To expect a taxi driver to speak English, understand English and no we're they're going ??

[BoppitChamp]

Not to spend an 20 minutes driving round in circles because he couldnt understand my directions, he didnt have a clue where he was going. Seriously.

He then (by pointing at the meter) tried to charge me extra for the privelige.

I told him where to stick it and knocked £1 off what I usually pay for my wasted time.

Apple, why on earth are you assuming it's poor education?

Sorry, I can see that this is done to death, but I can't resist! Ha, ha! "no we're" haaa!

Yup, still makes me chuckle!

My pissed typing usually ends up with letters missing, or in the wrong order. (I expect there are plenty of examples around...) Not wandering apostrophes invading innocent words!

Erm, cheers for assuming i'm 'uneducated'.... drunk yes, uneducated.... no. As in drunk I mean 'slightly swaying' I wasn't rolling around the floor bladdered.....

Obviously didn't occur to the people ripping the piss out of my botched up thread title that it's actually quite scary sat in the back of a car with a stranger who is refusing/unable to speak English or any language for that matter, Not to mention being driven miles out of my way alone ?

If I wanted to work in say France for example I would be expected to have a basic knowledge of the language, more so if it I was working with the public.

I'll walk home in future, couldnt go through that ordeal again, probably quicker tbh

Glad my fear gave so many of you such a good laugh anyways.

Obvious thread title aside, I can't see the racism here.

I did work as a taxi dispatcher once as a second job to see me through.

Our firm was ridiculed for having so many foreign drives, there was no racism it destroyed the business.

Why? Because they didn't have a bloody clue about the local area, where they were going, how to find a location or an address, a big local attraction they may get there, anywhere else forget it.

They had a crap grasp of English, would drive around and around in circles, charge for it or worse kick the cutsomer out miles from their destination as they couldn't find it and still try and charge them.

Try and get a taxi to a pick up point on time, forget it. I was always passing jobs to other firms so customers were not stranded.

For some reason the owner destroyed a very well run and busy business, he replaced all the European drivers, with drivers from the middle east who didn't have a clue. He firstly lost all the business contracts, blue chip companies, school runs, and the regular customers followed. People would deliberately avoid our taxis on the rank.

The council were forced to bring in basic knowledge and language tests after 2 years of complaints.

YANBU.

Maisie - no if she hadn't made grammar mistakes I wouldn't have called her a twat, obv. That was clearly the twattiest bit of all!

Daftpunk - you are correct. I don't care.

Sorry Bobbit, to be honest, I hadn't grasped that you were scared and alone (rather than just irritated).

I make the kind of mistake in the title myself, quite easily - if you're thinking ahead to the next word, which has an apostrophe, it's quite easy to write 'we're' instead of 'where' because you're already thinking 'they're'. Or it is to me.

The thread title was in no way racist. Badly written yes, racist, no.

Ah proudnglad, so all people with poor grammer, be they drunk or otherwise

a) aren't allowed to moan...

And b) are twats.

Nice one

Boppit, I'm sorry you were scared and I don't think you were being unreasonable or in any way racist. I did laugh, but you brightened an otherwise stressful night, so please forgive me. Perhaps next time you could establish they know where you mean before you get in?

(Is it just me who's got really paranoid about grammar and spelling now?)

Oooohhh, the head hurt, in a really hurty shouldnt have done that way.

Still managed to get up at 6 with the dcs though and we were running around the park at 10

Tbh it didnt even occur to me to check he knew where to go because I was pissed it's never happened before, the majority of non-English drivers have a good knowledge of the area or understand English well enough to be pointed in the right direction, I have never felt scared and unsure before.

Thinking on it soberly it's not really the guys fault, the taxi firm either shouldnt have taken him on or provided some sort of training, tho the poor sods probably being exploited by them

MrsYamada, every who has read this thread probably has grammer paranoia, mumsnetters up and down the country are quaking in their boots for fear of being called a twat if they get it wrong

Bobbit - arrrrgghhh, no not everyone with bad grammar's a twat. It's the amusing fact your English was so bad when complaining about English! That's v different.

Look, I'm sorry if I offended you. You did post twattily last night but I'm sure you are lovely and untwatty in RL!

I have a thing about grammar/spelling and also I didn't like your OP as I felt that some subsequent remarks would be dodgy/inflammatory.

x

But none of them were

None of them WAS.

v. amusing thread.

Something that I've noticed in plenty of cities is that most cab drivers seem to be Asian - and where I live the cab trade is entirely Muslim. Would be interested if anyone could explain how this happened? Am not objecting, just intrigued by how an entire industry locally and branches of it elsewhere in the country came to be dominated by one ethnic/religious group.

My (Muslim) driving instructor confirmed the ethnic/religious domination of the cab trade round here btw - although he's not part of that network as he's Bangladeshi and tells me the cabbies are all of Pakistani origin. (He prefers to be described as Bangladeshi, btw, it came up in conversation one day - he spends a lot of time in that country.)

(Oh, and given the thrust of the thread, should point out have never had any language problems with the local cabbies - they are all British Pakistanis.)

Edam, in the area I was in it was dominated by Afghanis after about 2 years.

It happened, and don't quote me on it, but I am sure the owner of our company got a financial incentive to get these job seekers into work and train them up.

Problem was it saved and made a load of money for the cab trade short term, as they were willing to work all the hours god sent for little money.

Then more, and more and more started to joing the ranks, as councils were giving out licences as confetti. IME, the Afghanis were willing to work dangerously high hours, to send money back home, they led simple lives over here with massive house shares, so low living costs.

You then had European drivers forced out of business, as they couldn't safely work the hours to compete or earn liveable wages for their families anymore. Thus the industry in our town literally became over saturated due to the influx, of unskilled migrants, driving down the income for those already in post, who had no choice to leave and find other work, or start up private hire companies.

I know that all sounds v Daily Mail, but it's a very true account of what happened in the town I worked.

Thus the trade over a space of 2 years became dominated by Afghanis.

An old neighbour of mine in the US started his own cab company that has since grown and prospered. He was a North African Muslim who wanted to start his own business, and found that he could grow the cab business gradually without resorting to borrowing money just by buying three or four older cabs to begin with and having them painted, then buying more cabs as the business grew.

The drivers he employed are overwhelmingly Muslim at this point, maybe because they recommend others who needed a job from time to time. I also know for a fact this is because his initial drivers (cabbies with local experience and knowledge that he hired with an ad in the paper) gave him no end of grief; he learned that there was a reason some people like to work alone, at night, without a boss hovering over their shoulder and without any 'output' to show for their hours of work, basically people who had a chip on their shoulders. With the word of mouth referrals for hiring, the personnel problems decreased and customer satisfaction increased.

interesting contrast between what happened in those two places. Thanks, something to think about.

I can't put grammar and spelling that poor down to anything else.

Well, you're remarkably ignorant then, because I have two degrees and would still be perfectly capable of writing an OP like that.

It's called wine. With or without dyslexia.

Or whine - depending how many glasses.