"This is the Dispatch Centre," says Adel Shakri, Director of Transport Systems at the Roads and Transport Authority (RTA) while he holds the door to the ‘nerve centre’ of the taxi in Dubai.

In the dispatch centre, the taxis on the road are monitored day and night. The movement of the vehicle, the job description, the average time per trip and the destination of each taxi can all be seen on the screens under the observing eyes of the RTA employees.

This does not only mean that the taxi driver is monitored. Information about the client is available too.

"If you give me your phone number, I can see when you last booked a taxi, where you stepped in the taxi and where you went," explains an employee.

However, the information is not available to the public. "We do receive phone calls from family members who want to know where their sister went on a certain day. We do not respond to such requests."

The information can however be requested by authorities such as Dubai Police.

Further, the information is used to improve the taxi experience, as violations made by taxi drivers can be signalled immediately.

According to the system, the number of violations made in 2013 went down by 15 per cent. The number of complaints by the public has decreased by 70 per cent.

On average 15,000 taxi trips are made per day, while the Dubai fleet exists of a total number of 9,447 taxis.

The number of taxi users in the first half of this year clocked 106.565 million riders, while the overall number of passengers in 2013 amounted to 172 million.