search engines use it to understand the page and show rich results, and AI assistants to cite precisely. It only counts if it tells the truth: marking up a rating or a price the page does not display is grounds for a penalty.
Supplement: An amount added to the base price of a ride for a specific circumstance known in advance: airport or station pick-up, night or holiday hours, bulky luggage, child seat, pet, intermediate stop, a vehicle with more seats. In a fixed price the supplements are included and itemised in the amount accepted when booking, never added on board; in a taxi they are set by the regulated fare and shown on the meter.
Taxi (auto-taxi): Public passenger transport in a car under a municipal licence, which may pick up anyone hailing it in the street, wait at a rank or take calls and bookings. It charges by meter at the fare approved by each council or joint service area, except on fixed-price trips that the same fare allows, such as airport runs. It also needs an interurban authorisation to leave its municipality. Its rules are municipal and regional, within the state framework of Law 16/1987.
Taxi licence: The municipal title that allows taxi services in a municipality or a joint service area, with a given vehicle and holder. It sets how many taxis there may be, which vehicles qualify and how the licence is transferred, and it is completed by the interurban authorisation granted by the region. The number is capped: the historical ratio of one VTC authorisation for every thirty taxi licences comes from there, and it is what the sector observatory follows by region.
Taximeter: An approved, sealed measuring device that calculates the amount of a taxi journey from the distance travelled and the waiting or slow-moving time, applying the regulated fare in force. It is subject to metrological control and periodic verification, and the customer is entitled to see it running and to ask for the receipt it prints. A VTC has no meter because the price is fixed before starting; what must exist instead is the trip sheet or the service record with that price.
Terminal tout: A person who, at the arrivals of an airport or station, approaches travellers offering an unrequested taxi or transfer, sometimes wearing a vest or an official-looking badge, and leads them to an unlicensed car. Neither a taxi, which is taken at the rank, nor a VTC, which requires prior booking. The giveaways are the approach itself, a price negotiated on the pavement and paid in cash without a receipt, and a car with no sticker. Anyone with a booked transfer knows where their driver is and needs nobody else.
Toll: The amount a motorway or toll-tunnel concessionaire charges for using it. In a fixed-price ride the toll of the planned route is inside the price or declared separately before confirming, but it is never added on board as a surprise; if the driver chooses another route on their own, the extra toll is theirs. In a taxi the toll is passed on to the customer under the regulated fare. Airport access tolls and terminal parking fees are treated the same way.
Trip sheet (hoja de ruta): The document, now electronic, that accompanies every VTC job and proves it was contracted before being provided: it identifies the operator, the customer, the place and date of the contract, the origin, the destination and the features of the service. It must be shown to inspectors during the trip. Since 2018 it coexists with the report to the state register, which replaces it where so provided. For the driver it is their backing at a checkpoint; for the customer, the proof of what was agreed.
Unaccompanied minor: A minor travelling on a ride without a parent or guardian. Parents or guardians decide with whom and how the minor travels, and a carrier taking the child alone assumes a custody during the journey that not every company accepts. Each platform sets in its terms whether it allows it, from what age, what written authorisation it requires and which contacts it demands; when accepted, one adult hands the child over at pick-up and another identified adult receives them at the destination, with both phone numbers on the booking.
Urban service: A ride that takes place entirely within a municipality or a joint service area. It is the historical ground of the taxi, with a regulated fare and a meter, and since Royal Decree-law 13/2018 its provision by a VTC depends on what the region or council has regulated, which may require an additional urban licence, a minimum pre-booking interval or vehicle conditions. That is why a pre-booking platform has to know which region it picks up in to offer what the rule allows.
Urban VTC permit: A permit of its own that some regions or municipalities require for VTC services starting and ending in the same municipality, since Royal Decree-law 13/2018 narrowed the national authorisation to interurban transport and left urban transport to regions and municipalities. It may carry a maximum number tied to the taxi fleet, a sticker, vehicle requirements and a driver register, governed by the rule of the place where the service runs. The national authorisation covers interurban trips nationwide; without the urban permit, no urban trip where one is required.
VAT on passenger transport: In Spain, passenger and luggage transport is taxed at the reduced VAT rate that Law 37/1992 sets for that service, different from the general rate applied to most services. The fixed price shown to a consumer includes VAT; for a company it is itemised on the invoice so it can be deducted. Ancillary services that are not transport — a handling fee, an intermediation commission — may carry another rate, which is why the invoice separates them.
Vehicle tracking: The position of the assigned vehicle, shared with the passenger from the moment the driver sets off for the pick-up until the job ends, together with the driver's name, the plate and the model. It is shown in the confirmation or the app, can be shared with someone else — whoever is meeting a relative at the airport, whoever is waiting for a minor — and is logged in case a trip has to be reconstructed. It is safety for the passenger and backing for the driver.
VTC (private hire vehicle with driver): Passenger transport in a car of up to nine seats that is always booked in advance, driver included, under a VTC authorisation. Unlike a taxi it cannot pick up anyone who hails it in the street or wait for customers at a rank: every job has to be contracted before it starts and be recorded in the communications register. Its rules sit in Law 16/1987 on land transport and its regulation, and since 2018 the regions and town councils may regulate urban services.
VTC authorisation: The administrative title that allows a company or a self-employed driver to provide chauffeured car hire with a specific vehicle, identified by its plate. The region grants it on behalf of the State for interurban services and, since Royal Decree-law 13/2018, urban services also require whatever each region or council decides. It is renewed periodically, requires insurance, a vehicle under a maximum age and a tax address in the issuing region, and it appears in the public register of the Ministry of Transport, where anyone can check that it is in force.
VTC identification sticker: The sign that identifies a vehicle as an authorised VTC: the sticker on the glass or body, in the format and position set by each region, and in some of them the blue public-service plate. It lets the passenger and inspectors tell an authorised vehicle from one that is not. A taxi carries its own municipal identification, with the licence number and the municipality's colour or stripe.
VTC service communications register: The electronic register of the Ministry of Transport in which, before each job starts, the holder of the VTC authorisation reports the contract data: plate, origin, destination, date and time, and in some cases the price. It was created by Royal Decree 1076/2017 and developed by the amended Order FOM/36/2008; it lets inspectors check that a vehicle is driving a contracted job and allows the sector's activity to be measured. A ride that is not recorded there is not covered by the authorisation.
VTC-to-taxi ratio (one-in-thirty rule): The cap in the ROTT that lets regions refuse new VTC authorisations when there is already more than one for every thirty taxi licences. Its history is troubled: a 2009 liberalisation law removed its legal basis, thousands of applications refused then were later granted by the courts, the 2013 reform of the LOTT put it back into the law, and Royal Decree 1057/2015 and Royal Decree-law 3/2018 fixed it again. Today it is exceeded in most territories and hardly any new authorisations are granted.
Wheelchair-accessible vehicle: A vehicle with a ramp or lift, anchorages and room for a person to travel in their own wheelchair without moving to a seat, approved under Royal Decree 1544/2007 on transport accessibility. The rule requires a share of each municipality's taxi licences to be accessible; with a chauffeured service it is booked as such, stating the type of chair, so the platform assigns a vehicle that truly is accessible rather than a large one without anchorages.
Working-time record: The duty of every company with employees to record each day the start and end time of each person's working day, keep the records for four years and make them available to the Labour Inspectorate, under article 34.9 of the Workers' Statute. In a fleet with salaried drivers it ties in with driving and rest times; it does not apply to the self-employed, although keeping their own record is advisable for safety and fatigue behind the wheel.

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