Flight Tracking for Taxi Firms: Airport Pickups That Follow the Flight
The Short Answer
Flight tracking in taxi dispatch software links an airport pickup to the passenger’s flight number, so the pickup time moves when the flight lands late or early and the driver and passenger are told. A good system ignores changes of a few minutes, never moves a pickup on its own for a cancelled or diverted flight, and lets the office decide whether to approve each move. In Cabica it is on every plan; the flight data comes from your own AeroDataBox key, which has a free plan to try.
Airport work pays well and goes wrong expensively. A flight lands forty minutes late and your driver sits in the short-stay car park, paying for it, while two local jobs go to someone else. Or it lands early and the passenger walks out to an empty pickup zone and opens Uber. Either way, someone in the office was supposed to be checking the flight, and at half past five in the morning nobody was.
Flight tracking takes that job off the desk. This is how it works in Cabica, rule by rule, and what to ask of any system that claims to do it.
How it works
- The flight number goes on the booking. In the office, an Airport Pickup button on the booking form opens a Flight Number box. Passengers can type it themselves in your passenger app when they choose an airport, and on your booking website.
- The system finds the flight. Within seconds the booking shows a Flight panel: the airport, when it is due, when it is now expected, and when it was last checked. “ba 1234” is fine; it does not need to be typed perfectly.
- It checks the flight on a schedule. Rarely while the flight is days away, every ten minutes in the last hour, and never again once it has landed or the passenger is in the car.
- The pickup follows the flight. When the landing time moves, the pickup moves with it, the job still goes out to a driver the same time before pickup, and the driver and passenger are told.
What happens when the flight changes
The rules matter more than the feature. A system that moves pickups on its own for every kind of change will eventually send a car to the wrong airport. These are Cabica’s:
| The flight | What happens |
|---|---|
| Lands late | The pickup moves later by the same amount, plus any extra time you set |
| Lands early | The pickup moves earlier, but by no more than you allow (15 minutes unless you change it) |
| Changes by a few minutes | Nothing moves. Changes under 10 minutes are ignored unless you change it |
| Is cancelled | A red flag on the booking and the board. The booking is not cancelled and nothing moves until someone in the office deals with it |
| Is diverted | A suggested new time, never moved on its own: the car would be going to the wrong airport |
| Moves by more than 12 hours | Suggested, never moved on its own |
| Cannot be checked | Nothing moves. If it still cannot be checked near the landing, the booking says to check the flight by hand |
If you would rather decide every change yourself, choose Suggest, dispatcher confirms: a late flight then puts *Move pickup* and *Keep current time* on the booking instead of moving it.
Why the buffers matter
A landing time is not a pickup time. Passengers still have to get off the plane, through passport control and to the carousel. That is what the buffers are for, and they are yours to set, because you know your airports:
- Extra time after a late landing. Added on top of the delay, so a late flight does not mean a car waiting at the kerb before anyone is through.
- The earliest an early landing moves it. Fifteen minutes by default. An early landing rarely means an early passenger.
- Ignore changes smaller than. Ten minutes by default, so a pickup is not moved, and the driver not texted, every time an estimate shifts by two minutes.
- Diversion time. Added to a diverted flight’s new landing for the suggested time.
What it costs
Flight tracking is on every Cabica plan, with nothing extra from us. The flight data comes from AeroDataBox, which you subscribe to through RapidAPI with your own key, the same way your Google Maps key is yours. It has a free plan to try, and the paid plans are priced by the number of checks; because the system checks rarely until the last hour, an ordinary week of airport jobs uses few of them.
Setting it up in Cabica
- Create a free RapidAPI account, subscribe to AeroDataBox and copy your key.
- In Cabica: Management → Settings → Maps & APIs → Flight Tracking. Paste the key and press Test key with a flight you know is flying today.
- Switch Track flights on, and set your buffers.
From then on, the Airport Pickup button is on the booking form, and the Flight Number box appears in your passenger app and on your booking website. Most airport work is booked ahead, so it sits alongside your other scheduled taxi bookings on the dispatch board. Flight tracking is part of our private hire booking system, and of the chauffeur booking software for firms that also run meet and greet.
A note for chauffeur and meet-and-greet work
If your drivers wait in arrivals with a name board, the same pickup time moves the meet. On a meet-and-greet booking in the Cabica driver app, *Show Name Board* puts the passenger’s name full screen, black on white, with the screen kept awake.
Do airport runs? See flight tracking on your own bookings in a 20-minute demo.
Book a DemoFrequently Asked Questions
- How does flight tracking work for taxi firms?
- The passenger’s flight number is added to an airport pickup. The dispatch system checks the flight on a schedule and moves the pickup time when the landing time changes, telling the driver and the passenger. Small changes are ignored, and cancelled or diverted flights are flagged for the office rather than moved automatically.
- Does Cabica charge extra for flight tracking?
- No. Flight tracking is on every Cabica plan. The flight data comes from AeroDataBox through your own RapidAPI key, which has a free plan to try; paid plans are charged by AeroDataBox, not by Cabica.
- What happens to a taxi booking if the flight is cancelled?
- In Cabica, a cancelled flight puts a red flag on the booking and the dispatch board. The booking is not cancelled and the pickup does not move: the office rings the passenger, decides, and marks it dealt with.
- Can passengers add their flight number themselves?
- Yes. In Cabica the passenger app shows a Flight Number box when the pickup is an airport, and the firm’s booking website has one on its form.
Written By
Chief Executive Officer, Cabica
Muhammad Gulfam Asim leads Cabica. He worked in the taxi business for six years as a controller and dispatcher, and now builds the dispatch and booking software independent taxi and private-hire firms run on, working on pricing, product direction and the operator conversations that shape both.
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