I’m getting really fucking sick of the lip I’m catching from cab drivers who (in some cases) refuse to take my debit card as a form of payment at the END of the ride. I get that your employer adds the $1 service fee on, and they collect the money (not you) but that’s no reason to REFUSE my form of payment. Or, if you don’t refuse it, you grumble like assholes when I ask, “Do you have debit?” and dole out some snarky comments about how it takes “forever” to turn the machine on, or roll your eyes at me, et cetera. If you don’t want to use the fucking machine, DON’T COME PICK ME UP WHEN I’VE REQUESTED DEBIT FROM THE DISPATCHER. I’m not paying $6 to go four blocks for your fucking sassy mouth.
Oh yeah, and quit smoking in cabs, assholes. —Paying for a Service, Not Your Attitude
This article appears in Nov 1-7, 2012.
The smoke masks the urine smell.
WAIT, you’re getting a cab to go 4 blocks???
Hey big spender… Did your chauffeur take the day off or something?
a $6 fare, 4 blocks, so he loses his place in the Q for that area and you want to pay with a time eating debit card. i am surprsied they haven’t black listed you yet.
Why bitch? If he can’t or won’t accept payment, it’s not your problem! Thank him for the ride and bid him adieu!
you have to ask for a cab that takes debit, you fucking idiot. not all do, but very soon from what i hear.
Four blocks? OP. Do you have two feet and a heartbeat?
Halifax cabs are disgusting. Not to mention you can never get one if its anything less than 22 degrees out, a droplet of rain has fallen or someone in dartmouth farted…
The drivers are terrible, they all smoke in the cabs (even the non smoking cars), throw a shit fit if you don’t want to use cash, and they can’t even figure out how the fuck a taxi light works… ummm… on means available, off means not available…. that hard eh?
Toronto is a terrible place but I can always get a cab there, and despite usually never speaking english, the driver always knows where s/he is going, the car is clean and smoke free, they have their debit machine fired up and ready to go and they know that if they don’t want someone to try and hail them – they *shudders in amazement* turn off their roof light. … imagine… simple…
It’s simple. If you offer debit, don’t complain when your customers use it. If you don’t like debit, run a cash-only cab.
The $6 was how much it would cost the OP to go out of their way to stop at a bank/atm to get cash out, not the whole ride itself, I think.
i dunno, it reads to me like it was $6 for the whole ride. maybe it was going to work after hrs and work pays OP back. maybe OP has disabilities re: walking. altho the bitch is so whiny it probably would have been thrown in.
and i doubt that the dispatcher told the cabbie that it would be debit. certainly would not have told the cabbie it was only 4 blocks. ‘told’ being electronic nowadays instead of radio. that’s the kiss of death for a dispatcher. cabbies all go deaf. just because the company goes debit, doesn’t mean it’s popular with the drivers. just sayin’.
it helps to walk a mile or two in others’ moccasins. most jobs have some real nastiness, otherwise they wouldn’t have to pay people to do them, right?
Clearly OP asked the dispatcher for debit. He requested that as he was calling for a cab.
I don’t see where he actually went wrong! Someone explain to me!
http://cdn.memegenerator.net/instances/400…
i have no doubt at all that OP asked the dispatcher about debit. just as i have no doubt that it was not passed along. it’s just the way it is. people are human, and it affects the way they do their jobs.
cabbies don’t like small fares because they lose their place in the Q for a couple of dollars. if they drop back and have to sit for 15 minutes til they move up to 1st again, it means $3 wages for a 1/4 hour.
if you are cruel to the server in a restaurant, you may get spit in your meal.
it doesn’t make it ‘right’ or ‘wrong’ but it is something to think about, and to take into account when doing one’s day to day activities.
I thought cabbies hated long trips, not short ones because of the gas required to get back to their zones?
Heh, my phone autocorrected ‘zones’ to ‘zombies’.
dang, i wish i had a phone that did that.
unless the industry has changed dramatically since i was a taxi dispatcher (and it well may have) drivers like nice long trips. once they get a fare, they lose their place. unless they own their own cab, they don’t pay for gas, the owner does. thye may take the money out and pay at the station, but it’s not out of their 40%
I hate this too! I was stuck a fair way from home when my ride bailed the other day so I called and asked for a cab with debit since i didn’t have cash (I don’t keep cash on me because of the thieves I work with). I got in the cab and it said on the screen I asked for debit. The guy groans and moans about how he’s not sure if his debit will work so I asked him why the hell he took my call in the first place? This isn’t the first time this has happened either.
^^ that deserves a complaint for sure! he was being a greedy fool.
I work for a small online news site and want to do a story on cabbies who refuse to pick people up or let them in the cab if they have debit. Casino advertises that they have debit in each cab. Some people don’t want to walk small distances if they live in bad neighbourhoods. If anyone would like to comment on their experience, please contact me at jessica.emin@gmail.com
Room goes silent.
The sad part is the debit machine that they are carrying in their cabs, they are paying for it in their office rent each week, they may as well use it. The dollar being charged to the customer is just that, it’s paid by the customer. I run a taxi myself and welcome all debit, credit transactions any day. I laugh when i’m in queue, sitting maybe sixth out to have customers come to me and ask if i take debit, get in i say, and they are all too happy.
As i drive away, i’m smiling, stopped wheels make no money. Not all cabbies are bad apples, but the ones who are, certainly paint the rest of us with the same brush.