Taxi "Mafia"

[samuibruno]

if tourists who arrived on samui were assured that a metre would be used by the taxi services then taxis would be much much much busier

ive been dealing with tourists for many years and my advise to them is always

rent a scooter or car as its usually cheaper than 2 taxis rides anywhere on samui

or use song thaews and bargain hard as many of them charge over the top to tourists

use taxis only as a last resort

my advise will change only when the taxis change

and tend to agree with the parking problem they cause

i go thru chaweng often and have counted more than 70 parked up along the strip

thats 70 potential customers who will probably go elsewhere

[Absolut]

A cold call comparison would be if the local taxi call center had my mobile number and called me every 10 minutes to ask if I needed a taxi right now? I think the call center is smart enough to know, that not only would they not be able to sell anything that way, they would likely also annoy me to an extent that I would avoid using their service when I actually needed a taxi.

I am only pointing out what is being done and not whether it is being done in an effective manner. Beeping the horn costs nothing so if the driver gets one fare a month it works. The downside is that people may well be reluctant to take a taxi who is using such abrasive advertising but this concept is lost for the most part.

Taxi drivers and songtheaws both do it. I remember my first visit to Samui and how annoying I found it.

Subsequent visits I learned to just ignore it and go with the flow of it being a Samui thing.

Personally I can't imagine anyone flagging down transport because of a beeping horn.

[Neilly]

Something was going down today...there was over 50 taxis outside the Tesaban (just before Nathon) this afternoon

Maybe the NCPO have been reading this thread

[notmyself]

Something was going down today...there was over 50 taxis outside the Tesaban (just before Nathon) this afternoon

Maybe the NCPO have been reading this thread

Given what is happening everywhere else, it seems more and more unlikely that something will not happen on Samui.