Messed Up Taxi Fares
by
TAXI!
You climb in the back.
The driver says “where to?”
You tell him.
He hits the meter, and off you go.
It happens every day in Nashville, Tennessee.
Presumably it is that easy.
The driver drives and the meter indicates the fare.
You tip the driver based on a variety of factors, including the total on the meter.
That’s the way the chamber of commerce hopes it goes down.
But there is a seedier side to the cab industry.
A side where charges can materialize out of thin air.
To the uninitiated, to the inebriated, to the passenger not paying attention, cab fees can escalate quickly.
According to the cab driver bill of rights, excessive charges, indiscriminately applied, are illegal.
A check with the Metro Licensing commission confirms that cabs cannot charge passengers indiscriminately for stopping at an ATM or going through a drive thru.
According to city officials, if a passenger requests a stop at a McDonalds or a visit to the ATM, a cab driver can legitimately charge the passenger. Officials say, this amount is predetermined.
I’m told there is a button on the meter that calculates the rate at .30 cents a minute. This is the amount authorized by Metro Government. Officials say that the charge is only applicable if the passenger requests the stop.
But the allegation swirling around Music City is some cabbies are making money any way they can.
Ray Novak is a Nashville man who claims a cabbie tried to take advantage of him.
Novak says it happened one recent Saturday night. He and a female friend hailed the cab on Division, headed to Cannery Row”
“I left my female companion in the car. I was in the Tiger Mart getting cash from the ATM. I came out, and my companion was upset. The cab driver kind of wanted to charge an extra 3 bucks for us stopping at an ATM while the meter was running. So he and I got into a heated discussion. The meter was running. Then what alarmed me, he said ask all the Vandy kids. I charge them 5 dollars to go thru drive thru and 3 dollars to go to an ATM. That’s when I asked him to stop the cab and he wouldn’t let us out of the cab. He had an electronic cargo door. And when he did stop, he stopped on the bridge on Broadway. He wanted us to get out then. I asked him to call the police. He told me, he would call the police if I did not pay the 3 dollar charge. I knew it was highly illegal because I use cabs all the time.”
Novak says the 3 dollars is not the issue. He says that he has been riding cabs for years in Nashville and he knows this is unacceptable behavior. Novak says his is main concern is for Vanderbilt students and out of town tourists who are being taken advantage of.
In some respects cab drivers are like ambassadors to the city. They are often the first face you see when you exit the airport, and perhaps the last face you see before heading home. If you get a hefty fare and some mysterious add on charges, you might just go home to anywhere USA and tell your friends Nashville is a lot more than smiling faces and honky tonks.
With this in mind, I go to the cab company which Ray Novak complains to. I walk in and ask officials there about cab number 11. Even though there is no proof the driver acted inappropriately, I am told that the cabbie has been removed because the company has a zero tolerance policy for this type of behavior.
The manager says what happened is under investigation, and the cab driver is now driving for another company.
I call Brian McQuiston who heads up the transportation licensing commission office.
McQuiston confirms that the cab driver in question does in deed work at another cab company. McQuiston says they transferred his permit while the allegations are investigated.
McQuiston says there is a formalized investigative process that must be adhered to before this cab driver’s cab permit is pulled, should it turn out he was guilty of gouging Mr. Novak.
I ask McQuiston if this is a big problem in Nashville.
McQuiston tells me that “this has never come up till this complaint.”
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Really?
I go to Vanderbilt University and stop a young woman on the sidewalk on frat row.
Alden Conway is a senior majoring in economics and Spanish.
“Have you ever been in a cab and the driver tells you that it will cost you 3 or 4 or 5 bucks for a stop?”
“I think I have once,” she says. “They didn’t tell me what was up. They just added it on there. I didn’t know it was a rule I go to a cab line and find a man more than willing to talk.
Richard Platt works for Checkered Cab and has been driving for 15 years.
The native Californian tells me that most cabbies obey the rules. A handful of bad apples ruin it for everyone.
“Oh yeah. They rip and roar out here,” he says at the front of the cab line just off West End.
“Sometimes, if someone wants to go thru an ATM or McDonalds, I will turn the time on. Sometimes I won’t”
“But there is a mechanism for stopping right. It’s a function of the meter which is running, right?”
He shakes is head affirmatively, pointing to the meter on top of his dashboard.
“You are talking mostly night drivers,” he says. “Much goes on at night that does not go on during the day.”
“Can a cabbie charge me whatever he wants?”
“He can only charge you what the time says on the meter.”
“But you know it goes on?”
“Oh yes.
He tells me there are many ways that cabbies take advantage of unsuspecting passengers.
One trick is to charge a flat fee, not on the meter to passengers unfamiliar with the rules of the road.
He also tells me about taking the long way, which in one case cost a tourist more than 70 dollars to go from the airport to downtown Nashville, a trip that should not cost more than 25 bucks.
“They took them by Opryland on Briley to 440 and back here,” the cabbie says.
Wow, that is like half a days worth of driving to go a couple of miles.
Now imagine the negative story that person tells his or her friends back in their home town about Nashville Tennessee.
“It doesn’t send a good message at all,” the cabbie says.
“It is my integrity on the line. To treat my passengers nice and hopefully get them back, they will call me again when they need a ride.”
Here is more information on Metro Ordinances regulating tax cabs.
‘“I think I have once,” she says. “They didn’t tell me what was up. They just added it on there. I didn’t know it was a rule I go to a cab line and find a man more than willing to talk.’
Check your article before posting, please. I feel like a teacher checking the work of a 6th grader. It really ruins the flow for the reader when something isn’t grammatically correct.
Never happened to me, but what DOES happen every time is that I offer to smoke out the cabbie on the way home from the bars and he turns off the meter, lol.