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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Did I screw the taxi driver over?!

223 replies

DontBiteTheBoobThatFeedsYou · 19/07/2020 09:31

A taxi driver flipped out at me yesterday. Over £1.
And I'm feeling guilty and cross about it.

I took a taxi to the train station yesterday, called a particular company who are reliable and asked if they had a card machine or do I need to organise cash?

They said they have card machines so that's fine.

The guy who took me was lovely, but said he's lucky if he makes £20 a day now. He used to make £200-£300 a day.

2 hours later I call a taxi to take us home.
We get home, I ask how much and it's £12something.
I get my card out but he says the card machine isn't working. So I say I'll run upstairs and get some cash. I have £3 in my wallet and a £10 upstairs.
I went to say "don't worry about the change" and
he then says it was £14something.

I was like, whaaaaat? He charged me for the time him and I took the bags out the boot, and for the matter or minutes it took me to run upstairs and grab the £10.

I said no sorry, I was ready to pay with my card. I'm not being charged extra while I ran upstairs and got cash, it was his card machine that was broken after all.

He starts shouting fuck you! Fuck you! You screwed me over, over £1.

I was thinking is this really happening?! He's shouting at me as he's driving away.

Now I'm thinking about what that guy said about only making £20 a day.

I feel like one of us was an arsehole and I'm not sure how it is.

Are taxi drivers furloughed??? Are things so desperate he's shouting at customers over a quid? I'm worried he flipped out because life is shit and he has no bloody food for his kids or something?!

Am I over thinking this?!

OP posts:
Jeremyironsnothing · 19/07/2020 10:27

X post Grin

Hardbackwriter · 19/07/2020 10:27

I felt I was at the generous end because I wouldn't complain - I'm amazed by the people suggesting that OP takes the extra £1 into the taxi office!

853690525d · 19/07/2020 10:31

I work in this industry. If it was priced on the meter then yes he can charge for waiting for you to get the money.

I don't think you've understood. He wasn't waiting for her to get the money. He could have been paid on the spot if his card machine (which certainly should have been working in the current conditions) was working. So he wasn't doing someone a favour by waiting.

pennysea · 19/07/2020 10:33

He's shouting at me as he's driving away.

They always act like big brave shouty men while they are driving away.

Swearing at a customer is unacceptable under any circumstances. It would be worth reporting him. If he's happy to behave like that to you during the day over £1, who knows what he does at other times.

LouHotel · 19/07/2020 10:35

Sometimes good people fall on hard times

Sometimes bad people fall on hard times.

Hard times doesn't give you a right to act like an asshole and if you had paid the extra fair I would say that he's taking advantage of you and potentially other people who are struggling for money - and OAP would have likely paid it.

Complain.

CarterBeatsTheDevil · 19/07/2020 10:37

I've had stuff like this happen before. I'd phone the cab company and explain that the driver didn't tell you his card machine was broken until you got to the house, told you it was £12something then upped that when you came back with what he had asked for and then was abusive to you. There's nothing reasonable about his behaviour. He should have told you at the start of the journey so that you could stop to get cash on the way or ask for another driver.

CarterBeatsTheDevil · 19/07/2020 10:38

They always act like big brave shouty men while they are driving away.

It's a special bonus for being a woman who wants a taxi. I hate men who behave like this. I bet a bloke wouldn't have got that performance.

LadyFlumpalot · 19/07/2020 10:38

@Hardbackwriter

I felt I was at the generous end because I wouldn't complain - I'm amazed by the people suggesting that OP takes the extra £1 into the taxi office!
I only mentioned it because the OP appears to be worrying about it and worrying about being blacklisted. I'm an anxious soul so for the price of a quid I'd take the easy way to stop the anxiety.

Also, by taking the extra quid in the OP has the chance to explain what happened to the office - important if the taxi driver is actually going to get her banned. It'll be hard to make a banning stick if the customer has gone to the effort to pay back the pound she short changed the driver by....

Pesimistic · 19/07/2020 10:39

He was being u, you werent to know you getting the cash would inflate the cost again it was his card reader that wasnt working. Dont think any more of it.

