For the past six months or more, we've been using WheelTrans for transportation: although there is more variability in vehicle and drivers, the trip costs a single TTC fare (and since our son has the low income Presto card, that means a trip costs $2.05). There are some important things to keep in mind about this service:
- as in any other area of life, some of the drivers are friendly, good-natured and kind and others, well, not so much
- the vehicles used vary, sometimes a taxi and sometimes an adapted cab (depending on who else is travelling)
- often, although not always, there are other people using the same service, which means both that your kid needs to be comfortable sharing a vehicle with strangers (although regularly scheduled trips seem to often have the same people travelling together) and that the trip will almost always take longer than it would take to travel directly from home to destination (or vice versa)
- the online booking service is, shall we say, not entirely user-friendly (I remember trying and failing to cancel or add a trip, can't remember which, and when I ended up calling customer service was told to scroll down to the very bottom of the screen where the option I needed was tucked out of sight, a solution he had assured me stumped many users, himself included) and the automated calls the night before confirming the times for the next day's trips use a singularly irritating voice
If there are time limitations (for example, for one of my son's programs the doors do not open until 9 am and the group leaves the facility at 9:30) scheduling can be a little stressful. A kindly customer service person offered me this guidance when I was first wrestling with this: if the scheduled pickup time you are given would either get your kid to program too early (based on driving straight there) you would be wise to cancel it. So, for example, if it's a 30 minute drive from your place to the location, and he can't be there earlier than 9, and the trip is scheduled to pick up at 8:00, that's a worry. Straightforward enough, assuming of course that you have some backup system for transportation, but there's no way to know whether someone else will also be being transported in the same trip, and whether that extra leg of the journal would ensure arrival will be after 9. As a consequence, right now it's not possible to simply leave my son at home and assume he'll negotiate any time issues when the driver pulls up. The last time the driver arrived early I told him about the 9:00 timeframe and he assured me that if it looked like they were going to be too early he would drive "very, very slowly", which was kind of sweet. Note that if you have to cancel, don't do it online, but call the priority line, which is 416-393-4111
Bottom line? If you're already having to ensure your kid makes it safely to the vehicle in which they'll travel to/from a program or activity (whether or not you are driving that vehicle) then WheelTrans won't necessarily make it possible for you to waltz out of the house free and clear, but it will certain save you money and give you another avenue for building independence skills.
One caveat: in our experience, sometimes WheelTrans does not show up. So far this has happened only on Friday afternoons, but as a precaution I set downloaded and set up the Beck Taxi app which will make it easier for me to order and pay for a cab if this occurs.
You need to apply for WheelTrans and one of the parts of the application needs to be completed by a doctor.
An automated voice message will be sent about 12 hours before the next day's trips, to whatever phone number is associated with the Wheel Trans account, saying the exact time of the pickup/delivery (before this time is reached, the time is a range. You can also use the self-booking online tool (https://mywheel-trans.ttc.ca/SelfBooking2018/login) to check the time, and to cancel trips if necessary, as well as to book additional ones. Please note that if you book a one-time trip, you may see a message saying the trip could not be booked: this is a design flaw in the software, apparently (as the helpful man at Wheel Trans told me after I waited on hold for about an hour) and if you scroll down you will see an option to ask to be put on the waitlist for that trip. I have to note that everyone I have dealt with at the WheelTrans office has been kind and helpful.
One caveat: in our experience, sometimes WheelTrans does not show up. So far this has happened only on Friday afternoons, but as a precaution I set downloaded and set up the Beck Taxi app which will make it easier for me to order and pay for a cab if this occurs.
You need to apply for WheelTrans and one of the parts of the application needs to be completed by a doctor.
An automated voice message will be sent about 12 hours before the next day's trips, to whatever phone number is associated with the Wheel Trans account, saying the exact time of the pickup/delivery (before this time is reached, the time is a range. You can also use the self-booking online tool (https://mywheel-trans.ttc.ca/SelfBooking2018/login) to check the time, and to cancel trips if necessary, as well as to book additional ones. Please note that if you book a one-time trip, you may see a message saying the trip could not be booked: this is a design flaw in the software, apparently (as the helpful man at Wheel Trans told me after I waited on hold for about an hour) and if you scroll down you will see an option to ask to be put on the waitlist for that trip. I have to note that everyone I have dealt with at the WheelTrans office has been kind and helpful.
Thank you Laurie
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