7.1 Goods & Baggage Rules

7.1 Goods & Baggage Rules

Quick Answer: A taxi may carry no goods other than personal hand baggage. Personal hand baggage does not include dangerous or offensive goods, or goods that are not securely wrapped. Light personal baggage in the passenger compartment is free if each piece's total dimensions (length + width + height) are ≤140 cm. The driver may charge a baggage surcharge for every piece placed in the luggage compartment, regardless of dimensions. Wheelchairs, crutches, and mobility aids of a disabled passenger are free regardless of size or placement.

Part A of the Taxi Written Test treats baggage as both a conduct rule (what may go in the vehicle) and a fare rule (when the surcharge applies). Section 6.2 taught the $6 per piece additional fare figure. This section teaches the goods regime from the Taxi Operation Booklet (around §X): what is allowed on board, what counts as free cabin baggage, when the luggage compartment surcharge is available, and the absolute free rule for mobility aids.

Core Rule: No Goods Other Than Personal Hand Baggage

A taxi is a public service passenger vehicle, not a light goods van. The Booklet rule is blunt:

No goods other than personal hand baggage of passengers may be carried on a taxi.

That sentence does three jobs:

1. Passenger baggage only — items belonging to or accompanying the hiring passengers, not freestanding commercial cargo for a third party.
2. Hand / personal character — ordinary personal luggage associated with travel, not bulk merchandise, construction materials, or wholesale packages.
3. Public-safety and trade boundary — keeps taxis in the passenger-transport business and out of unregulated goods carriage.

Exam implication: if a scenario describes cartons of stock for a shop, loose building materials, or a pure delivery of goods with no passenger travel purpose, the correct answer is that such goods are not lawful taxi cargo under this rule. The lawful category is personal hand baggage of the passenger(s).

What Personal Hand Baggage Does NOT Include

Even among items a passenger wants to bring, two exclusions strip an item of "personal hand baggage" status:

1. Dangerous or offensive goods

Dangerous goods (flammable, explosive, corrosive, or similarly hazardous materials in ordinary language of the rule) and offensive goods (items that foul, sicken, or unreasonably distress other passengers or the vehicle) are not personal hand baggage for the purpose of this rule.

Practical teaching examples (exam-safe themes, not an exhaustive chemical list):

• Open fuel containers, unmarked hazardous chemicals, leaking batteries, or similarly hazardous packages
• Strongly smelling refuse, raw materials that soil the cabin, or other offensive cargo that turns the taxi into a nuisance vehicle

A passenger cannot re-label a dangerous or offensive item as "hand baggage" and force carriage. The exclusion is definitional: those goods do not count as personal hand baggage under the Booklet rule.

2. Goods not securely wrapped

Goods that are not securely wrapped also fall outside personal hand baggage. Secure wrapping protects other passengers, the vehicle interior, and the integrity of the load. Loose, spilling, or inadequately contained packages fail this test.

Exam traps:

• "Any bag the passenger calls personal baggage must be carried free" — false if it is dangerous, offensive, or not securely wrapped, or if dimensions/placement trigger a surcharge rule below.
• "Only police can refuse dangerous goods" — the Booklet rule itself excludes them from personal hand baggage; drivers study the carriage boundary, not only enforcement after the fact.

Free Cabin Baggage: Light Personal Pieces ≤140 cm (L+W+H)

When baggage is personal hand baggage and is carried as light personal baggage in the passenger compartment, it is free if each piece satisfies the total dimension test:

Length + width + height ≤ 140 cm

Key teaching points:

How to apply the 140 cm test

Measure (or assess) the three external dimensions of the piece and add them. The sum must not exceed 140 cm. It is not "any one side ≤140 cm" and not "volume in litres." A suitcase that is 55 cm + 40 cm + 25 cm = 120 cm total passes the free cabin test if it is light personal baggage securely wrapped and non-dangerous/offensive. A piece that totals 150 cm fails the free cabin dimension rule even if it sits on a seat.