Polly111 · 19/07/2020 10:40

YANBU he was lucky you had any cash at all that you could go get, he would have lost out even more if you’d turned him away and sent for another taxi with a working card machine.

I definitely wouldn’t be going into the office to pay the extra £1, but I would be complaining about how he spoke to you, it’s not on at all. If he was that bothered about the £1 he could have told you to phone the office and pay over the phone.

PuppyMonkey · 19/07/2020 10:44

The fact his card machine was broken is not your fault at all and tbh if that had been me, I probably wouldn’t have had any cash on me or in the house! So what would he have done then?

By rights he should have mentioned before you began the journey that the card machine was broken, so you could have the opportunity to get in another cab.

I get that it must be a difficult time for taxi drivers but that doesn’t give him an excuse to be rude and unreasonable and unprofessional.

lobster12 · 19/07/2020 10:46

I think I would complain. The taxi company won’t want their drivers swearing at people.

You would like to think. I once ordered take away, I had no idea the restaurant ordered a taxi to deliver my food. For some reason the man took it out on me and verbally abused me (shouting, swearing at me, got in my face) I was actually really scared. My husband phoned up the taxi company and they couldn't care less. It's a major taxi company in my city and they have a reputation of aggressive drivers. I was shocked when reading some reviews.

Most taxi drivers I have had elsewhere have been so nice.

Yanbu OP purely because it's not your fault. Hopefully you won't get blacklisted.

alifeintheday · 19/07/2020 10:48

I would complain to be honest. You did nothing wrong and he reacted aggressively like that... who does he think he is?? We're all under pressure at the moment.

Standrewsschool · 19/07/2020 10:53

You did nothing wrong. He quoted £12, so You shouldn’t need to pay anymore. His attitude was a disgrace, and you should alert the taxi company about it. If anything, he tried to screw you over by charging you more.

Winter2020 · 19/07/2020 10:56

DontBiteTheBoobThatFeedsYou

"He also said that the company wouldn't come to my address again which is bloody annoying because that was a reliable company that I've used for years but for the first time since living here."

I would phone up and say "I'd just like to check that my address won't be blacklisted - because when the card machine wasn't working (and when the fare continued to increase) I was £1 short." Of course the firm wouldn't black list you if the driver told the truth but I think he will say you didn't pay at all - and because you paid in cash there is no proof that you did. He can then keep all of the money (and get revenge on you for in his eyes not giving him what he felt owed) . He might be hard up but if he keeps behaving like that the taxi firm will have no repeat customers. Ask for a note on your file not to send that driver please.

MidnightCitrus · 19/07/2020 10:58

@arethereanyleftatall

He was definitely wrong in this snap shot to shout at you. You hadn't done anything wrong personally. But, assuming he's a nice guy normally, this is indicative of the financial stress many many people are under right now. No, op, many self employed people have been given no financial help throughout this. Neither myself (new business, no books prior to April 2019), nor my se Exh (over £50k) were entitled to anything. We've gone through £30k of savings.
How have you gone through 30k of savings?
WeBuiltThisBuffetOnSausageRoll · 19/07/2020 10:58

I work in this industry. If it was priced on the meter then yes he can charge for waiting for you to get the money. If he helps you load/upload shopping he can also charge for that, say you have 4 bags and the meter is set at 10p a bag there's an extra 40p, The meters are set according to local authorities.

Can your house be blacklisted? To an extent yes, we have customers that are banned for not paying etc but it would be unusual for the sake of £1. When these customers ring it pops up on their number that they are banned.

Charging for extra services that you ask for like getting bags out is one thing, but I don't see how he can charge for waiting to get the money when OP had that money right there, in what she had been advised was a valid form of payment. If I called out a plumber who charged by the hour and he turned up having forgotten his tool bag, or if he'd broken an essential tool whilst doing the job before mine, I wouldn't accept him charging me for the time it took him to go back and fetch the bag or to go to buy a replacement.

Incidentally, does that mean that disabled people who might need more time and help getting in and out and with their bags routinely have to pay more for a taxi than an able-bodied person (who might have been easily able to get the bus, anyway), by order of the local authority? Not saying the driver isn't entitled to do so, but I'd feel terrible if I ran a business and charged less able folk more, essentially because they're disabled or elderly etc.

