Fake taxi fiasco

Roadrage77 said :

Did the driver by chance have a shaved head, tattoos and a penchant for techno music? There is a very dodgy late-night operator who preys on young intoxicated girls in the Civic/Kingston area. He abused my girlfriend the other night because she wanted to pay via eftpos to the point where she was so petrified she ran from his cab to the safety of a service station, even leaving a shoe behind in his cab. He proceeded to chase her and scream abuse until the service station employee intervened. Seriously doubt whether he is a licensed cabbie. I intend on bashing him next time I come across him.

Call me, I’ll help. This guys sounds like a nasty piece of work.

AG Canberra said :

You actually do have to have a valid endorsement on your licence to drive either a taxi or chauffeured hire car in the ACT. To get the endorsement you have to do a theory and practical test with the RTA. You also need to have a mediacal done (in the first instance) with a gov doctor to prove you are fit enough to do the job. How some of those blokes that can barely fit behind the wheel pass this test is beyond me!

Either way the comanpy involved won’t be rushing out to get rid of the above mentioned driver – getting anyone to fill these shifts is near impossible.

UMMMMM No you don’t.
I was a Queanbeyan driver and allowed to drive in ACT also. You have to do the Physical which is nothing but that’s all. There was no RTA tests, no exams or anything.
All you do is find an owner who needs a driver and sit in with them for 2 weeks and that’s it.

I’ve never had problems with the drivers on a Friday afternoon…because I can never find one!

There’s an easy way to find out whether your taxi driver is real or not. Please print out the following check list for future reference. Ignore these at your peril. You must be able to tick at least 5 of these for the driver to meet our stringent requirements.

1. Bad breath.
2. Bad body odour.
3. The taxi smells of 3 day old greasy, fried food (and body odour).
4. Shocking array of driving skills.
5. Doesn’t speak English particularly well.
6. Doesn’t speak at all.
7. Listens to Radio Lebanon.

Man, I hate to hear these stories. I drove from 1994-2000 and took great pride in my work, as did most of the other cabbies I knew (which probably amounted to 50 or 60 drivers).

Unfortunately, the industry has gone to hell, and it has nothing to do with over-regulation, it has to do with wages and the increasing difficulty of the job attendant with a more abusive society. Fares have increased about 80% in the 8 years since I drove, and the number of taxis has increased by, what, 60? However these guys are still making the same money I was 8 years ago.

As for that maxi driver, he’s an idiot. He was probably worried the $6.60 would come out of his pocket, but he should have just made a note to the owner on his takings envelope at the end of the night. He should have looked at the 4-5 of you and told you to take the first cab on the rank, as is the custom.

I’m glad this topic came up, because on Saturday Night a few friends and I had a run in with a cabbie.

We got into a maxi cab at the cab rank which was sitting behind another cab waiting for a fare. We all realised that we could fit into a car that someone was driving so we hoped out before everyone had got in and were seated. The taxi driver abused us and said he’d already started the meter and wouldn’t let us leave until we paid him $6.60.

Whats the deal with this. One of my friends ended up paying it, albeit with a bit of abuse.

There was an episode in the late 80’s where a dude from an interstate town nearby had acquired an ex Aerial Taxi complete with meter and dome light. I think he had a scanner of some sort to listen to voice dispatches. In those days all ACT taxis had a yellow plate with black lettering. Starting at TX1 and finishing about TX130 excepting TX 13 (bad luck and all that) This dude’s got himself NSW plates (black letters on a yellow plate) along the lines of TXI 175 or something. In the dark it looked close enough to the real thing. He worked the late night ranks in Civic and Manuka, and stole radio jobs in the quiet times. I remember it took a shirt load of complaints and much Guvmint stuffing about to get this dude off the road at the time. Maybe he’s baaaaaccckkk!

OMG it must have been a Canberra Cabs or a Cabexpress car!

Oops is that speculating?

I don’t think you’d gain much from having the identification shown anyway. Firstly It’s pretty easy identifying taxis in the ACT, identified by the numberplate and it also shows you inside the taxi, the drivers (should) have their own login into the company’s network where they can identify the driver and thirdly all cabs had surveillance cameras installed from memory.

As for the safety of the taxi, you also have the option of reporting it to TAMS http://www.tams.act.gov.au/move/public_transport/taxi_services_and_information/complaints

or to the RTA
http://www.rego.act.gov.au/registrations/regodefective.htm

Can you please give me the contact details for this person. I’d gladly patronise them over Canberra Cabs and its affiliates. The sooner our over-regulated, entirely inadequate and customer-loathing taxi system is done away with the better.

I had my parked motorbike reversed into by a taxi. No number plates.
A very well managed system indeed.