Now Big Joke declares war on taxis refusing tourists and not turning on the meter

[webfact]

Now Big Joke declares war on taxis refusing tourists and not turning on the meter

 

 

Thailand's top crime buster Maj-Gen Surachate Hakpal - is determined to stamp out taxi drivers ripping off tourists and refusing fares. 

 

So much so that the new immigration head is teaming up with the department of Land Transport (DLT) in a continuing get tough drive.

 

The Maj-Gen wants persistent offenders to lose their licenses.

 

He told News.mthai today that rogue drivers are damaging tourism in Thailand. 

 

Surachate who seemed to be more concerned with tuk-tuk drivers and illegal guides when he was the star man at the tourist police is now demanding more action from the RTP and the DLT.

 

He took over as immigration commissioner on Monday.

 

The Thai media reported that from September 2017 to August 2018 4,411 taxi drivers were caught refusing passengers without reason. And 3,277 didn't turn on the meter. 

 

In addition 14,247 were caught for a variety of other offences. 

 

But of this number only 489 had their licenses revoked. 

 

Surachate, or Big Joke as he is known in the Thai media, believes that everyone can fall victim to unscrupulous drivers but tourists are especially vulnerable. 

 

Somchai Ratchkaew, a DLT chief, said that the sequence of removing a driver's license was 3 months for the first offence, six for the second and a year after that.

 

Only when the fourth stage was reached were licenses taken away for good. 

 

Source: MThai news

 

-- © Copyright Thai Visa News 2018-10-04

[bluesofa]

29 minutes ago, webfact said:

Only when the fourth stage was reached were licenses taken away for good. 

Allowing them to drive without a licence, as they will then have nothing to lose.

 

[George Bowman]

32 minutes ago, webfact said:

Thailand's top crime buster Maj-Gen Surachate Hakpal - is determined to stamp out taxi drivers ripping off tourists and refusing fares. 

He can start with this taxi driver here who only wanted B600 to go from Don Muang to Ploenchit. I declined the offer...

 

 

[sjaak327]

Does big Joke know this does not happen to tourists alone ? In fact, the taxi drivers try it on with non tourists as well. In my personal experience, the number of times a inflated fee is asked is tiny, but the number of times these drivers simple refuse to go is on a sharp increase. Just four years ago, I hardly ever witnessed this myself. The last two years, it is a downright nightmare to get a taxi at certain times and in certain places. 

 

But this is just hot air, nothing will change. 

[blackhorse]

No mention of how they will police this.

[keith101]

Sorry but what has this got to do with the Immigration Commissioner as he no longer has his position with the Tourist Police , maybe he should have tackled it while he was still there .

[blackhorse]

Sorry but what has this got to do with the Immigration Commissioner as he no longer has his position with the Tourist Police , maybe he should have tackled it while he was still there .

He is doing what 99% of thais can't and its called multi tasking

[coulson]

13 minutes ago, keith101 said:

Sorry but what has this got to do with the Immigration Commissioner as he no longer has his position with the Tourist Police , maybe he should have tackled it while he was still there .

As their most popular show pony, it doesn't matter what his title is, he is deployed now to restore confidence in Chinese tourists. 

 

Suvanrnhabhumi is a joke. Bloody A4 paper printed signs all over the place now. Special lines for Chinese, no tips, no photos.....the whole place looks like a giant pinboard. 

[trainman34014]

Majority of Taxi's are rented by the Scum, so let the vehicle owners know that whenever a driver is caught not accepting lifts or refusing to turn on the meter the vehicle will be impounded until a huge fine of say...50,000 Baht is paid by the owner to get the Taxi released.   They will soon clamp down on the drivers and be a lot more picky about who they rent to !

[nausea]

3 minutes ago, trainman34014 said:

Majority of Taxi's are rented by the Scum, so let the vehicle owners know that whenever a driver is caught not accepting lifts or refusing to turn on the meter the vehicle will be impounded until a huge fine of say...50,000 Baht is paid by the owner to get the Taxi released.   They will soon clamp down on the drivers and be a lot more picky about who they rent to !