When you say it would be unusual to blacklist a customer for the sake of £1, surely there's a big difference in a customer refusing to pay it and the driver being unable to take the agreed payment as offered. If it were me, I'd 'blacklist' the driver and, next time I called the company, ask for any car except number 31, who was abusive to me last time.

Of course, we can't know, but I too am a bit suspicious about his card machine being 'broken'. Sometimes getting a signal isn't straightforward and you might need to turn them off and on again to reset them if they glitch, but do they really 'break' as often as people say they do?

As has been said, cash doesn't incur a bank charge and, if desired, could be taken 'off the books'. Nothing to stop them putting up a little sign in the car saying "Cash preferred if possible, please" but accepting all agreed forms of payment graciously.

It's pure conjecture, but I wonder if he was hoping that, when he told you it had to be cash, you would ask to stop off at a cash point (all the while on the clock, naturally), withdraw £20 and then, on being told it was approaching £15 anyway and feeling bad for keeping him waiting (even though you were paying him to wait), would just give him the £20 note and tell him to keep the change. Just maybe, although it was a £12 fare, he had mentally rounded that up to £20 and then, when he 'lost' £7, that's what made him angry, albeit knowing that he never had a right to that money in the first place.

Mummyoflittledragon · 19/07/2020 11:00

I would speak to the company about the blacklisting comment if nothing else.

MarioPuzo · 19/07/2020 11:02

Yes definitely complain. He was shouting and swearing at you! You will need to call the company anyway to see if you've been blacklisted.

@lobster12

You would like to think. I once ordered take away, I had no idea the restaurant ordered a taxi to deliver my food. For some reason the man took it out on me and verbally abused me (shouting, swearing at me, got in my face) I was actually really scared. My husband phoned up the taxi company and they couldn't care less. It's a major taxi company in my city and they have a reputation of aggressive drivers. I was shocked when reading some reviews.

This is terrible Shock If you have a problem like that again you can report the driver to the local authority department who issue taxi licences. I had to do that once before when a taxi driver drove like a maniac (including stopping on a motorway slip road to reset his sat nav!) The local authority took it very seriously.

theendoftheworldasweknowit · 19/07/2020 11:02

He was in the wrong.

If his card machine was really broken, he should have said as much at the start of the journey, so you could have declined the cab or made a stop via an ATM. I don't know anyone who has cash on them right now.

Really cheeky to keep the meter running whilst you tried to find a solution to his problem. If the card machine had been working, but you had no cash or card on you, and you had had to run inside to get payment, then yes, I agree it would have been OK to not stop the clock. That wasn't what happened though - this was his problem to fix, not yours.

I'd call the company. He may well try to get you blacklisted, but his behaviour was bang out of order (shouting, overcharging) and they should know that. You say you use this company a lot, and you seemed surprised by this journey, so it must not be in line with the service the company usually provides. Worth feeding back.

diddl · 19/07/2020 11:03

Of course you should contact the company.

He told you the price then changed it.

He swore at you & you are the one who will be blacklisted?

Utterly disgusting!

That's not a company I would want to use with the chance that I might encounter him.

Bluntness100 · 19/07/2020 11:04

He was out of line but I’d suspect he’s got it tough right now so phoning to complain is just shitty and making his life worse. So I’m glad you’re not taking that suggestion.

I’d assume he was desperate op

Puzzledandpissedoff · 19/07/2020 11:05

My husband is self employed but still got money from the government

That may be because he declared his full income so could prove he was entitled to it ... the chances of taxi drivers doing the same are about nil, hence the age-old story about the tech being broken so they can get cash instead

And that's why there's no way they'll ever accept a fully cashless service - try that and the drivers will probably all walk out

FartingNora · 19/07/2020 11:09

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

WhattheHhashappened · 19/07/2020 11:11

You’ve done nothing wrong.

Maybe the card machine was faulty but that’s not your fault. You were told how much it cost and went to get the money.

I’m always amazed at (not really, I know what they’re doing) how many London black cabs have card machines and clocks ‘out of action’ ...