How to start a taxi company in Belgium

Starting a taxi company in Belgium is not only a question of buying a vehicle and finding drivers. A taxi company must decide where it will operate, which regional rules apply, how vehicles will be licensed, how drivers will work, how payments will be reconciled, and how operational records will be kept. Belgium is regionalized for taxi regulation, so Brussels, Wallonia, and Flanders have different procedures and terminology.

This guide focuses on Brussels and Wallonia because those are the first operational regions supported by Tomcabs content. It is written for future taxi managers who want to launch professionally: with a licence path, compliant vehicle setup, insurance, road-sheet discipline, payment tracking, and software from day one.

In the Brussels-Capital Region, taxi operators should begin with Brussels Mobility's professional taxi sector information. Brussels distinguishes categories such as rank-based taxis, street taxis, and ceremonial taxis. The relevant administration publishes procedures, forms, and professional updates, and operators may need to contact the taxi service at the regional administration for licence, capacity certificate, or status questions.

Brussels also applies an annual tax on taxi services. Brussels Fiscality states that holders of a licence to operate one or more taxi services must pay this annual tax. The official page lists EUR 614.32 per identification sticker for 2023 and notes that the amount is indexed annually. For a launch budget, treat this as a recurring regional cost that must be verified against the latest MyTax or Brussels Fiscality amount before filing.

Operationally, a Brussels taxi company should prepare for traceable records: driver identity, vehicle assignment, shift dates and hours, start and end indexes, race records, payment methods, and road-sheet or equivalent documentation. Tomcabs is built around those records so a manager does not have to reconstruct them later from paper, messages, and spreadsheets.

Wallonia's official procedure is titled "Transport de moins de 9 personnes - Obtenir une licence d'exploitation d'un service de taxis". It defines taxi services as remunerated passenger transport using small-capacity vehicles, with taxi de station and taxi de rue categories. The Walloon page states that station taxis use a taximeter or approved equivalent equipment and a roof light, while street taxis operate exclusively through an electronic intermediation service.

Wallonia also sets quantitative limits: the number of station taxi licences and street taxi licences authorized in a municipality is limited to one vehicle per 1,500 inhabitants, with annual review by the paid passenger transport commission. The same page states that licence duration depends on vehicle age and type: 7 years for classic vehicles, 10 years for vehicles adapted for wheelchair transport, and 10 years for zero-emission electric or hydrogen vehicles.

A key practical point is establishment. The Walloon procedure states that an operator must have a stable and effective establishment in the Walloon Region. The page was updated on April 23, 2026, but managers should still verify forms, local municipality practice, and transitional rules before buying vehicles or signing driver contracts.

Before buying or leasing vehicles, decide which category you will operate in and which region will license each vehicle. A vehicle may require specific visual identity, equipment, taximeter or approved equivalent, roof sign, identification sticker, inspection, and insurance documentation depending on region and taxi category. Do not assume a vehicle that is acceptable for one category or region is automatically acceptable in another.

From an operations perspective, create one clean vehicle record per taxi: licence plate, make, model, fuel type, vehicle type, terminal or equipment identifier, activation status, and assigned company. In Tomcabs, every shift and race is linked back to a taxi, which makes later balance checks and road-sheet generation much easier.

Taxi companies should budget for professional insurance, vehicle insurance for paid passenger transport, liability coverage, accounting support, payment terminal fees, fuel or charging, maintenance, cleaning, parking, software, and taxes. Insurance and accounting are not optional admin details: they shape whether the company can operate safely and pass review.

The most common finance problem is not knowing what each driver owes or is owed. Taxi revenue can arrive through cash, card, invoice, app platforms, terminal payments, and mixed payment methods. If these flows are tracked manually, disputes become likely. A taxi company should decide before launch how every race, expense, commission, and driver settlement will be recorded.

A realistic launch budget should include company creation, accounting, professional advice, licence applications, regional or local taxes, vehicle purchase or lease, insurance, equipment, payment terminals, branding or visual identity, software, driver onboarding, and working capital. Official fees change, and some costs are regional or municipal, so the numbers must be verified before launch.

Tomcabs currently references anonymized platform data from approximately 19,500 races, 1,600 shifts, 40 taxis, and early live companies. These figures are not official Belgian market averages. They are useful because they show the type of operational dataset a taxi company should build: revenue per shift, races per shift, payment mix, expenses, balance movements, and unresolved reports.

Many new taxi companies start with WhatsApp, paper, and spreadsheets. That feels cheap until the first dispute, missing race, wrong payment method, or end-of-month reconciliation. At minimum, a professional taxi company needs a reliable way to manage drivers, taxis, shifts, races, payment methods, expenses, road sheets, reports, and balances.

Dispatch software helps assign jobs. Taxi operations management software handles the internal operating system: who worked, which taxi was used, what was earned, how it was paid, what expenses were declared, what road sheet was generated, and what each driver owes. Tomcabs is built for that second category.

Choose your region and taxi category. Confirm the licence process with the official regional or municipal authority. Verify current fees, annual taxes, and deadlines. Select vehicles that fit the category. Arrange insurance and accounting. Create driver onboarding rules. Define payment methods and commission logic. Set up road-sheet and record-keeping workflows. Test your first shift before accepting real passenger work.

The companies that scale cleanly are the ones that start with structured records. Every shift, race, payment, vehicle, and driver balance should be easy to review. That is the difference between a taxi company that runs on memory and a taxi company that can prove what happened.