We live in different worlds. There's the tourist world and then there's the Thai world. It would take a pretty brave driver to turn off the meter where I live. I've found most Thai taxi drivers are pretty decent guys. I accept their prerogative to refuse a fair, it's part of the price you pay for a very cheap and efficient service, and you know there'll be another one along in a minute.

[Darcula]

2 hours ago, webfact said:

The Thai media reported that from September 2017 to August 2018 4,411 taxi drivers were caught refusing passengers without reason. And 3,277 didn't turn on the meter. 

 

In addition 14,247 were caught for a variety of other offences.

 

Those figures do not stack up against the good ones.

 

How about a big round of applause for the 1,342 taxi drivers who returned lost wallets (346 with at least 10 billion baht each), those 4,874 who helped delivered babies (532 with triplets or higher), and the 23,592 drivers who didn't masturbate while driving?

 

Chai-yo!

 

[jimmynewbie]

1 hour ago, blackhorse said:

1 hour ago, keith101 said:

Sorry but what has this got to do with the Immigration Commissioner as he no longer has his position with the Tourist Police , maybe he should have tackled it while he was still there .

He is doing what 99% of thais can't and its called multi tasking

Its called propaganda

[blackhorse]

Its called propaganda

That to. But the correct term is promotional work.

No good saying your going after the bad guys if you keep it a secret but many farang here are to s....d to get it

[usacb500biker]

Big Joke had lunch with the head of the tourst police  and now he"s building a Wining team, POlice next, Get on board..... Hows BKK helmet law going....

[sjaak327]

8 hours ago, nausea said:

We live in different worlds. There's the tourist world and then there's the Thai world. It would take a pretty brave driver to turn off the meter where I live. I've found most Thai taxi drivers are pretty decent guys. I accept their prerogative to refuse a fair, it's part of the price you pay for a very cheap and efficient service, and you know there'll be another one along in a minute.

I can assure you that in the Thai world, taxi drivers refusing rides is very common as well. And whilst you accept them refusing a ride, the law quite clearly states they  do not have this right. And I agree fully with this law, if you are going to waste fuel and damage the environment with fumes, you might as well drive people from A to B or otherwise find a different line of work. 

[The manic]

8 hours ago, trainman34014 said:

Majority of Taxi's are rented by the Scum, so let the vehicle owners know that whenever a driver is caught not accepting lifts or refusing to turn on the meter the vehicle will be impounded until a huge fine of say...50,000 Baht is paid by the owner to get the Taxi released.   They will soon clamp down on the drivers and be a lot more picky about who they rent to !

They are not scum, thats a horrible thing to call a human being and in Bangkok, especialy from the airport they are good but in Pattaya and Phuket they are.taking the piss and refuse to use a metre 100%. The Pattya baht bus is brilliant. One of the best public transport systems in the world.

[Thian]

13 hours ago, bluesofa said:

Allowing them to drive without a licence, as they will then have nothing to lose.

 

In the subs i got several taxi's who didn't look like the picture on the permit...they didn't cheat me though.

[Time Traveller]

I'm a little confused from all this schizophrenic media reporting. I just read the Joke is coming after foreigners, now he is declaring war on taxis that refuse to take foreigners? 

So are foreigners good, or the foreigners bad?  This guy is freeking messed up in the head. But the good news is he's making a lot of enemies. So sooner or later.....just saying

[pattayadgw]

Big Joke Big Note....... he forgets what hat he's wearing now.....lol

[Esso49]

38 minutes ago, Time Traveller said:

I'm a little confused from all this schizophrenic media reporting. I just read the Joke is coming after foreigners, now he is declaring war on taxis that refuse to take foreigners? 