"Each piece" and "light"

• The free rule is expressed per piece of light personal baggage meeting the cabin + dimension conditions.
• Light personal baggage is the Booklet's character of ordinary hand luggage — not heavy freight stacked in the cabin to avoid the boot surcharge.
• Multiple free cabin pieces are possible if each piece independently meets the free conditions; do not invent a "whole party only one free bag" rule the Booklet does not state.

Luggage Compartment: Surcharge Regardless of Dimensions

The driver may charge a baggage surcharge for every piece placed in the luggage compartment, regardless of that piece's dimensions.

This is the critical contrast with the cabin free rule:

So a small bag that would have been free in the cabin can still attract the baggage surcharge if it is placed in the luggage compartment. Placement, not only size, drives the surcharge availability.

Link to the $6 extra (Chapter 6)

Section 6.2 teaches the additional fare of $6 per piece of baggage (except light personal hand baggage in the passenger compartment). Read Chapter 6 and Chapter 7 together:

• Chapter 6 = money figure and fare table identity across Urban / NT / Lantau.
• Chapter 7 = what may be carried, when free cabin applies (≤140 cm), when boot surcharge applies (any piece in luggage compartment), and mobility-aid free rule.

For the Written Test, if a question asks the dollar amount, answer from the extras table ($6). If a question asks whether a piece is free or chargeable by placement/dimensions, answer from this section's goods rules.

Mobility Aids of Disabled Passengers: Always Free

Wheelchairs, crutches, and mobility aids of a disabled passenger are free:

• regardless of dimensions (the 140 cm cabin test does not create a charge for these aids), and
• regardless of placement (cabin or luggage compartment).

This is both a high-yield exam fact and a core fairness rule. Do not:

• Code a wheelchair as $6 baggage
• Charge "handling" or "equipment" extras for crutches or mobility aids of disabled passengers
• Claim that a wheelchair in the boot "must" attract luggage-compartment surcharge under the ordinary baggage rule

The mobility-aid free rule overrides ordinary baggage surcharge logic for those items when they belong to a disabled passenger as mobility aids.

(Section 6.2 already flags wheelchairs and crutches as free in the extras table; this section restates the same principle in the goods chapter with explicit dimensions and placement independence.)

Operational Decision Map

When a passenger presents items at the kerb, work through this order:

1. Is it personal hand baggage of the passenger? If not (commercial goods only, etc.), it is outside lawful taxi goods carriage under the core rule.
2. Is it dangerous, offensive, or not securely wrapped? Then it is not personal hand baggage under the exclusions.
3. Is it a wheelchair, crutches, or mobility aid of a disabled passenger? → Free, any size, any placement.
4. Otherwise, where is it placed?
   • Luggage compartment → driver may charge baggage surcharge per piece, dimensions irrelevant.
   • Passenger compartment, light personal → free if L+W+H ≤140 cm; if over 140 cm total, it does not enjoy that free cabin dimension rule (and fare treatment follows the lawful baggage/extra framework — never invent unofficial rates).

Common Exam Traps

Memory Hooks

• Only personal hand baggage — no general goods trade.
• Exclude dangerous/offensive / not securely wrapped.
• 140 cm = free cabin light personal (L+W+H total).
• Boot = surcharge available per piece, size irrelevant.
• Mobility aids free — size and placement do not create a charge.

Closing Checklist for Section 7.1

1. No goods other than personal hand baggage on a taxi.
2. Personal hand baggage excludes dangerous/offensive goods and goods not securely wrapped.
3. Free: light personal baggage in passenger compartment with L+W+H ≤140 cm per piece.
4. Luggage compartment: surcharge may be charged per piece regardless of dimensions.
5. Wheelchairs, crutches, mobility aids of disabled passengers: free always under this rule set.
6. Connect to Chapter 6's $6 baggage extra for the money figure; use this section for goods / free / surcharge logic.

Next, Section 7.2 covers animals, lost property (finder and driver duties, six-hour police deposit), and seat-belt refusal rights.