FRIDAY, March 29, 2024
nationthailand

Taxi drivers still fleecing tourists at the airport

Taxi drivers still fleecing tourists at the airport

We have just enjoyed a great holiday in beautiful Phuket. On our way back, the comfort of Thai International business class helped us to forget the trauma of loading and reloading our luggage at the entrance to Phuket Airport. This system is hell: my last experience like this was in the Communist Bloc of the 1970s.

Arriving at a Bangkok airport with two full golf bags, we took a ticket for a large cab, and I began loading the luggage. But the driver then declared we needed two taxis. (On previous occasions with the same luggage we have always used the same van-type taxi, no problem.) Then came the question: “How much you pay?” 
At this point I went to the taxi kiosk to complain. Their solution: take another number. That meant I had to unload and reload all of our luggage into a cab parked 10 slots away. Instead of discouraging this attitude, the management’s solution is to change cabs or take two cabs.
I am not keen to let my wife travel alone by taxi outside town, especially after two female tourists were robbed by a taxi driver last week.
We all know that in town after midnight the meters in taxis are often just decoration, and we appreciate that it is difficult to enforce regulations. But it shouldn’t be difficult to enforce rules at Thailand’s international airports.
After this bad experience we were relieved to return to the kindness and hospitality of our hotel.
Roberto Cucchi
 

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