So are foreigners good, or the foreigners bad?  This guy is freeking messed up in the head. But the good news is he's making a lot of enemies. So sooner or later.....just saying

Come along drink more coffee and follow his logic.   Big Joke is targeting both because what he wants are more taxi drivers picking up foreigners so they can be driven straight to immigration and deported.  Got it ? he kills two birds with one stone  ????

[TTSIssues]

Is this only in BKK? When will he sort out the Phuket meter taxis who NEVER turn them on, or the taxi “clubs” who charge some of the highest rip off prices in the world? 

[robblok]

15 hours ago, sjaak327 said:

Does big Joke know this does not happen to tourists alone ? In fact, the taxi drivers try it on with non tourists as well. In my personal experience, the number of times a inflated fee is asked is tiny, but the number of times these drivers simple refuse to go is on a sharp increase. Just four years ago, I hardly ever witnessed this myself. The last two years, it is a downright nightmare to get a taxi at certain times and in certain places. 

 

But this is just hot air, nothing will change. 

Sjaak, maybe you did not read the article well, but your question is answered there. 

 

Surachate, or Big Joke as he is known in the Thai media, believes that everyone can fall victim to unscrupulous drivers but tourists are especially vulnerable. 

[Borzandy]

14 hours ago, nausea said:

We live in different worlds. There's the tourist world and then there's the Thai world. It would take a pretty brave driver to turn off the meter where I live. I've found most Thai taxi drivers are pretty decent guys. I accept their prerogative to refuse a fair, it's part of the price you pay for a very cheap and efficient service, and you know there'll be another one along in a minute.

i think you assume your post it a big joke.

[Deli]

I definitely don't fancy him but he could earn a bonus point if he would clear Phuket of the taxi / tuk tuk cartel.

Won't happen, though

[Cadbury]

15 hours ago, keith101 said:

Sorry but what has this got to do with the Immigration Commissioner as he no longer has his position with the Tourist Police , maybe he should have tackled it while he was still there .

As you say, nothing to do with Immigration. He needs as many reasons as he can find to create another heavy duty vinyl banner with a life size image of himself on it. Never a day goes by now when he is not in the news for one reason or another. His rapid rise to fame and all this publicity; something is brewing!

[monkfish]

As you say, nothing to do with Immigration. He needs as many reasons as he can find to create another heavy duty vinyl banner with a life size image of himself on it. Never a day goes by now when he is not in the news for one reason or another. His rapid rise to fame and all this publicity; something is brewing!

Who in their right mind would create a banner with a picture of themselves on like that?

Sent from my ASUS_Z01BDB using Tapatalk

[Srikcir]

15 hours ago, blackhorse said:

15 hours ago, keith101 said:

Sorry but what has this got to do with the Immigration Commissioner as he no longer has his position with the Tourist Police , maybe he should have tackled it while he was still there .

He is doing what 99% of thais can't and its called multi tasking

No, it's called "going off the reservation."

He either doesn't yet understand his new position under a different ministry (Foreign Minister vs Interior Minister) or he's a publicity seeker. Or both.

He can't be effective as head of Immigration if he's spending his time within the authority of other Ministries.

[Hayduke]

17 hours ago, webfact said:

Now Big Joke declares war on taxis refusing tourists and not turning on the meter

How many times have we seen this sort of thing?

 

A simple cure-all proposal that is (theoretically) supposed to magically solve a complicated and vexing problem. Everyone applauds and wants to believe, but then…well...nothing happens.

 

It’s because the only thing important to the government is ‘show’. You put on a front, create photo ops, make speeches, exaggerate, lie and pretend you’re doing great things. But in reality you’re not doing much more than stuffing cash in your pockets.

 

Odds are that’s what we’re seeing once again.

 

Edited October 5, 2018 by Hayduke

[Ossy]

What can you say, apart from 'Big Joke - please give P1 big poke and run for PM' . . . a hell of a better proposition if you ask me. And, who knows . . . he may be totally corruptless, a new word that I found in my New Thainess Dictionary.

[Wallander4]

He need to change his name to "Big Fool"