The “Dark” Side of Taxi Drivers

I believe that this is the longest on-going frustration for those who rely on taxis in Cyberjaya. Most of us are foreigners who don’t own a car, and have to rely on the abusive taxi drivers to fulfill our need for transportation. Over the months, the practice of most of these drivers had gone from bad to worse.

Let’s have a closer look at the taxi service in Cyberjaya. The worst is the problem of overcharging. Despite government regulation to use meter to charge customers, I have never seen a taxi using meter in Cyberjaya. When we try to ask, they say NO before we complete the question. The rates are unbelievably higher. A 2 minute ride from Cyberia Condominium to MMU costs RM5. The same is for Street Mall (which is less than a kilometer from Cyberia).

This is an incident that happened last week. One of my friend and I took a taxi. We went to Street Mall. We asked the driver to wait for sometime in there till we come back. We took like 3 minutes. Then we went to MayBank which is less than half a minute form there. We took like 6 minutes to withdraw cash from the ATM. Then we went to a coffee shop nearby which was within a kilometer. Guess what. The driver charged us RM25. We refused, but our bargaining power was combat by his broken English. What to do? There was no any other choice. Good for those unscrupulous drivers. An easy way to make their living, while we, customers, have to suffer.

Even though they charge such a higher price the quality of their service isn’t worth the price. The drivers are shabbily dressed and smelly. Few can speak English. The cars are ill-scented and ill maintained. Some of the taxis are with no air- condition while others are with no sound system. The attitudes of some drivers are intolerable. Some are so short tempered that even we are late for a few seconds they start to complain. But there are so many occasions that they were late and we missed the train.

However, this is not the status of all the taxi drivers. There are certain taxis that care about us. Some greet us with our name. Some taxis are properly maintained and punctual. But the good names of these few drivers are overshadowed by some bastards. .

How can this be controlled? Government should take necessary action against such people. Their license should be held or fined as it is practiced in Singapore.

However government is criticized for this mater for such a long time. We are supposed to make complains to http://www.mced.gov.my/, but right now even as I am writing this blog, the website cannot be accessed. So it’s us who have to suffer.